An example comes to mind. Suppose someone gives me a film clip a car going through its paces at a proving ground and asks me to learn everything I can about the handling dynamics of the car from the film. By making precise measurements I can estimate spring and damping rates, and even make estimates of the mass of the car and engine horsepower. If I know something about the characteristics of the predecessor of this vehicle, I can determine whether certain handling problems have been solved, and even make intelligent guesses about how they've been solved. That's what I can do scientifically.
Scientific explanations aim to determine what methods the designer used.