June 3: Philosophy of Science 2
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To do for next class - 1) Read pp. 362-387. 2) Can you think of any scientific revolutions that have happened in the last 30 years? Why are they revolutions? 3) Can you think of examples where science has seemed like politics? |
To do for next class - 1) Read pp. 388-405. 2) Are you a materialist? Do you think we are free-willed? 3) What do you think really exists? |
Thomas Kuhn
Kuhn was trained as a physicist. He was also very interested in the history of science. In fact his analysis of the history of science lead to his theory of how science works. There had been few before him to be as interested in how science really works. He begins his discussion (in The structure of scientific revolutions) by noting how misleading the picture that most textbooks present of the progression of science really is. When we read a text, it is as if everything were a big long chain leading up to the current state of science. However, each theory had its rival. There were great schisms in the scientific community as to which was really right. Science is not really a story of getting closer and closer to the truth as time goes on, it is a story of battles won and lost by theories with great periods of application and slight refinement of currently accepted theories. Whether we are getting closer to the truth is another question. In fact, that is exactly the sort of questions Kuhn raised: Are we progressing to the truth? Does science even give us the truth about what nature really is?
Scientific revolution
Before we can understand revolutions, we must understand the preceding context - which Kuhn calls 'normal science'. What is normal science? (Application of well entrenched theory - the stuff of textbooks.) What is a paradigm and how does it compare to normal science? (a paradigm is the well entrenched theory. Note Kuhn has been attacked on his loose use of this term, with one commentator noting many (12?) different usages by Kuhn of the same word; similar to research program). Can you think of some examples of a paradigm? (Newtonian physics; geocentric solar system; theory of evolution; quantum mechanics). He notes that students must be trained in a paradigm in order to be accepted to work with others in that paradigm - doesn't sound much like unbiased rational pursuit of objective knowledge, does it?
Normal science is conceived of as solving a puzzle by Kuhn. (He uses many analogies to puzzle solving and game playing). In order to solve puzzles, we literally try to impose a picture on the pieces we have. This is just like using a theory to put the data together. These paradigms inform much of what we do - this effect has been well demonstrated by psychologists (e.g. color of a card inferred from the suit). However, if we look at the data long enough, we are bound to find some which is not predicted or explained by the theory. If these examples accumulate for long enough, some one will try to explain them - ie posit a new theory. This is the cause of revolution.
Kuhn picks the word revolution for a good reason. Political revolutions are sudden, radical, or complete changes... a fundamental change in political organization (from Websters). The same is true for changes in science. Paradigms are stagnant during successful normal science. But these rules of the game often produce anomaly in fact and theory. These anomalies eventually send the paradigm into crisis. In crisis, claims Kuhn, new theories arise and are compared to the old ones. If they are better able to handle the anomaly, they may be accepted (though some will never change their minds). Notice how unlike foundationalism this is. Comparison is not to the natural world, it is to other theories (and the world). Though Wolff casts Kuhn as someone who seems to deny scientific progress and method, it is not clear that this is so (Wolff notes that Kuhn rejected the criticism that he saw science as irrational). However there are those who do - Feyerabend (Anything goes).
This revolution, or paradigm shift, is the central insight of Kuhn's book. It's consequences are rather astounding. It seems to mean that those in one paradigm cannot 'talk' to those in another - since their terms refer to different things (though the terms may be the same). There is no 'super paradigm' that theoretical disagreements can take place under. If this denial is true, then as Wolff points out, perhaps scientific facts themselves are redefined, and there is an incommensurability between theories. How can we possible tell if one is better than the other? Theories are just 'right' insofar as they have the most adherents. Science is just politics, Wolff concludes.
Problems with the text
Did you note any bad argumentation? Look at p. 358-359 from last days reading.
Wolff's bit on 'theory neutrality' on the bottom of p. 358 to 359 is more relevant here than where he put it. Why do you think it came earlier? (his bias).
Also, on the top of 359 he 'disproves' progress in nonscientific areas by saying "are we in the United States confident that today's politicians are superior to Abraham Lincoln..." he is confusing scientists with science/ politicians with politics/ Religious leaders with religion/ composers with music, etc. etc. This is no proof.
