Talk:The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

What made the book radical was its view that there is no such thing as scientific progress, and that science is actually an irrational process that jumps from paradigm to paradigm without really getting any closer to the truth. The view is popular among relativists who like to deny that there is any absolute truth.

Really? That's not how I read the book. Martin 23:53, 22 Nov 2003 (UTC) Me neither - and Kuhn considered himself a rationalist so that statement is wrong...? 18:25, 05 Mar 2007

moved

Text below was shifted from Talk:Thomas Samuel Kuhn when the book review text was shifted here - David Gerard 22:13, Jan 19, 2004 (UTC)

Burke Nothing to Do with Kuhn

According to Fastfission, James Burke (science historian) has nothing to do with Thomas Kuhn. Would you not at least consider The Day the Universe Changed a parallel (if later and leity-oriented) work? Also, fundamental tenets for both Kuhn and Burke are to raise awareness that science is not and has never been a straight-forward path of continuous progress. Perhaps, as this is an article about a particular work, the "See also" should refer to TDtUC specifically?

One is a BBC documentary by a "historian" whose main body of work is about how one invention naturally leads to another (I'm not familiar with this particular Burke work and the current text of that article doesn't encourage me to think it is related), the other is a major philosophical text about how scientific change works with a major introduction which specifies that it's never a case of how one invention naturally leads to another. I don't see the connection, to be honest, no. There are plenty of other more relevant historians and philosophers than James Burke, BBC historian fellow, that one could link to, even though I do find Connections entertaining (though a bad model of the history of science and technology, one Kuhn would have thoroughly disagreed with if he ever gave it any thought). --Fastfission 12:38, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

old NPOV

I dispute the neutrality of this last addition:

Kuhn is very often interpreted by post modern and post structuralist thinkers as having undermined the enterprise of science by showing that scientific knowledge is dependent on the culture of groups of scientists rather than on adherence to a specific, definable method. In this regard he is considered a precursor to the more critical thinking of Paul Feyerabend. Kuhn’s work can also be interpreted as blurring the demarcation between scientific and non-scientific enterprises by undermining naïve scientific method. Kuhn’s innovation was to focus on the social aspects of science. However, science is intended as a description of the world, and scientists continually and self-consciously refer back to the experimental evidence. Interpretations of Kuhn that ignore this aspect of science, implicit in the examples that saturate Kuhn’s writings, do not do it justice, and cannot begin to elucidate the power of scientific knowledge to allow us to manipulate the world.

What are "naïve scientific method"?, from where comes these statements of "intentions" within science? The "experimental evidence" part looks like a statement that wants to say "science is empiricism", the last sentence is just blatantly unneutral, arguing text. Will edit if the author doesn't want to do it. Nixdorf 23:03, 26 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Thank you for responding to my contribution, Nixdorf. You are, of course, quite correct.

I’ve replaced ‘naïve’ with the less accurate, but perhaps less controversial, ‘idealised’ scientific method, meaning it in roughly the way as it is used in the simplistic description in scientific method.

I’ve also had a go at re-writing the end of the paragraph to make a bit more explicit the debate to which I was referring, and removed any attempt at a conclusion. The end result is no were near as interesting, and no doubt could be improved, so please, feel free to edit it as you please. I’m interested to see what your take is on this on-going debate. As I commented below, much better to have the debate out in the open than pretend it doesn’t exist. Banno 09:32, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Splendid rewrite. I am more than pleased, and remove the dispute mark. Nixdorf 00:28, 28 Nov 2003 (UTC)

death

Wasn't it one of Kuhn's conclusions that the most important factor in the final acceptance of the paradigm shift came when everyone died who had believed the old paradigm? Long time since I read it. Ortolan88

• Kuhn may have adopted this conclusion, but it was first expressed in these terms before he published. I vaguely recall that the original quotation was due to Max Plank. Interestingly, the paradigm shift from the early, semi-classical quantum theory of Plank and Bohr to the modern quantum theory of Heisenberg, Born and Schrodinger was one of the most peaceable (ie least Kuhnian) in recent scientific history.Alan Peakall 09:50 Oct 23, 2002 (UTC)

• You may find this reference useful: "Planck, Max (1949) Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers . Philosophical Library: New York, USA." -- Planck writes "[a] new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it." (pp33-34). --Matti 14:06, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

• Actually Feyerabend criticized Kuhn for this: Kuhn's theory does not rule out killing the representatives of the status quo. (Feyerabend, Paul (1970) Consolations for the Specialist. In Lakatos and Musgrave (eds.): "Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge": pp.197-230) Also Popper and his followers criticized Kuhn's theory for being a politically primitive social formation that combined the qualities of the Mafia, a royal dynasty, and a religious order.--Matti 14:06, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I just removed the Planck quote. It's well-known and cute but I don't think it reveals much about Kuhn. Certainly SSR would not rule out the possibility (indeed, the likelihood) that the vast majority of scientists will switch to the new paradigm before dying--scientists switch when they see the new paradigm allows normal problem-solving to progress once again. The possible existence of a few holdouts isn't really a key part of the story and quoting Planck gives it undue weight. Gruntler (talk) 04:55, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

criticism - or lack thereof

This entry fails to mention that Kuhn's work is heavilly criticised. Where are the summaries of the many disagreements with his position? Although his book is widely read and referenced, that doesn't mean that most people agree with most of his claims. RK 02:30, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Indeed, where are the "many disagreements with his position"? I couldn't find any such disagreements in any major encyclopedia or scientific reference book that discusses Kuhn's work. Would you care to point out some noteworthy scholars who express disagreement with Kuhn's position, preferably some that have been published in peer-reviewed journals? -- NetEsq 03:55, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Off the top of my head, Dudley Shapere's in Philosophical Review in 1964 (73: 383-385). I should imagine that a few seconds of searching on the internet will find many more. --Coroebus 08:52, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

see also

C.R. Kordig, The Justification of Scientific Change, 1971, Reidel publishing company. ibid. the Compatibility of Scientific Theories, "Philosophy of Science",n. 38. ibid. The Theory Ladenness of Observation, "Review of Metaphysics", n. 24.

