The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
by Thomas S. Kuhn
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Book Summary Information
Author: Thomas S. KuhnEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1996-12-15
ISBN: 0226458083
Number of pages: 226
Publisher: University Of Chicago Press
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- ISBN13: 9780226458083
- Condition: New
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Book Reviews of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
Book Review: Revolutions and Evolution
Summary: 5 Stars
Plenty of very good reviews of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (TSoSR) are already published on Amazon. Both the positive and the negative reviews make good points, and there's not much for me to add, except that I liked it. Regardless of my personal endorsement, I believe TSoSR should be read by anybody who hopes to understand the processes of scientific discovery - not because Kuhn's account is infallible, but because it is the most well-known and influential. Indeed, precious few concepts from the philosophy of science ever percolate into popular consciousness, but Kuhn's concept of "paradigm shift" certainly has, for better or for worse.
Beyond that, I want to make a few comments about TSoSR in the context of current events. As I write this review - late 2005 - a lawsuit is pending in Pennsylvania regarding the teaching of "Intelligent Design" (ID) in public school classrooms. Numerous other public school districts and boards of education around the country are considering, or being pressured to consider, revising their science curricula to include ID, or at least to "teach the controversy" as the ID mantra goes. Although ID is generally regarded as repackaged creationism among scientists in relevant disciplines, ID proponents insist that populating the gaps of evolutionary theory with an Intelligent Designer is the next great paradigm shift - yes, many of them explicitly invoke Kuhn's vocabulary. As someone who wrote about paradigm shifts before the anti-evolution movement became emotionalized and politicized in its current proportions, Kuhn is perhaps a source all parties could turn to in evaluating the ambitious claims of ID. Kuhn actually discusses three elements that are extremely timely to our present situation: the role of crisis in precipitating revolutions, the role of textbooks in the initiation of scientists, and the role of public opinion in the search for scientific truth. I'll address each of these in turn.
Kuhn suggests that scientific revolutions occur when anomalous observations overwhelm an existing paradigm's explanatory power. An anomaly is not simply an unexplained observation - normal science thrives on those. Instead, anomalies are unexplained observations about which the dominant paradigm lacks even a theoretical framework or vocabulary for addressing. Once enough of these accumulate, the field is in a state of "crisis." At this point, any new paradigm that can explain most of what the old paradigm purported to explain, while at the same time explaining some of what had been considered anomalous - in other words, any proposed paradigm that is "progressive" - may precipitate a revolution. What's important here is that the new paradigm need not be exhaustive - it need only be an improvement upon the previous paradigm. By implication, if a proposed paradigm fails to be progressive in the sense just described, the scientific community will prefer to retain the existing paradigm, anomalies and all.
This suggests at least one way in which ID - an upstart paradigm - might be evaluated vis-a-vis blind evolution - the dominant paradigm. Is evolution in a state of crisis? Books like Icons of Evolution by Jonathan Wells and Darwin's Black Box by Michael Behe suggest that it is. Most working biologists, in contrast, view Darwin's "black boxes" as opportunities for further research within the paradigm, rather than cause for abandoning the paradigm. They emphatically do not believe the field is in a state of crisis, and they scoff at the notion of "teaching the controversy" because they don't believe there is one. This is not to say that any scientist believes Darwin answered all the questions. On the contrary, Darwinian evolution remains a vibrant paradigm in part because it presents so many interesting puzzles, and suggests solutions to many of them within the consensus rule-set. If a sense of crisis is a precondition of revolution, then ID has arrived before its time. But even if it were timely, serious questions may be asked about whether ID is progressive compared to evolution. Most scientists think it is not, for reasons beyond the scope of this review. (Hint: Occam's Razor).
Another timely topic discussed in TSoSR is the role of textbooks in the initiation of scientists. (Kuhn writes about undergraduate science education at the university level, but I think much of the discussion is relevant to junior high and high school science education). In contrast to philosophy or theology or literature or law, science education affords very little status to the pedigree of an idea. That is to say, a physics student will not study Aristotle's mechanics in the same way a philosophy student will study Aristotle's ethics. Aristotle, Galileo and Newton appear only in sidebar discussions of undergraduate texts, or in specialized courses on the history of science. Even there, the old guys are generally discussed only insofar as their work paved the way for the current paradigm. Newton's enthusiasm for alchemy, for example, doesn't merit much discussion in modern chemistry textbooks. The textbook itself, along with the lecture component of science education, is almost purely a distillation of the current paradigm. The lab component is a collection of model problems, the solutions to which crisply illustrate current techniques. This de-emphasis of pedigree means that in biology, for example, the most recent edition of the leading textbook has almost a greater claim to canonicity than Darwin's The Origin of Species (although even "current" textbooks contain dated and erroneous material, as the anti-evolutionists are pleased to point out).