Read the last para of that section... This is exactly what bad philosophy is. Making conclusions irrelevant to your previous discussion. The arguments are confusing scientists with their product. This is unfair. Even a lack of theory neutrality does not prove his point (Kitcher). He says "it may turn out that science is rather more like religion, art or politics than we thought" - this challenges the non-normativity of science. Is it conceivably as normative as these other disciplines (at least all but art & some, but little, politics)? What about matters of degree? Couldn't science be a social institution done by fallible people and still be different than other social institutions?
Science and society
What are the implications of the fact that science is a social institution? Wolff's opinion is obvious, but he seems to be missing large arguments against what he is saying. First, his position.
A social institution is one in which there are social roles (such as head of a lab, or researcher, journal editor, etc). These roles help define a power structure (not everyone has an equal say in what is scientific). This institution is supported by associations, official congresses, and university departments - these give out recognition as 'scientist' or not (e.g. Ph.D.s). Furthermore, there are standards of behavior in any social institution - which are enforced by the power structure.
What do you think of his analogy to a search party? What does this show? (That one scientist shouldn't get all the glory; there is luck involved) Does the existence of an element of luck mean we can learn "nothing" from her example about future searches? (Sure, but this is where the example is just an analogy. There are some search methods that are better than others. So the sci method does have some relevance even though there is luck involved as Wolff notes). The results of this discussion are that we must evaluate science as a whole. That luck has a role. That we can't learn anything from the success or failure of a search. Does it say anything about the contents of science? (nope).
What about scientific content (i.e. facts)? Bacon thought these were objective (ala realism). Some recent work in philosophy of science challenges this claim (anti-realism). Now Wolff's description of science (p. 375) make it sound like the number of citations confirm or not the existence of something as fact. Maybe the make something accepted scientific fact, but does it make it fact simpliciter?
Wolff says "There is no other test save acceptance by the scientific community, as signaled by citation, replication, and eventual incorporation into the canon of well-known "facts"". Well, one of these may be more important than the other (if by replication he means more than just copying the words). What other tests does science claim for itself? Furthermore, the role of replication of results is ignored by Wolff, though it obviously plays an extremely important role in determining if a claim is factual (just look at the cold fusion example). Of course, it can be non-obvious if a fact is indeed replicated - many experiments are quite complicated - but in general, time will tell. Science is not simply a passing around of something on paper that is randomly accepted or not. There is an element of this, but the description is too one-sided to be accurate (says me!).
The last statement of Wolff's important to reinterpret: "the social dimension of science as an established institution interacts with laboratory observation and experiment to determine what is, and what is not, a scientific fact" (italics added). The interaction is everything! Neither determines fact - one side of that interaction is, perhaps, what sets science apart.
Cold fusion
What does Wolff think are the important aspects of the cold fusion debate? Clearly it's not what I pointed out yesterday. He notes that F&P were 'lowly' chemists. And that they were from a state university... he goes so far as to say: "If some scientists at Princeton or Harvard or Caltech or MIT had announced cold fusion, the reaction of the scientific community would have been very different indeed." Really? What does he mean? Would we have cold fusion tea makers now if MIT scientists had made the announcement? In fact F&P backstabbed Jones, though this isn't mentioned in the articles... the claim is rather that Jones' results supported F&P. However, Jones' claims were more guarded and Jones has retracted them since. Of course, it is true that the university hired a slew of lawyers to patent everything they could think of. It is true that the press played a major role (perhaps if it didn't things wouldn't have seemed so 'wild'). It is also true that a lot of money rides on such announcements. F&P are well set (though not in the US) for research for the next 10 years (or they were, things may have changed recently). What about the huge monetary investment of physicists? That could indeed cloud their judgment. But they do have some reason for their skepticism.
Obviously it is difficult to sort out the people from the science. But is it impossible? What about the role of time? It has been said that old theories die with old scientists. What does it mean if the theories don't die? Do all of these 'personal' or human interests ruin science?
1) Read pp. 388-405. 2) Are you a materialist? Do you think we are free-willed? 3) What do you think really exists?