Harty Field, Theory Change and the Indeterminacy of Reference, "Journal of Philosophy", n. 70.

I could go on.....--Lacatosias 18:36, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

So now these should be written up as a section of the article.... Banno 19:39, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

True. I was just testing the waters to see if this was acceptable or not. I'm still pretty new around here. I have also been too busy. I'll try to get to it as soon as I can and then everyone can pile on and rip it apart as they wish obviously. (;. It's an interesting process.--Lacatosias 09:19, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

I have added a section which discusses only two of the authors who have developed some interesting criticisms of Kuhnian ideas over the years. The point is not, of course, to denigrate Kuhn. I hope this is understood first of all. I am neither pro-Khunian nor anti-Kuhnian. I just think that it important to put as much information out there as possible. This makes for a better, "more philsophical" entry, IMHO. I have left out a number of other criticims which I have come across in various places, however, becasue some (many) of them are rather complex and require space to develop. I don't want the critism section to end up longer than the article!! Let me know if anyone thinks I should add e.g. Shapere's views,for example.--Lacatosias 11:25, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

scientific method

It is perhaps dangerous to defend science using the sort of naïve methodology presently described in scientific method. That methodology is, at the least, dubious. Better to point out that science is grounded in a shared, and powerful, understanding that allows us to manipulate the world in ways that no other enterprise can. The debate between post modernists and empiricists (for want of better terms) is ongoing, and it is not appropriate to pretend here that it is finished. Better to simply refer the reader to the relevant articles. Banno 00:07, 25 Nov 2003 (UTC)

length

I simply comment: the whole entry is much too long: If there is discussion still going on (what I doubt), it is not the job of an encyclopedia to resolve these issues. It is ok with me to include as many references as you want (they will be outdated soon), but I have severe objection to put a reference for the author´s own book anywhere here. Somehow by common sense, this could not be NPOV. User: Zuckowski

I see nothing wrong with the article length. (Though the length is probably my fault - most of it is stuff which was under Thomas Samuel Kuhn and I shifted here because it was specifically about the book, not its author.) It is a very important work. The book's own article still seems to me the best place to present its thesis.

One thing the article really could do with is a section ==Criticisms of the book== . Presenting the book's argument then presenting criticisms may be an entirely fair and workable way of writing an article on this book. - David Gerard 12:51, Jan 27, 2004 (UTC)

Length: no problem at all. It is an excellent entry as it stands right now. David's suggestion: yes, but a massive task to write such a section fairly, and one probably doomed to failure in this environment. Tannin 12:57, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Don´t take me wrong: I don´t have a problem with ANY length of an article ( I ma a very quick reader). I stepped onto this article just by "random pages" (I like this button) and I was just thinking: "What an average reader may think about Kuhn if (s)/he will step over THIS page. They may not be familiar with any science, they may not be familiar what an encyclopedia was/should be. The only hope I have that they are at least able to read and someday be able to express my first impression: I have expected "something different" than the present entry. There is nothing wrong in the article, by no means. But it is NOT encylopedic (don´t worry, I will not fight..it´s your article)

(BTW: is there a shortcut to include user and timestamp?)

Not really 'my' article :-) But what sort of thing were you thinking of? What I brought in was a bit unstructured; the article could still do with lots of work. The way to include username/date is ~~~~ - see Wikipedia:How to edit a page for all the odd stuff you can do. - David Gerard 15:46, Jan 27, 2004 (UTC)

What a nice article on a difficult subject

I'm relatively new to Wikipedia and I spend some time looking through different articles, mostly in despair at how poor they treat their subject and how poorly the group of people working on the subject work together. This article stands in complete opposition to those feelings. All of you that worked together on this did a really nice job. This subject could have easily lead to all sorts of disputes but I think this turned out nicely - it's balanced, it's fair, and it's accurate. At least to me it is. Again, kudos to all of you

Progress of science according to Kuhn

Cleon Teunissen 14:33, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC) It seems to me that according to Thomas Kuhn it is so self-evident that science progresses, that it didn't occur to him to mention it. Later, in comments to critics of his theories, Kuhn emphasized that one cannot possibly doubt the reality of scientific progress.

In his book, Thomas Kuhn refers to the type of particle accelarator called cyclotron. The trajectories of the particles in that machine are calculated with the formulas of Special Relativity dynamics. There is no point in using newtonian dynamics if you want to engineer a cyclotron; the cyclotron would have zero yield. There can be no doubt that Special and General Relativity dynamics are closer to the true properties of Nature than newtonian dynamics is.

