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Mechanism of Theory Pursuit (view source)
Revision as of 18:46, 16 March 2017
, 18:46, 16 March 2017no edit summary
|Formulated Year=2015
|Prehistory=Among classical philosophers of science, there was no unanimity as to whether the question of theory pursuit can have a reasonable answer. For instance, [[Imre Lakatos]] can be interpreted as claiming that while one has to [[Theory Acceptance|accept]] the most progressive research programme, one can legitimately [[Theory Pursuit|pursue]] any research programme whatsoever.[[CiteRef::Lakatos (1971a)|p. 117]] The latter part of the claim would be readily accepted by Paul Feyerabend.[[CiteRef::Feyerabend (1976a)|pp. 213-216]]
Lakatos divided research programs into two different categories: progressive and degenerating. Lakatos judged research programs on explanatory power and this looked at them in terms of whether modifications to their protective belt had been progressive or regressive. In short, progressive modifications fit into unity with the current research program with excess corroborated empirical content[[CiteRef::Lakatos (1970)|pp. 31-32]] while regressive modifications did not fit and had no corroborated empirical content.[[CiteRef::Lakatos (1970)|pp. 110-112]] Both progressive and degenerative programs could be pursued for Lakatos, however degenerative programs are irrational to pursue. It is worth knowing however, a program could at any point of time change from degenerative and become progressive again with a few progressive modifications.
Feyerabend criticized Lakatos’ degenerating programs as having no set time limit on when to stop pursuing them. A program could become degenerative and stay this way for millions of years but to Lakatos it will always be available for pursuit. Feyerabend believed there had to be a sharp line as to where and when a program becomes not worth pursuing.[[CiteRef::Motterlini (Ed.) (1999)|p. 9]] In contrast to Lakatos’ understanding of the mechanisms of theory pursuit, Feyerabend believed that all theories are worth pursuing at all times, a much more anarchical view.
However, there were other philosophers who thought that there ''can'' be rules telling us which theories are pursuit worthy. In his [[Laudan (1977)|''Progress and Its Problems'']], [[Larry Laudan]] devises a methodological rule indicating when it is rational to pursue a certain research tradition. According to Laudan, "''it is always rational to pursue any research tradition which has a higher rate of progress than its rivals''".[[CiteRef::Laudan (1977)|p. 111]]
In another example, for Kuhn, a theory would become worth pursuit so long as it satisfied the method of the time and views.[[CiteRef::Godfrey-Smith|p 91-92]]
|History=In [[Barseghyan (2015)|''The Laws of Scientific Change'']], Barseghyan left the question of including the logic of pursuit into the scope of scientonomy open. According to Barseghyan, "we are neither restrained nor obliged to provide an account of pursuit in an actual TSC".[[CiteRef::Barseghyan (2015)|p. 41]]
|Related Topics=Mechanism of Theory Acceptance,
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