Science as a belief system
- Created by: Emily Uffindell
- Created on: 01-11-14 15:44
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- Science as a belief system
- Introduction
- Science and technology have had an enormous impact on society over the last few centuries, undermining religion and leading to widespread 'faith in science.'
- The key feature of science is that it gives us cognitive power (it enables us to explain, predict and control the world.)
- Popper: Claims that science is an "open belief system."
- Scientists try to falsify existing theories by providing evidence to do so.
- If evidence contradicts a theory, a theory is discarded and a better one sought.
- In this way, knowledge grows.
- Evaluation
- Science may cause problems as well as solve them, through "manufactured risks."
- Example: Pollution, global warming and weapons of mass destruction.
- Science may cause problems as well as solve them, through "manufactured risks."
- If evidence contradicts a theory, a theory is discarded and a better one sought.
- Scientific knowledge is not absolute truth. It can always be tested and potentially falsified.
- Merton: Science as an organised social activity has a set of norms that promote the growth of knowledge by encouraging openness.
- Universalism Scientific knowledge
- Knowledge is judged by universal, objective criteria (testing).
- Disinterestedness
- Seeking knowledge for its own sake.
- Organised scepticism
- Theories are all open to scepticism/criticism.
- Communism knowledge
- Knowledge must be shared with the scientific community.
- Evaluation
- Some argue that science is a self-sustaining, close belief system.
- Polanyi: All belief systems reject fundamental challenges to their knowledge claims.
- Science is no different.
- Polanyi: All belief systems reject fundamental challenges to their knowledge claims.
- Some argue that science is a self-sustaining, close belief system.
- Universalism Scientific knowledge
- Scientists try to falsify existing theories by providing evidence to do so.
- Horton: distinguishes between open and closed belief systems.
- Like Popper, he sees science as an open belief system.
- He sees religion as a closed belief system as it makes knowledge-claims that cannot be overturned.
- A closed belief system has "get-out," clauses that prevent it from being disproved in the eyes of its believers.
- Polanyi: Belief systems have three devices to sustain themselves in the face of contradictory evidence.
- 1. Circularity
- Each idea in the system is explained in terms of another within the system and so on.
- 2. Subsidiary explanations
- For example: if the oracle fails, it may be explained away as due to the incorrect use of the benge.
- 3. Denying legitimacy to rival beliefs
- Belief systems reject alternative worldviews by refusing to grant any legitimacy to their basic assumptions.
- For example: creationism rejects outright the evolutionists' knowledge-claim that the earth is billions of years old, and therefore that species have gradually evolved over a long period rather than all having been created.
- Belief systems reject alternative worldviews by refusing to grant any legitimacy to their basic assumptions.
- 1. Circularity
- Kuhn: Science as a closed system
- Science, such as physics, is based on a paradigm ( a set of shared assumptions).
- Most of the time, scientists are engaged in normal science within the paradigm.
- Scientists who challenge the paradigm are more likely to be ridiculed (except during periods of scientific revolution, when accumulated evidence undermines it.)
- Most of the time, scientists are engaged in normal science within the paradigm.
- Science, such as physics, is based on a paradigm ( a set of shared assumptions).
- The sociology of scientific knowledge
- Interpretivists argue that the idea of scientific knowledge is socially constructed.
- Knorr-Cetina: What scientists study in the laboratory is highly constructed and far removed from the natural world they are supposedly studying.
- Woodgar: Scientists have to persuade the scientific community to accept their interpretations of the world. A scientific fact Is simply a shared, socially constructed belief.
- Marxism, feminism and postmodernism
- Marxism and feminism see science as serving the interests of dominant groups (the ruling class/men)
- Many scientific developments are driven by capitalism's need for knowledge to make profit.
- Postmodernists also reject science's claims to have the truth.
- Lyotard:science is a meta-narrative ( it is just another discourse used to dominate people.)
- Some argue that science has become technoscience, serving capitalist interests commodities for profit/
- Postmodernists also reject science's claims to have the truth.
- Many scientific developments are driven by capitalism's need for knowledge to make profit.
- Marxism and feminism see science as serving the interests of dominant groups (the ruling class/men)
- Interpretivists argue that the idea of scientific knowledge is socially constructed.
- Introduction
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