I think the theories of Thomas Kuhn on the progress of Physics (really, SSR is about the history of Physics only) are valid up until the second half of the 20th century. At the dawn of the 20th century, the theory of Relativity was introduced

The theory of Relativity didn't quite replace newtonian dynamics, the two have coexisted ever since. In school education, newtonian concepts are taught first, because in the vast majority of engineering calculations newtonian dynamics is used. Also, learning the concepts of newtonian dynamics provides good training for the highly abstract, highly counter-intuitive relativistic concepts that are to be learned later. Newtonian dynamics is just to good to discard, to good to skip.

The coexistence of newtonian and relativity dynamics has facillitated a profound shift, I think. For the last decades, theoretical physicists have been working hard on explorations to find the successor to General Relativity and Quantum Physics. When Relativity and Quantum Physics appeared on the stage, it was a surprise, and resistance to change had to be overcome. Nowadays the entire physics community is eagerly awaiting the uncovering of the successor, the theory that will do to Relativity what Relativity did to newtonian dynamics. Cleon Teunissen 14:33, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That's a very unorthodox reading of what Kuhn was trying to say (he certainly didn't mean for it to apply to Physics only, he certainly didn't limit it until the 20th century, he certainly didn't say that SR and GR were closer to the "true properties of nature" than Newtonian dynamics). The entry should try to present what it was Kuhn meant originally, and then how it was received and criticized by others (historians, philosophers, scientists, etc.), not what each of our interpretations of its implications are. --Fastfission 23:05, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well, from my point of view, Thomas Kuhn is widely misunderstood. The usual interpretation of Kuhn is, to my mind, wrong. Yes, Kuhn didn't explicitly say SR and GR are closer to the true properties of nature; he didn't have to, like you don't need to say the Earth orbits the Sun.

So the problem is that it's very hard, perhaps impossible, to reach concensus on what Thomas Kuhn originally meant. Cleon Teunissen 09:04, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[...]fastfission made a point. Thomas Kuhn was widely misunderstood, partly because of the way he presented his views. With the benefit of hindsight, I can "correct" what to me seem omissions, but that would not be true to Thomas Kuhn. In a sense, I feel the article should be vulnerable to being misunderstood the way SSR is.--Cleon Teunissen 20:03, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Just take care to reference what you say to the postscript of the 3rd edition, and not to present your own material. Banno 20:49, Jan 16, 2005 (UTC)

The important consideration here is not that Kuhn recognized the progress of science, though it seems many people have debated this point. The truly important aspect of SSR is Kuhn's notion that scientific progress is non-linear -- that despite the claims of various scientific communities to continue a scientific tradition or theory, there is a pronounced disconnect/cleavage between the praxis of previous communities and those that follow them. This relates to the titular notion of 'Revolution' within science and I think it an important distinction to make in this debate about 'scientific progress' within SSR. --User: BasilSeal 16 May 2007

Others have already noted that Kuhn's view is basically true for physics and related sciences from the start of the scientific revolution to 1900ish, and not much else. Try the Kuhn chapter in What makes biology unique for a source. For one of the most drastic counter-examples, see History of evolutionary thought - arguably the most profound change of how we understand ourselves, but it did not gain acceptance by anything even remotely like a Kuhnian revolution.) Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 16:20, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Whig philosophy of science?

"In this regard, Kuhn is considered a precursor to the more radical thinking of Paul Feyerabend."

It seems odd to take this sort of progressive view of philosophy when we're talking about Kuhn. Kuhn and Feyerabend informed one another's work. --Coroebus 09:02, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Well, that's certainly an interesting objection. The point of the line, I believe, is just to say that Kuhn "set the stage" for even more radical critiques (since Feyerabend's main radical work didn't come out for over a decade after Structure), and at same time distance Kuhn a bit from Feyerabend. It isn't progressive in any real sense -- I'm not saying Feyerabend is a necessary linear outgrowth of Kuhn, nor that Kuhn necessarily lead to Feyerabend, nor the Feyerabend is more correct/sophisticated/what have you; I'm just saying that on a (heavily abridged) scale of "philosophies about the truth status of science", the general progression is Popper (science fairly true), Kuhn (science not necessarily true), and Feyerabend (science not true). Does that clear it up? If you have a suggestion towards making the same point but not falling into a whiggish rut I'd appreciate it. --Fastfission 16:25, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

What sense of 'true' is meant here? The most demanding incarnation of truth is exhaustive truth, eternal truth. It has been recognized (in parallel to Kuhn's philosophical work) that it is unrealistic to expect that such a thing as exhaustive truth has any meaning at all. It seems to me that to strive for exhaustive truth is like looking for the proverbial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. What can be attained is progress, improvement. The new theories are improvements as compared to their predecessors.

I think Stephen Hawking made a very valid point in describing the shift from a concept of truth to a concept of operational effectiveness:

I don't demand that a theory correspond to reality because I do not know what it is. Reality is not a quality you can test with litmus paper. All I am concerned with is that the theory should predict the results of measurements. Quantum theory does this very successfully. -Stephen Hawking

--Cleon Teunissen | Talk 21:26, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I simply meant, "is a model in strict accordance with some sort of objective reality." --Fastfission 23:42, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Feyerabend claimed priority over Kuhn with regard to incommensurability, amongst other things. The sentence is dubious at best, and should be removed. Banno 21:41, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)

