The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962)
Modern Library Top 100 Non-Fiction Books of the 20th Century
THESIS: Scientific disciplines, once they have emerged
from the pre-paradigmatic stage, undergo
periods of "normal science" which allow them to
obtain a high degree of precision and progress
rapidly. Normal science is dependent on the adoption
of a universally accepted paradigm which
defines research problems for the scientist, tells
him/her what to expect, and provides the methods
that s/he will use in solving them. However, in
the course of research, scientists inevitably stumble
upon anomalies which the paradigm is unable to explain.
If the paradigm repeatedly fails to explain
the anomaly, a crisis ensues and alternative theories
develop. Eventually a competing theory proves
relatively successful in explaining the anomaly
and it replaces the old paradigm. This replacement is
Kuhn's "scientific revolution." Initially, the scientific
community resists the replacement, but with
time the success of the new paradigm gains enough
support to win out. According to Kuhn, the
adoption of a new paradigm necessarily establishes
the creation of new research problems,
methods, and expected results. The scientists within
the discipline thus sees the world in a different
way than it "was" under the old paradigm. Once the
old paradigm is replaced and the revolution has
ended, normal science reemerges only to await the
discovery of new anomalies.
-SYNOPSIS:
Prof. John Dowell at Bowling Green
There, that was certainly easier than going through the exercise of coming up with my own version of Kuhn's argument. Just a quick perusal of the resources on the Internet indicates that there are two general bases of attack on Kuhn. First, there is a semantic attack because he is somewhat lackadaisical in his use of the term paradigm. Some nitwit has actually counted 21 different definitions for it in this one book. Big whoop! I think it is, or should be, generally accepted that we know what he means; a paradigm is basically the accepted wisdom of a society as it pertains to one area of knowledge--it is the prevailing explanation for something.
Second, many scientists attack him on the basis that his theory is too cynical, implying as it does that scientific theories are simply temporarily useful utilities for explaining things. And since, on some level, we are always awaiting the next paradigm shift, this theory undermines our confidence in their work. This, it strikes me, is precisely what makes Kuhn's theory so valuable. Like Karl Popper he has laid down a challenge to science. In the heady days of the Enlightenment, The Age of Reason and the Industrial Revolution, it was argued that it was possible that all of existence would yield to human reason and science would explain everything to us. Personally, I feel that this is true and we will eventually reach such a stage. But what Popper and Kuhn combined to do was to remind how far we are from such a point and to demonstrate the importance of doubting the current models of thought. Some scientists would like us to believe that they are discovering abstract truth; this is simply not the case. Science provides us with the best current explanation for things, not with truth.
Now Kuhn and Popper are also challenged in regards to whether history has actually followed their theories. Have scientific revolutions really followed the incremental paths that Kuhn describes? I don't honestly know the answer to that question. But it seems to me that his idea of a paradigm shift, taken metaphorically, does fit with our intuition about how a society's view of big issues evolves. Take Welfare Reform as an example. For 50 years the received wisdom of the elites was that government spending would alleviate poverty and provide the necessary stopgap to tide people over so that they could get jobs. Government agencies and liberal colleges spent millions of dollars on studies to show that this system was working. Even as research and observation steadily ate away at that notion and conservative critics began to question the system, the establishment clung tenaciously to the outmoded model. As competing theories were tried in states like Wisconsin and met with success, the public simply lost faith in the assurances of the bureaucracy and President Clinton was forced to adopt the conservative's competition model or be left on the dust heap of history. The paradigm had shifted and the revolution occurred.
It may be that Kuhn's thesis, like any of the paradigmatic systems of
the past, will be disproved or has so many anomalies that it too will be
discarded. But it certainly seems that, for now, it is a useful
way of understanding how revolutions in our understanding of the world
around us come about.
(Reviewed:)
Grade: (A)
