Does Natural Science Encourage a Narrow Mind?

[coberst]

Does Natural Science Encourage a Narrow Mind?

Paradigm directed science encourages the scientist to steadfastly adhere to carefully crafted narrow minded thinking. Because “normal science” has been so successful in achieving its narrow goals I claim that our whole society has become dangerously enchanted into viewing all domains of knowledge in restricted narrow constraints.

Normal science is a puzzle-solving enterprise. Normal science is a slow accumulation of knowledge by a methodical step-by-step process undertaken by a group of scientists.

‘Paradigm’ is a word that was given great meaning and clarity by Thomas Kuhn in his book “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions”.

“One of the things a scientific community acquires with a paradigm is a criterion for choosing problems that, while the paradigm is taken for granted, can be assumed to have solutions…A paradigm can, for that matter, even insulate the community from those socially important problems that are not reducible to the puzzle form, because they cannot be stated in terms of the conceptual and instrumental tools the paradigm supplies.”

The author notes that all “real science is normally a habit-governed, puzzle-solving activity” and not a Critical Thinking activity. Paradigm and not hypothesis is the active meaning for the ‘new image of science’. Paradigm is neither a theory nor a metaphysical viewpoint.

Kuhn’s new image of science—the paradigm—is an artifact, a way of seeing, and is a set of scientific problem solving habits. Normal science means research based upon one or more past achievements ‘that some particular community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its further practice…and these achievements are sufficiently unprecedented to attract an enduring group pf adherents away from competing modes of scientific activity’ furthermore they are sufficiently open-ended to leave all sorts of problems for the redefined group of practitioners to solve’. Such achievements Kuhn defines as paradigm.

“A puzzle-solving paradigm, unlike a puzzle-solving hypothetico-deductive system, has also got to be a concrete ‘way of seeing’.”

Kuhn constantly refers to the ‘gestalt switch’ when discussing the switch in reference from one paradigm to another as ‘re-seeing’ action. Each paradigm has been constructed to be a ‘way-of-seeing’. Here Kuhn is speaking not about what the paradigm is but how the paradigm is used. He is defining a paradigm as a newly developed puzzle-solving artifact that is used analogically to understand another artifact; for example, using wire and beads strung together to facilitate understanding the protein molecule.

I think that we place “Science” (meaning normal science) on too high a pedestal and thereby distort our comprehension of political and social problems. We cannot solve social and political problems like we solve the questions formed by the normal sciences.

Do you think that the techniques of normal science are directly applicable for solving the social and political problems of society?

 

[Chesterton]

Does Natural Science Encourage a Narrow Mind?

Yes, absolutely. It encourages the study of nature as if nature is all there is, and there's no evidence for that.

 

[Gracchus]

Yes, absolutely. It encourages the study of nature as if nature is all there is, and there's no evidence for that.

Nature is what we observe, what we have evidence for.

What we do not have evidence for is the supernatural. There is no evidence for fairies, leprechauns, or magic sky-daddies.

 

[Chesterton]

Nature is what we observe, what we have evidence for.

What we do not have evidence for is the supernatural. There is no evidence for fairies, leprechauns, or magic sky-daddies.

And...? Did you have a point to make?

 

[Gracchus]

Yes, absolutely. It encourages the study of nature as if nature is all there is, and there's no evidence for that.

Nature is what we observe, what we have evidence for.

What we do not have evidence for is the supernatural. There is no evidence for fairies, leprechauns, or magic sky-daddies.

And...? Did you have a point to make?

My point was: There is no evidence for what has not been and cannot be observed.

 

[Chesterton]

My point was: There is no evidence for what has not been and cannot be observed.

Your point is invalid on both counts. You don't know everything that has or has not been seen, and you don't know what can and cannot be seen.

 

[Gracchus]

Your point is invalid on both counts. You don't know everything that has or has not been seen, and you don't know what can and cannot be seen.

I never claimed to know everything.
Only religious people do that. That is part of the reason they infer all sorts of things from reading that were never even implied in the text.

 

[J0K3R]

In proper science only that which can be proven is acknowledged as real. You cannot use the logic "there is no proof against it" in real science.

 

[variant]

Yes science encourages limitation of study to what is observed/observable and methodological rigor in studying it.

Science doesn't limit what you can think though.

Do you think that the techniques of normal science are directly applicable for solving the social and political problems of society?

Why wouldn't they be?

 

[coberst]

A person can walk the corridors of any big city hospital and observe the effectiveness of human rationality in action. One can also visit the UN building in NYC or read the morning papers and observe just how ineffective, frustrating and disappointing human rationality can be. Why does human reason perform so well in some matters and so poorly in others?

We live in two very different worlds; a world of technical and technological order and clarity, and a world of personal and social disorder and confusion. We are increasingly able to solve problems in one domain and increasingly endangered by our inability to solve problems in the other.

Normal science is successful primarily because it is a domain of knowledge controlled by paradigms. The paradigm defines the standards, principles and methods of the discipline. It is not apparent to the laity but science moves forward in small incremental steps. Science seldom seeks and almost never produces major novelties.

Science solves puzzles. The logic of the paradigm insulates the professional group from problems that are unsolvable by that paradigm. One reason that science progresses so rapidly and with such assurance is because the logic of that paradigm allows the practitioners to work on problems that only their lack of ingenuity will keep them from solving.

Science uses instrumental rationality to solve puzzles. Instrumental rationality is a systematic process for reflecting upon the best action to take to reach an established end. The obvious question becomes ‘what mode of rationality is available for determining ends?’ Instrumental rationality appears to be of little use in determining such matters as “good” and “right”.

There is a striking difference between the logic of technical problems and that of dialectical problems. The principles, methods and standards for dealing with technical problems and problems of “real life” are as different as night and day. Real life problems cannot be solved only using deductive and inductive reasoning.

Dialectical reasoning methods require the ability to slip quickly between contradictory lines of reasoning. One needs skill to develop a synthesis of one point of view with another. Where technical matters are generally confined to only one well understood frame of reference real life problems become multi-dimensional totalities.

When we think dialectically we are guided by principles not by procedures. Real life problems span multiple categories and academic disciplines. We need point-counter-point argumentation; we need emancipatory reasoning to resolve dialectical problems. We need critical thinking skills and attitudes to resolve real life problems.

 

[Ayersy]

Your point is invalid on both counts. You don't know everything that has or has not been seen, and you don't know what can and cannot be seen.

In that case, we should just believe in anything and everything, just because, you know, it hasn't been disproven.

Things have to be proven before they can be disproven.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

Why wouldn't they be?

I am not sure if the OP actually debates, or just posts his opinions on multuiple forums. IMO science is not used enough in forming public policy. I would like to have access to crime stats from about the globe, but as far as I can tell they are only available to high ranking law officials and the like.

 

[variant]

]When we think dialectically we are guided by principles not by procedures. Real life problems span multiple categories and academic disciplines. We need point-counter-point argumentation; we need emancipatory reasoning to resolve dialectical problems. We need critical thinking skills and attitudes to resolve real life problems.

A world of principles doesn't solve all the worlds problems.

Science is a methodological tool and nothing more, you are the one making it out to be more than it is.

 

[Chesterton]

I never claimed to know everything.

Maybe not everything, but you're certainly claiming to know a whole lot more than you know.

Only religious people do that. That is part of the reason they infer all sorts of things from reading that were never even implied in the text.

No, atheistic scientific people do that. They infer things from nature which are not implied in nature.

In that case, we should just believe in anything and everything, just because, you know, it hasn't been disproven.

Things have to be proven before they can be disproven.

It doesn't follow that anyone should believe anything and everything.

 

[Whatthedeuce]

I disagree with the claim that science causes a narrow mind. Science frequently allows for its models and theories to be refined, falsified, and replaced. This is the opposite of what something with a narrow mind does.

Paradigm directed science encourages the scientist to steadfastly adhere to carefully crafted narrow minded thinking. Because “normal science” has been so successful in achieving its narrow goals I claim that our whole society has become dangerously enchanted into viewing all domains of knowledge in restricted narrow constraints.

How have you described anything dangerous? What gives you the idea that society "views all domains of knowledge in restricted narrow constraints"?

I think that we place “Science” (meaning normal science) on too high a pedestal and thereby distort our comprehension of political and social problems. We cannot solve social and political problems like we solve the questions formed by the normal sciences.

We place science on exactly the right pedestal. It is the only verified method our society has of checking the validity of hypotheses about observable phenomena. That is how we treat it, and that attitude towards science is entirely justified.

How has our comprehension of political and social problems been distorted?

Do you think that the techniques of normal science are directly applicable for solving the social and political problems of society?

No, I don't.
Seems like a really weird question. The techniques of science are not even designed for solving problems of any sort. They are designed to help us acquire knowledge.

 

[Gracchus]

I never claimed to know everything.

Maybe not everything, but you're certainly claiming to know a whole lot more than you know.

For instance?

Only religious people do that. That is part of the reason they infer all sorts of things from reading that were never even implied in the text.

No, atheistic scientific people do that. They infer things from nature which are not implied in nature.

For instance?

ETA: By the way, I am, technically, not an atheist. I am a panentheist.

 

[Chesterton]

For instance?

My point was: There is no evidence for what has not been and cannot be observed.

You claim to know 1) what has been observed, 2) what cannot be observed and 3) that there is no evidence for either.

For instance?

Such as the idea that nature is all there is.

 

[variant]

Yes, absolutely. It encourages the study of nature as if nature is all there is, and there's no evidence for that.

No, science merely limits itself to what there is evidence for, so, If there were evidence for it, scientists would be studying it.

The only evidence for nature being all there is the lack of evidence to the contrary.

 

[Bushido216]

The point you're missing about philosophy of science, as opposed to science, is that the philosophy side holds itself to a much higher rigour of deductive truth and direction of investigation than standard science does.

When someone like Kuhn says that a paradigm limits the sorts of questions that can be asked, he's not talking in the strictly scientific sense. It's a wierd example, but the paradigm of modern chemistry limits you to talking about things that make sense in the paradigm, and doesn't allow you to ask about phlogistons anymore. That's the point he's trying to make. It's a philosophical point. If you don't say things like a paradigm limits the direction of research then in the rigorous world of the philosopher you may as well be asking about phlogistons as sublimation.

 

[variant]

When someone like Kuhn says that a paradigm limits the sorts of questions that can be asked, he's not talking in the strictly scientific sense. It's a wierd example, but the paradigm of modern chemistry limits you to talking about things that make sense in the paradigm, and doesn't allow you to ask about phlogistons anymore. That's the point he's trying to make. It's a philosophical point. If you don't say things like a paradigm limits the direction of research then in the rigorous world of the philosopher you may as well be asking about phlogistons as sublimation.

Well of course unevidenced theories with little to no power to explain everything are tossed aside.

And what is wrong with limitations on research in this manner?

All philosophy throws out useless concepts, this is about as limiting as taking out your trash so you have somewhere to live.