Hmm, that's interesting, I wasn't aware of that (I read Against Method a few years ago now). I suppose in the end all I think should be said is that "This work has been seen as a precursor to later more radical critiques" -- which is not to say that radical critiques did not exist before the work (after all, Kuhn drew heavily on Fleck) or that the work was actually a precursor, but that it has been portrayed as a first "salvo" against the notion of scientific objectivity (i.e. the Science wars). I think whether it actually was or not is very very questionable (both on whether it was a salvo against scientific objectivity -- which I'm not sure it was at all -- and both whether it was really as influential and original as it has been portrayed). --Fastfission 23:42, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The source is Science in a free society, pp. 66-67, especially footnote 114. F. claims that the idea of a paradigm in Kuhn derives from Wittgenstein, and that he had talked about them in his thesis and elsewhere. To quote: "Inthe years following my 1958 paper(which precedes Kuhn's Structures...) I tried to specif the conditions under which two theories 'in the same domain' would be deductively disjointed"(p.67, parenthetic comment in original). It would be interesting to put his claim to the test! Banno 10:43, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)

Criticisms

Aside from the problematic section title, I'm not sure this section really does what it ought to. It seems to focus exclusively on a limited number of very specific criticisms of SSR, and goes into a lot of detail on one which is not really to my knowledge considered one of the major criticisms. Are they considered major criticisms? I imagine it depends on the discipline; I don't know how the philosophers criticize Kuhn so much as I do the historians.

The major ones I have seen from historians are: 1. one doesn't really see what Kuhn says ought to be there in the historical record most of the time, 2. Kuhn is trying to create a trans-historical, trans-disciplinary model of science and that doesn't work very well, 3. incommensurability is often not truly so, and Kuhn overstates other aspects of it, 4. by focusing purely on a conceptual models Kuhn negates all sorts of other important things, such as instruments and institutions and things of this nature. --Fastfission 15:57, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

If you had read my earlier posts above Fastfission, with all due respect, you would know that my point here was fundamentally simply to get something up there in answer to the (sort of) challenge that someone else posted: to find if there were ANY criticisms of Kuhn AT All. I posted (only) some of the criticisms that I, personally, am aware of from philosophers. But to answer you criticisms directly:
1)most of the criticisms that I know of focus on the incommensurablity thesis. Hence I naturally focused on those.
2) H. Field's criticism is a bit complex and detailed if you actually read it. I tried to whittle it down, but it still ended up taking up some space. Hence, in order not to make the criticism sections longer than the whole artcile, I decided to add only one more.
3) Toulmin's criticism is completely different and overlaps with many of the critcisms which you descibe as coming from historians.
4) If you don't like the title, please change it!!

I'm just trying to share what I know or have learned so as to positively contribute to the Wikipedia, folks.

So by all means, edit it, add to it, shorten it, and above all, let's discuss the thing. --Lacatosias 16:42, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, since you seem to be suggesting that these critisicms are not sufficient, I've added Fodor's criticism of the theory-ladeness of perception based on the modularity of the mind. Does that help to "do the job" or not? If not, I can obviously add accusations of relativism and irrationalism, even though I donìt agree with them. I'm completely new to this sort of project and am trying to find out where to go with this. But I need input. --Lacatosias 17:41, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

It occurred to me -- the problem here is that these are all criticisms from philosophers, which is why they are so unfamiliar to me (and possibly why they look so irrelevant to me -- I'm not a philosopher). I'll try and write up a "criticism" from historians section, based on my understanding of the case (overly "conceptual" model of history leads to ignoring of social circumstances, role of instruments, over-emphasis on experimental results, etc.). I also think it might be worth noting how scientists have generally interpretted it -- there are two basic camps among those who think it is accurate, from what I understand: one which sees the book as a justification for arguing that current paradigms are arbitrary, and another which sees the book as giving a prescriptive model for how scientific fields mature. --Fastfission 23:21, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

By all means. I haven't seen much written about Kuhn from the perspective of historians either pro or contra. So this would be a welcome addition, I think.--Lacatosias 08:04, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

In his 1958 work, The Uses of Argument, Steven Toulmin argued that a more realistic picture of science than that presented in SSR would admit the fact that...

It is impossible for Toulmin to have criticized SSR in this way; SSR was published in 1962, whereas Toulmin's comments were published in 1958. Kuhn not only hadn't published SSR, but he hadn't even written it. (He finished it after returning from CASBS in 1959.) In fact, I find the whole "criticisms" section lacking. -JTBurman (talk) 20:05, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I'll go ahead and remove that section, since no one else seems to be doing so. It struck me as odd too. Drosboro (talk) 23:25, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Okay, never mind. A quick search on Toulmin's page revealed that he actually made his criticisms in his 1972 book "Human Understanding". I've updated the page to reflect this. Drosboro (talk) 23:28, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

WMC's removal

Why did User:William M. Connolley remove this? J. D. Redding 15:42, 5 March 2006 (UTC) (OS... a citation needed tag is called for ... but again WMC removes things he doesn't think is right.)

With the new conjecture about the nature of motion, it suddenly made some sense to have the Earth turning on its axis, rather than the Cosmos rotating around the Earth. Before, philosophers had argued: if the Earth would be turning, then this would result in a constant tremendous wind from the east. Suppose something is pushing the Earth, to sustain the turning: you can't push the air; everything on the surface of the Earth would constantly be pushed through the slower moving masses of air.

