HND Social Science
Social Research and the Practice of Science
Introduction
Thomas Kuhn’s (1970) work was a historical study of scientific progression. Kuhn argued that science does not progress according to the criteria of falsifying theories, as Popper would maintain. On the contrary, evidence, which does not support theories, is regarded as only a temporary problem to which future research is directed. In this way theories are not falsified but become the subject of continuous research. It is this that calls ‘normal science’:
‘normal science’ means research firmly based upon or more past scientific achievements, achievements that that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its further practice.
(Kuhn, quoted in B. Barnes 1991:87)
Given that any deviant data serve as the basis for future research, the theory is never falsifies because there will always be evidence which both supports and refutes it. Kuhn therefore refers to scientific paradigms as charaterising the practice of science. These paradigms do not, unlike Deductivism and inductivism, provide rules which the methods of research must slavishly follow, but provide only examples
Of good practice and scientists must themselves determine how the model is to be used…Thus, scientists doing normal science do not merely have to agree upon what should serve as the basis of their work, they also have to agree upon how it should serve that purpose in every case. They are obliged to employ a paradigm much as a judge employs an accepted judicial precedent.
(B. Barnes, 1991:88)
Science develops according to the culture that scientists inhabit and this not the rules of induction or deduction.
Kuhn claimed that scientific enquiry is characterised by conservatism because scientists are socialised into basic assumptions called ‘paradigms’ that they take for granted and rarely question. A paradigm is a particular way of looking at the natural world. It affects the way a scientist sees the world and her or his choice of research methods. All evidence gathered is guided by the paradigm. The method of collecting data is therefore dependent upon the dominant paradigm and its dominance blocks the ability of scientists to see contradictory evidence.
Scientific progress only occurs when pieces of evidence (anomalies) build up which cannot be ignored. The established paradigm loses its credibility and is overthrown in a period of ‘scientific revolution’. Scientists produce a new paradigm that explains what the old paradigm could not and normal science resumes.
Kuhn therefore challenged the view that science is a method. Rather he saw science as a body of knowledge, i.e a paradigm. Scientific method depends on the dominant paradigm of the time. Scientific method is therefore not free to wander in any direction it wishes. It is constrained by ‘taken for granted’ assumptions about how the world is. Scientific knowledge is therefore socially produced rather than discovered.
Groupwork
In small groups answer the following questions: