Finished The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
That was an extremely rewarding book. It is hard in many respects for me not to be a Kuhnian, especially after reading pp.205-6, where he partially delineates the means by which different paradigms can be commensurated:
The former three criteria are more important than the latter three, but all help a theory be better overall at solving puzzles. Thus Kuhn is a firm believer in scientific progress. However--and this is absolutely crucial--he does not believe that science can progress towards what we wish to know, only from what we do know (p.171). In fact, he lucidly compares this with Darwinian evolution, where life forms progress from more primitive beginnings but towards no ultimate goal (pp.171-2).
I think that all of the above is of very great value. Kuhn definitely does not see himself as a relativist about science at all, and he definitely thinks that once both paradigms are weight impartially, the new paradigm can be seen to be conclusively better than the old. It is simply that to make the transition from one paradigm to the other cannot be performed incrementally, but by means of a gestalt switch (cf. pp.150-1). This switch is not at all easy, and is very often not made at all. That is why the younger and less experienced of the members of the scientific community are able to see the paradigm more clearly as superior to the old, and adopt it accordingly. Another part of the complication of the process is that no one argument or criterion can uniquely or unequivocally adjudicate between paradigms (p.169). The choice can take a generation to make and must be made by the entire community--but the fact that it gets made at all is clear evidence that the choice is not relative or arbitrary.
Analagously, the fact that whole cultures can unequivocally shift their social mores is evidence that that choice is not arbitrary either. There are definite reasons why it happened during the Enlightenment. There are also definite reasons why it is happening now with respect to animal rights. The more I explore the issues empirically, the more convinced I am becoming that social mores are indeed progressing, although I have to agree with Kuhn that they are not progressing towards some kind of ultimate moral truth. This does not mean too much, though, simply because one can equally well say that science is not progressing towards any kind of ultimate truth about reality. Having said that, however, no one doubts that there is an objective reality out there for science to theorise about. There is a considerable amount of debate, on the other hand, about whether there is any ultimate moral reality that ethics is elucidating. It seems to me that this is an irrelevant debate, for reasons covered in "Subjectivity vs Objectivity in Ethics". What I shall say here is that, like science, morality does not need to progress towards an absolute conception if it can progress away from more limited conceptions of moral truth. And it does seem as though moral statements admit of a truth value that can be argued over--the question is simply whether the determinant of that truth value is 'out there' in objects or 'in here' in subjects.
- Accuracy of prediction, particularly of quantitative prediction;
- The balance between esoteric and everyday subject matter;
- The number of different problems solved;
- Simplicity;
- Scope; and
- Compatibility with other specialties.
The former three criteria are more important than the latter three, but all help a theory be better overall at solving puzzles. Thus Kuhn is a firm believer in scientific progress. However--and this is absolutely crucial--he does not believe that science can progress towards what we wish to know, only from what we do know (p.171). In fact, he lucidly compares this with Darwinian evolution, where life forms progress from more primitive beginnings but towards no ultimate goal (pp.171-2).
I think that all of the above is of very great value. Kuhn definitely does not see himself as a relativist about science at all, and he definitely thinks that once both paradigms are weight impartially, the new paradigm can be seen to be conclusively better than the old. It is simply that to make the transition from one paradigm to the other cannot be performed incrementally, but by means of a gestalt switch (cf. pp.150-1). This switch is not at all easy, and is very often not made at all. That is why the younger and less experienced of the members of the scientific community are able to see the paradigm more clearly as superior to the old, and adopt it accordingly. Another part of the complication of the process is that no one argument or criterion can uniquely or unequivocally adjudicate between paradigms (p.169). The choice can take a generation to make and must be made by the entire community--but the fact that it gets made at all is clear evidence that the choice is not relative or arbitrary.
Analagously, the fact that whole cultures can unequivocally shift their social mores is evidence that that choice is not arbitrary either. There are definite reasons why it happened during the Enlightenment. There are also definite reasons why it is happening now with respect to animal rights. The more I explore the issues empirically, the more convinced I am becoming that social mores are indeed progressing, although I have to agree with Kuhn that they are not progressing towards some kind of ultimate moral truth. This does not mean too much, though, simply because one can equally well say that science is not progressing towards any kind of ultimate truth about reality. Having said that, however, no one doubts that there is an objective reality out there for science to theorise about. There is a considerable amount of debate, on the other hand, about whether there is any ultimate moral reality that ethics is elucidating. It seems to me that this is an irrelevant debate, for reasons covered in "Subjectivity vs Objectivity in Ethics". What I shall say here is that, like science, morality does not need to progress towards an absolute conception if it can progress away from more limited conceptions of moral truth. And it does seem as though moral statements admit of a truth value that can be argued over--the question is simply whether the determinant of that truth value is 'out there' in objects or 'in here' in subjects.
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