I removed it for the reason given in the edit comment: that I don't think its in Kuhn. If you can find chapter and verse, then return it William M. Connolley 16:12, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

(Edit conflicted)

I agree with J.D. Redding here: I don't think this is in Kuhn is not sufficient justification for deleting the passage. A citation needed tag would have been more appropiate in the light of the policy of assume good faith. --Lacatosias 16:14, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it's in Kuhn either, personally. I haven't read Structure for some time but I re-read Copernican Revolution a few months ago and never saw anything about a massive wind. It is certainly not in the style of Kuhn's historical examples. --Fastfission 22:55, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, either way, the citation IS needed. I was being a bit over-punctilious perhaps. --Lacatosias 08:02, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I looked up every instance of Copernicus in SSR listed in the index and saw nothing about any wind at all. I think in this case we can assume that it is not in SSR unless someone gives any evidence otherwise? --Fastfission 02:19, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Lakatos & Musgrave - Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge

I just added a brief paragraph to the Criticisms of Kuhn and SSR section about this important early criticism of SSR. It needs to be elaborated upon.

I'm also a bit uncertain about whether some of the criticisms of SSR are sufficiently influential to merit the extensive discussion they have in that section. I had never heard of the critiques by C. R. Kordig and Hartry Field until I saw them in this article.

Perhaps something should be done to improve the balance of this section. --SteveMcCluskey 17:11, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

This article is way too long

All the major points get lost. A short succinct article would have much more impact. Mattisse(talk) 14:53, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Does anyone have suggestions for cutting? For starters, I would shorten the section Criticisms of Kuhn and SSR by summarizing each critic's views in a single short paragraph. --SteveMcCluskey 14:12, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that is a good idea because that section is just one long paragraph. It would be nice to try and group some of the critics into groups based on what they are attacking either incommensurability or the rationality of choosing a new paradigm etc. 18:35 05 Mar 2007 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dom Wiki (talk • contribs) 18:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC).

One problem is that various editors tend to find a particular criticism of Kuhn attractive, and decide to give it an extensive treatment (sometimes in other related articles as well). An example of what I mean are the recent edits of Yarlini advancing the recently published multicultural history of science by the physicist and philosopher Arun Bala. Bala's book may have something to say -- it's one of a number of recent multicultural studies of science written by scientists that have appeared lately -- but I don't think it deserves the attention Yarlini is giving it. --SteveMcCluskey 12:54, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Three Phases

This page could do with some clarification about what the three seperate phases are. Only the first phase is in bold, the 'pre scientific phase', the second phase and third phase are not defined well in that section. 18:26, 05 Mar 2007

Ain't there actually five phases? Pre-paradigmic, normal science, crisis, revolutionary science and conclusion of science revolution. At least this is what I recognized from the book's contents. 本 Mihajlo ^{_[ talk _]} 18:08, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

"Radical Environmentalists"

"authority of science, such as creationists and radical environmentalists"

Do radical environmentalist generally seek to undermine the authority of science? It's very different to object to the direction science-led technology is taking and worry about its potential impacts than to reject the scientific method or claim that positions arrived at by other means (e.g. religious faith) are just as legitimate.FrFintonStack 00:23, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't want to go to far into this. But, at least over here in Italy and with respect to many but not all radical greens, the answer to your first question is ABSOLUTELY, CERTAINLY, CONSTANTLY and WITH GREAT DELIBERATION and PASSION. After all, thats' why they are called RADICAL GREENS and proudly associate themselves with the Communists, post-modernists, Catholic fundamentalosts and other anti-science types to keep research spending on science the lowest in all the industrialized states. Anyone who wants to work in any aspèect of science in Italy has to immigate to the US or UK: it's an enmormous brain drain. Nothing is invented, all serious projects are halted before even getting of the ground. Come on folks, don't shit yourselves about this. The truly radical Greens want to halt all technological and scientific progress, beleving in the inherent goodness of nature (neo-Stoicism or neo-romanticism). But nature is horror and blind indifference, of course. --Francesco Franco 11:20, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

The question this article should address is not whether "radical environmentalists" and other factions criticize science, but

• the extent to which they have used Kuhn's arguments from SSR in their critiques, and
• the extent to which such critiques accurately reflect the content of SSR.

--SteveMcCluskey 14:35, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Sure, but obviously that wasn't the question being asked above. (;--Francesco Franco 08:12, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Nonstandard Terminology

Were the passages about Galileo written by someone for whom English is not their first language? Yes, his name is often referenced as Galileo Galilei, but he isn't ever called Galilei.

And the standard way to shorten the name of a book, when the reviewer has access to the technology of italics, is the selection of the noun in the title that is sort of a genre and italicizing it. Here that would be Structure. Yes, abbreviations are used in comparisons of a writer's œuvre, but there's only one work studied here. "SSR" reminds me of either the brand name of a toy car or a subdivision of Communist Russia. 64.69.127.105 (talk) 18:35, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

The Uses of Argument

Moving here a section removed from the article. A 1958 book cannot criticize a book not published until 1962.

In his 1958 work, The Uses of Argument, Steven Toulmin argued that a more realistic picture of science than that presented in SSR would admit the fact that revisions in science take place much more frequently, and are much less dramatic than can be explained by the model of revolution/normal science. In Toulmin's view, such revisions occur quite often during periods of what Kuhn would call "normal science." In order for Kuhn to explain such revisions in terms of the non-paradigmatic puzzle solutions of normal science, he would need to delineate what is perhaps an implausibly sharp distinction between paradigmatic and non-paradigmatic science. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Drono (talk • contribs) 15:09, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Eurocentrism?

