Kuhn it has been argued, overturned the following ideas from traditional philosophy of science

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Kuhn it has been argued, overturned the
following ideas from traditional philosophy of
science

• Naïve Realism scientific theories mirror
  reality.
• Demarcation there is a sharp distinction
  between science and other kinds of belief.
• Science is cumulative.
• There is a sharp contrast between observation and
  theory, with science based on, and justified by
  observation.
• Separate contexts of discovery and justification
• One science about one real world ultimately all
  knowledge is reducible to matter in motion
  (physics).

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Modernism vs. Postmodernism Realism vs.
Relativism Objective vs. Subjective
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Realism

• Do not focus on methodology to justify science
  but on the status of the entities posited by
  scientists.
• Realists use a transcendental argument to work
  out what the fact of human knowledge tells us
  about the relationship between humans and the
  natural world. (Yearley (2005,p18)

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Roy Bhaskar

• It is not necessary that science occurs. But
  given that it does, it is necessary that the
  world is a certain way. It is contingent that the
  world is such that science is possible and that
  humans as part of that world have characteristics
  that enable science to be done.
• That the world is structured and differentiated
  can be established by philosophical argument
  how it is in fact so are matters for scientific
  investigation.

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Realism

• Objects of scientific knowledge are independent
  of the activity of science itself.
• Scientific knowledge can only be produced by a
  community.
• The notion of falsification makes no sense unless
  one that there is an independent natural world
  capable of falsifying our hypotheses.
• Science is special because it tells us about
  the real causal structures of the world.
• But being a realist does not help us decide what
  the real causal structures are.

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Constructivism

• Scientific knowledge is merely socially
  constructed
• Industrialised science manufactures both the
  facts of science and the truth they are
  supposed to express

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Sociology of Scientific Knowledge (Barnes and
Bloor) Strong Programme

• Discover the conditions (economic, social,
  political,psychological) that bring about
  particular states of knowledge.
• Success and failure in science to be explained in
  the same way not sociological explanation for
  false belief and rationalist explanation for
  true.
• Does not deny realism but seeks to illuminate
  reality by sociological inquiry.

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Relativism
Although there are many different kinds of
relativism, they all have two features in
common. 1) They all assert that one thing (e.g.
moral values, beauty, knowledge, taste, or
meaning) is relative to some particular framework
or standpoint (e.g. the individual subject, a
culture, an era, a language, or a conceptual
scheme). 2) They all deny that any standpoint is
uniquely privileged over all others.
http//www.iep.utm.edu/r/relativi.htm
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Arguments for Realism?

• Cosmic coincidence
• Realism is the only metaphysical position that
  does not make the general overall success of
  science a preposterous miracle.
• Manipulation
• For any putative entities x, if one can
  successfully manipulate xs , then xs exist

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Anti-realists response

• Apparent convergence between science and the
  world is not genuine it is rather an artificial
  result due to the tendency of theories to be self
  affirming when used to evaluate their own
  products
• Success is a brute fact not something to be
  explained by positing a reality to which the
  theory conforms (van Fraasen)
• Scientific explanations are metaphorical.

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Relativism vs. Realism

• Science Wars

http//members.tripod.com/ScienceWars/
Whos side are you on?
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• References
• Popper/Kuhn debate
• Kuhn, T S (1977) The Essential Tension.
  ChicagoUniversity of Chicago Press.
• Lakatos, I Musgrave, A (1970). Criticism and
  the Growth of Knowledge. CambridgeCUP
• Klee,R. (1997) Introduction to the philosophy of
  science. Oxford OUP
• Overviews
• Bernstein,R.J. (1984) Beyond Objectivism and
  Relativism. Oxford Balckwells.
• Yearley, S (2005) Making Sense of Science.
  London Sage
• Sardar, Z. (2000) Thomas Kuhn and the Science
  Wars.Cambridge Icon Books.
• Paradigms and psychology
• Harre, R and Gillett, G (1994) The Discursive
  Mind. USASage Publications
• Harre, R.(1998) The singular self.London Sage.
• Driver-Linn,E. (2003) Where is Psychology Going?
  American Psychologist 58, 4. 269-278

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• Realism, relativism constructivism
• Bhaskar, R http//www.raggedclaws.com/criticalrea
  lism/archive/rbhaskar_rbi.html
• Berger, P and Luckman T (1967) The Social
  Construction of Reality.London Anchor
• Shaffer, J. Review of The construction of Social
  Reality by J Searle http//www.california.com/ra
  thbone/searles.htm (Searles realism explained)
• The Social Dimensions of Scientific Knowledge
  Longino, L http//www.seop.leeds.ac.uk/entries/sci
  entific-knowledge-social/
• Classical sociology of science
• Robert K Merton http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robe
  rt_K._Merton