The nearly exclusive reliance on textbooks and canned problems in science education has, like everything else, its pros and cons. On the positive side, it provides tremendous economy in the face of scarce resources - including departmental budgets, instruction time and student attention span. On the negative side, it may give the false impression that the dominant paradigm is unassailable. Whether the pros outweigh the cons depends on whether would-be scientists have the same educational needs as would-be philosophers or would-be historians of science. Similar questions should be asked concerning ID or any other maverick paradigm - should would-be scientists study the unproven contender, or the professional consensus? The solutions to these cost/benefit problems will draw on both values and cold pragmatism. Whatever the answer, Kuhn states, and experience shows, that textbooks are rewritten in the aftermath of revolutions. For the first time ever, as far as I know, ID proponents are arguing that textbooks should be rewritten before the revolution has occurred - before even practicing scientists recognize a crisis. Unable to persuade scientists that this is a good idea, ID proponents have turned to the courts of law and the court of public opinion. This leads to the third timely topic of TSoSR.
At least once, Kuhn invokes the truism that the merit of an idea has nothing to do with its popularity. By extension, scientific truth cannot be determined by opinion polls or legislation or judicial fiat. For that matter, scientific truth cannot be determined by professional consensus - otherwise scientific revolutions would never occur (because scientific revolutions are, by definition, the overthrow of consensus). Given that scientific truth scorns popularity, cannot be adjudicted or legislated, and is defiant of professional consensus, perhaps we should dispense with it altogether. Perhaps we should instead talk about the usefulness of ideas for discreet purposes, rather than their universal truth. Newtonian mechanics is eminently useful for setting up shots in billiards and launching rockets towards pin-prick targets in the outer solar system - even though its assumptions are demonstrably false by Einsteinian standards. This brings us back to the discussion of explanatory power in the third paragraph of this review. The concepts of variation and selection proposed by Darwin have proven extremely useful, in an explanatory sense, in the fields of population genetics, biogeography, paleontology, epidemiology, immunology, and even artificial intelligence (to name but a few fields). As long as they keep producing useful insights, why should we abandon them? Putting the shoe on the other foot: what useful insights has ID yielded?
Recent opinion polls show that roughly half of querants deny the truth of evolution. Another significant fraction accepts the fact that evolution occurs at some level, but believes that God nudges evolution along when the going gets tough. This latter position most closely resembles ID. Taking both positions together, it's clear that most Americans disbelieve any materialistic, non-teleological explanation for the origin of species. If the matter could be resolved by popular vote, strict Darwinism would be declared false today. The proponents of ID and the holdovers of "Creation Science" expect this will happen. What they don't understand is that by changing legislation, by persuading the judiciary, by intimidating school boards, by coloring the curriculum, they will not have changed science. Kuhn suggests that science is what scientists do. Therefore, as long as scientists find Darwin's theory useful, they will continue to use it, regardless of whether they belong to an unpopular minority.
Summary of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
Thomas S. Kuhn's classic book is now available with a new index.
"A landmark in intellectual history which has attracted attention far beyond its own immediate field. . . . It is written with a combination of depth and clarity that make it an almost unbroken series of aphorisms. . . . Kuhn does not permit truth to be a criterion of scientific theories, he would presumably not claim his own theory to be true. But if causing a revolution is the hallmark of a superior paradigm, [this book] has been a resounding success." ?Nicholas Wade, Science
"Perhaps the best explanation of [the] process of discovery." ?William Erwin Thompson, New York Times Book Review
"Occasionally there emerges a book which has an influence far beyond its originally intended audience. . . . Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions . . . has clearly emerged as just such a work." ?Ron Johnston, Times Higher Education Supplement
"Among the most influential academic books in this century." ?Choice
One of "The Hundred Most Influential Books Since the Second World War," Times Literary Supplement
There's a "Frank & Ernest" comic strip showing a chick breaking out of its shell, looking around, and saying, "Oh, wow! Paradigm shift!" Blame the late Thomas Kuhn. Few indeed are the philosophers or historians influential enough to make it into the funny papers, but Kuhn is one.
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions is indeed a paradigmatic work in the history of science. Kuhn's use of terms such as "paradigm shift" and "normal science," his ideas of how scientists move from disdain through doubt to acceptance of a new theory, his stress on social and psychological factors in science--all have had profound effects on historians, scientists, philosophers, critics, writers, business gurus, and even the cartoonist in the street.
Some scientists (such as Steven Weinberg and Ernst Mayr) are profoundly irritated by Kuhn, especially by the doubts he casts--or the way his work has been used to cast doubt--on the idea of scientific progress. Yet it has been said that the acceptance of plate tectonics in the 1960s, for instance, was sped by geologists' reluctance to be on the downside of a paradigm shift. Even Weinberg has said that "Structure has had a wider influence than any other book on the history of science." As one of Kuhn's obituaries noted, "We all live in a post-Kuhnian age." --Mary Ellen Curtin
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