This section of the article (probably receiving undue weight) currently does not make clear how the charge of Eurocentrism is related to criticism of Kuhn's thesis. Srnec (talk) 15:44, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

incommensurability is not the same as incomparability

I kindly ask the author of the article to remove this common misinterpretation of Kuhn's views (for Kuhn's own clarification of this issue see the collection of his later works in "The Road Since Structure"). There is a big difference between untranslatability and incomparability. RenuRenu (talk) 16:01, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Ernst Mayr

Mayr's scathing critique of Kuhn should be in there: he showed that Kuhn's "revolutions" simply do not exist except in a very limited field of science. For example, there was no similar process in any significant paradigm change in biology. So Kuhn is right in physics, but approximately nowhere else. Kuhnian revolutions are by and large insignificant in number, compared to other ways of scientific progress (e.g. gradualist or fitful).

All the philosophical bickering seems so empty when confronted with cold hard empirical data... Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 01:05, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

See e.g. interview here:

Kuhn's description of how scientific revolutions happen does not apply to any biological revolution. To be very frank, I cannot understand how this book could have been such a success. The general thesis was not new, and when he did assert specific claims he was almost always wrong!

This appears to be an assertion, perhaps some quotes with facts would be helpful. AshforkAZ (talk) 22:49, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

problem-solving progress

A while ago I deleted the following paragraph from the section "Kuhn's opinion on scientific progress." It's been deleted and restored a few times now.

However, Kuhn never demonstrated any such problem-solving progress was exemplified by any particular historical paradigm-shift, not even any of those many cases of scientific revolutions he analysed in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions or in any other work. Nor has anybody else ever demonstrated scientific revolutions make such quantitative problem-solving progress as depicted by Kuhn.

First of all, the current placement of the text is bad. Before I deleted it, it (or rather, similar text) was part of the first paragraph of that section. It now looks like it's dealing with the second paragraph, where it doesn't parse properly.

I don't see how it's a correct statement, either. He had numerous examples of how old paradigms broke down because it was difficult to do more problem-solving with them, and how new paradigms allowed normal science to resume. To pick one example, Ptolemaic astronomy had got bogged down in increasingly complex epicycles until it became unworkable, and was replaced by Copernican astronomy which allowed further progress. In general, new theories "win" because they're better for puzzle-solving than the old theories are; I thought this came through clearly in SSR.

Gruntler (talk) 07:24, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Removed as unsourced WP:OR again. Vsmith (talk) 14:51, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

organizing criticisms

The criticism section is a big undifferentiated mass, very hard to read. Should it perhaps be organized into subsections by category? Perhaps the less-important criticisms should be eliminated or at least shortened? I haven't read most of the works in question so I'm leery of doing it myself.Gruntler (talk) 05:32, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Condensing them to a shorter summary would be good. Because we need both shortening and expansion. At present, the criticisms are largely those by other philosophers, and they are essentially criticisms of Kuhn's analysis or epistemology if you will. However, as mentioned here and there on this Talk page, there are criticisms from other scientists also, and these are rather methodological criticisms; most of them seem to boil down to accusing Kuhn of a massive exercise of cherry picking, that his conclusions hold true for one small segment and time period in science and fail for almost everything other than the physical sciences between the eras of Kopernikus and Newton. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 16:44, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I went ahead and divided it into subsections. I'd like to shorten it but I don't know which are the less-notable criticisms. Certainly "criticism" is receiving undue weight compared to "influence," which is the more-important section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gruntler (talk • contribs) 05:38, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Kordig

Kordig suggests that with this approach, he is not reintroducing the distinction between observations and theory in which the former is assigned a privileged and neutral status, but that it is possible to affirm more simply the fact that, even if no sharp distinction exists between theory and observations, this does not imply that there are no comprehensible differences at the two extremes of this polarity.

I would suggest rewording this. I had to read it several times, and I'm still not sure what it means (comprehensible differences?). 68.239.116.212 (talk) 11:18, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

unreliable source: zero physical evidence

The source for the invalid assertion that Creationists are out to undermine the authority of science is a very short book advertisement on the NCSE web page for Kitcher's "Abusing Science" -- http://ncse.com/store/creationism-critiqued -- stating that "Kitcher is good at showing how creationists ... misuse such books as Thomas Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions." However, the following paragraph is the only place where Kitcher talks about Kuhn and creationists:

"The third source of the idea that the scientific establishment is close-minded is a philosophical picture of the nature of science. Thomas Kuhn’s book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions has probably been more widely read—and more widely misinterpreted—than any other book in the recent philosophy of science. The broad circulation of his views has generated a popular caricature of Kuhn’s position. According to this popular caricature, scientists working in a field belong to a club. All club member are required to agree on main points of doctrine. Indeed, the price of admission is several years of graduate education, during which the chief dogmas are inculcated. The views of outsiders are ignored. Now I want to emphasize that this is a hopeless caricature, both of the practice of scientists and of Kuhn’s analysis of the practice. Nevertheless, the caricature has become commonly accepted as a faithful representation, thereby lending support to the Creationists’ claims that their views are arrogantly disregarded." [1]

However, Kitcher does not provide any sources for his assertions. He doesn't quote any creationists to show that this is their position. In other words, this is the very thing he accuses creationists of doing--creating a caricature--a strawman argument.

