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Possibility of Scientonomy - The Argument from Nothing Permanent (view source)
Revision as of 07:06, 30 November 2018
, 07:06, 30 November 2018no edit summary
|Description=The Argument from Nothing Permanent can be summarized as follows: (1) In order for there to be a general theory of scientific change, science should at least have some permanent (fixed, static, unchangeable, transhistorical) features. (2) The Nothing Permanent thesis: Science doesn't have any permanent features. (Conclusion) Particularism: There can be no general theory of scientific change.
[[File:Argument from Nothing Permanent.png|300px600px]]
If science does not have any permanent features, it seems that any general theory of scientific change will be impossible as there will be no transhistorical regularities of science. So, if the Argument from Nothing Permanent is correct, then the study of scientific change reduces to particularism with no overarching order and science will only be able to be studied in episodes rather than as a whole.
|Authors List=Hakob Barseghyan,
|Formulated Year=2015
|Prehistory=The permanent feature of science was thought to be its method. From Whewell and Herschel up until 1970, it was accepted that the transhistorical feature of science was its method—the scientific method.[[CiteRef::Laudan (1996)|pp. 212-214]] Laudan notes that even in the great shift from infallibilism to fallibilism, scientists and philosophers of science did believe in a universal scientific method. This was implicit in the methodologies of many philosophers of science such as the logical positivists, Popper and Lakatos. However, the plausibility of a transhistorical method was questioned by Kuhn and Feyerabend. See for instance ''Against Method''.[[CiteRef::Feyerabend (1975a)]] For more on this topic see the page for [[Possibility of Scientonomy - Argument from Changability of Scientific Method]].
Authors like Galison take the Argument from Nothing Permanent for granted. Galison goes as far as saying that studying the generality of science is vacuous and science needs to be addressed in its specific local formations. "The theory of scientific change no longer grabs philosophers of science as a plausible enterprise. Science seems far too heterogeneous for that: too diverse at a given time (especially now); even within the same discipline too much has changed".[[CiteRef::Galison (2008)|p. 111]]
Barnes and Bloor advocate against any internal purely rational construction of science and instead say that external factors (social, psychological, etc.) explain scientific change better.[[CiteRef::Barnes and Bloor (1982)]] This is otherwise known as Edinburgh relativism. Sociologists say that for there to be a general theory of scientific change there needs to be similar goals, desires and criteria of theory appraisal, but clearly individuals differ. For more details, see the page on [[Possibility of Scientonomy - The Argument from Social Construction]].
Bunge argues that despite their being no regularities at the individual level, there may be regularities that emerge at a higher level of generality, perhaps the community level.[[CiteRef::Bunge (1999)|pp. 24, 33]]
Weinberg notes that in some instances science is culture-free and has some permanence to it that sociological factors do not.[[CiteRef::Weinberg (2003)|pp. 135-137]]
|Related Topics=Possibility of Scientonomy - Argument from Changability of Scientific Method, Possibility of Scientonomy - The Argument from Social Construction, Possibility of Scientonomy - Argument from Bad Track Record,
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