This is hardly a reliable source. It has zero evidence to support its claims. GCgeologist (talk) 14:35, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Are you saying the NCSE is not a reliable source, or Discover magazine is not a reliable source? KillerChihuahua^?!?Advice 22:54, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm somewhat puzzled by your note. What I did was check out Kitcher's book and found a single paragraph where he talks about Kuhn and the Creationists. In that paragraph he does not provide any sources or references to support his position. If that paragraph were put on WP it would be quickly noted with {[fact]} or perhaps even deleted for not having any sources. Without sources it is impossible to know if what he's said is valid or imaginary. For that reason, I noted that he is an unreliable source.

As for the NCSE, you tell me. They promote that one sourceless paragraph as "Kitcher is good at showing how creationists ... misuse such books". Is that statement justified?

As for the review of Kuhns book, it doesn't support the sentence in the article. Unless, you can supply a quote from it that does, it does not deserve to be used. GCgeologist (talk) 03:36, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I believe that I've shown that, in this case, Kitcher is an unreliable source and that the NCSE is not justified in referencing it. And so neither are valid sources for the statement in the article. Unless you can show that these are reliable sources, I'm going to remove the references. GCgeologist (talk) 20:46, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

prove the other false nor itself true

Here are quotes from the Incommensurability section that support the statement that was just deleted:

"the new paradigm cannot be proven or disproven by the rules of the old paradigm, and vice versa."

"Though each may hope to convert the other to his way of seeing science and its problems, neither may hope to prove his case. The competition between paradigms is not the sort of battle that can be resolved by proof." AshforkAZ (talk) 04:24, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Could you please cite pages for your quotations, I do not find them in Kuhn's writings. Secondly, since Kuhn is discussing the role of paradigms within scientific traditions, I don't see how these alleged opinions of his could apply to the tensions between creationism and paleontology, since creationism is not a scientific tradition. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 20:22, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

In his discussion of Progress through Revolutions Kuhn makes the resolution of the dispute not one between rival scientific camps, but as one resolved by the scientific community. He notes that "When it repudiates a past paradigm, a scientific community simultaneously renounces, as a fit subject for professional scrutiny, most of the books and articles in which that paradigm had been embodied." and later "The scientific community is a supremely efficient instrument for maximizing the number and precision of the problem solved through paradigm change." (SSR, 2nd ed., pp. 167, 169). In Kuhn's framework, creationism would (at the most generous) be seen as a rival paradigm that has been rejected by the scientific community. It may not be "proven false" but it has been rejected as not being science. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 20:36, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Science cannot be done but within a philosophical worldview, of which there are two -- naturalism or creationism. And switching from one to the other involves a incommensurate paradigm change. Neither one can prove the itself true to the other. The abandonment of creationism in the 19th century had nothing to do with proofs and science, and everything to do with, for the most part unknowingly, adopting a new paradigm, which was Lyell's (and others) agenda to get rid of Moses. What Kuhn has done is show that changes in paradigms, whether that be simply scientific hypothesis or majorly philosophical worldview, is not done by proofs of one over the other, but by which paradigm can explain the evidence better. AshforkAZ (talk) 20:04, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, the paradigm of science has been naturalistic since the time of Plato and Aristotle. Of course, medieval philosophers would sometimes (but rarely) interpret their naturalistic findings in theological terms, or interpret biblical texts in naturalistic terms (see the many hexaemeral writings on the six days of creation which provide naturalistic accounts of those events). But the notion that naturalism and creation (without the -ism) are at odds is completely at odds with what we know of the history and philosophy of science and the history of religion while the notion that creationism can be considered a scientific paradigm totally misreads Kuhn. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 21:24, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)While I think that there are other arguments that might support your position, there are some subtle category errors going on here. Darwinists reject creationism because they believe its wrong. If creationism is opposed to darwinism, then neither are science.--Heyitspeter (talk) 21:26, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Creationism is a paradigm

Here are two links to videos that show creationists experimenting: [2] [3]. I think many of us would agree that these experiments are, by our lights, "stupid", just as were Aristotle's arguments for the Earth's being stationary (though note that Aristotle performed only thought experiments). But creationists, and Aristotle, certainly are doing science. That's a part of the aim of Kuhn's "Copernican Revolution" and "the SSR": to show that our oldfashioned conceptions of what is and isn't science are both natural and myopic. It's difficult for us to see that creationists are doing science because we hold so few of their background assumptions. Without these assumptions their experiments are quite literally worthless, just as ours are to them.--Heyitspeter (talk) 21:39, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

No creation scientist would consider those to be experiments in the scientific sense of the term. At best they might be ill-conceived illustrations by obvious non-scientists. And just to clarify a point, creation scientists observe that there are two questions about nature; How did nature get here? (origins) and How does nature function? They hold that science is only valid for studying how nature functions. Science cannot be applied to the question of origins because creation by God is outside the realm of science by definition. Creationists typically have no problem with "ordinary" science dealing with chemistry, physics, biology, and engineering and technology, etc. But they believe that any theory of origins that disregards creation by God is useless--such as typical cosmology, prehistoric geology, prehistoric anthropology, evolutionary biology, etc. The question of which worldview or paradigm to choose go deeper than just science. AshforkAZ (talk) 22:49, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

The men pictured in those videos are creation scientists.--Heyitspeter (talk) 01:02, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

In the peanut butter video: Peanut butter promoter Chuck Missler is not a scientist. He was an electronic engineer, not a scientist and now has a ministry.

In the banana video: Ray Comfort is a minister having no scientific credentials. Kirk Cameron is an actor.

If you want to read scientific research by real creation scientists with degrees in the fields they work in, start with the on-line creationary scientific journal at [4]. Read and criticize these. AshforkAZ (talk) 02:59, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Aristotle never got a PhD either, but Kuhn argues that he defines the scientific paradigm known as the 'Aristotelian paradigm'. Your definition of 'scientist' is not Kuhn's. When Kuhn discusses scientists, he means to encompass creation 'scientists' like those pictured in those two videos. That is the thesis of a large part of his body of work.--Heyitspeter (talk) 04:31, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

This discussion is trending increasingly in the direction of OR: rival interpretations of what Kuhn really meant in his primary source (SSR). That is the reason that wikipedia places the responsibility of providing reliable sources (preferably secondary sources) to document any claims in an article. On those grounds, the controversial claims of what SSR means about paradigms (and whether Creationism qualifies as a scientific paradigm) should be removed from the article. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 12:35, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Removed the following as WP:OR:

As Kuhn states above, if incommensurability is correct then neither paradigm can prove the other false nor itself true.

Who said that in relation to the creationism bit? Other than a WP editor? Vsmith (talk) 13:18, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

NPOV problems at the start

The opening of this article "Its publication was a landmark event in the sociology of scientific knowledge," does not conform to NPOV standards in my view. A more neutral and accurate statement would be "Its publication was a landmark event in the sociology of scientific knowledge and it triggered an enormous and ongoing assessment and reaction in the philosophy community worldwide." The problem with the statement as it stands is that it reads as if it is an attempt to decide the controversial philosophic import of Structure by relegating it to "non-philosophy". Although there is a school of philosophic thought that wants to do this, that wants to minimize the philosophic importance of this work, it is not NPOV to take sides here with that school. The mere fact that Karl Popper held one of the most famous philosophy conferences in history to discuss this work and the resultant collected papers have been through 21 printings, as is noted here, is testimony to the fact that this work participated heavily in the philosophic discussion of the latter half of the 20th century and is a work of philosophic import, even if the realist school of philosophy would like to minimize it. It is not NPOV to take sides in this still hot dispute, rather the text should acknowledge the impact and controversy. Jbutler18 (talk) 14:48, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

How about something that indicates the breadth of Structure's impact: "Its publication was a landmark event in the history, philosophy, and sociology of scientific knowledge and it triggered an ongoing worldwide assessment and reaction in — and beyond — those scholarly communities." --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 22:13, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

I think your suggested edit is better than my first draft and solves this problem. Do you mind making the change? I am almost a complete Wikipedia novice and would slightly prefer that someone more engaged with it do so. Jbutler18 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 16:31, 19 November 2010 (UTC).

Draft of New Introduction

Since a new Introduction has been requested, I have drafted this as a proposed new paragraph two. I know something about this subject but am very new to Wikipedia.

In Structure, Kuhn challenged the prevailing view of progress in science. Scientific progress had been seen primarily as a continuous increase in a set of accepted facts and theories. Structure argued for an episodic model in which, periods of such conceptual continuity, called “Normal Science” were interrupted by periods of Revolutionary Science. During Revolutionary Science a change in deep concepts resulted in a new set of defining problems for the science, the temporary sacrifice of some explanatory power of the old concepts, and, most radically, a process of adoption that, instead of being a rational weighing of the set of solved vs. unsolved problems, was a mix of gestalt shift, practitioner succession, and enthusiasm for new problems. For example, Kuhn’s analysis of the Copernican Revolution emphasizes that, in its beginning, it did not offer more accurate predictions of celestial events, such as planetary positions, than the Ptolemaic system, but instead appealed to some practitioners based on a vague promise of better, simpler, solutions that might be developed at some point in the future. Kuhn’s called the core concepts of an ascendant revolution, its “paradigms” and thereby launched this word into widespread analogical use in the second half of the 20th century. Kuhn’s insistence that paradigm shift was a mélange of sociology, enthusiasm and scientific promise, but not a logically determinate procedure, caused an uproar in reaction to his work. For some commentators it introduced a realistic humanism into the core of science while for others the nobility of science was tarnished by Kuhn's introduction of an irrational element into the heart of its greatest achievements. Jbutler18 (talk) 20:00, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Jbutler, this is a really solid redo on the intro. Well done! I agree with it and offer three thoughts. 1) We should have the concept of 'anomaly' in this intro... 2nd only to 'paradigm' as a key concept. 2) For the sentence introducing revolutionary science, perhaps we can just combine his ideas into a functional definition for a first time reader. Recommend: "During revolutions in science the discovery of anomalies leads to a whole new paradigm that changes the rules of the game (pg 40, 41, 52, 175), the map directing research (109, 111), asks new questions of old data (139, 159) and moves beyond the puzzle solving of normal science (37, 144)." 3) On the sentence, 'caused an uproar', it may do the work justice to note "which Kuhn addressed in the 1969 postscript to the second edition" (pg 174). --pjm (talk) 03:15, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Jbutler, SteveM, all else--I have a very minor revision recommendation for sentence three in the intro. We use the phrase "a continuous increase" where Kuhn may have used "development-by-accumulation." I think the word accumulation is important to characterize the prevailing view of scientific progress--one discovery layered onto another. He uses this phrase four times on page 2. Again, a very minor adjustment. I'll wait a while for thoughts. --pjm (talk) 14:21, 19 February 2011 (UTC)