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  #471  
Old 08-11-2019, 03:28 PM
Altair Altair is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 7luminaries
I have nothing in there about religion or God, except 1 sentence to say that "To be clear, I am not talking about religion or God". Yet, you are still talking to me about religion and/or gods . Why? Those have nothing to do with my responses to you...so who is you are talking to about God and religion? And why? Is it for yourself, to calm and pacify yourself intellectually or emotionally?

It's because you postulated ''nurtured nature'' like Greenslade, and in actuality the way this has been explained here makes it rather similar to ''intelligent design'', which leads to the same issues as belief in creationism. It [design] cannot be observed in nature and changes in species and environment are natural, and require no supernatural explanation. You may not use the word ''god'', similar to those who believe in intelligent design, but it still leads to the same issues.
  #472  
Old 08-11-2019, 05:31 PM
7luminaries 7luminaries is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Altair
It's because you postulated ''nurtured nature'' like Greenslade, and in actuality the way this has been explained here makes it rather similar to ''intelligent design'', which leads to the same issues as belief in creationism. It [design] cannot be observed in nature and changes in species and environment are natural, and require no supernatural explanation. You may not use the word ''god'', similar to those who believe in intelligent design, but it still leads to the same issues.

Altair, I offered that not because I am deeply tied to it. Instead, I offered it as one possibility which can and may be reasonably considered.

As I have said and as you have not yet acknowledged, many cosmologists and planetary scientists also include it as a reasonable possibility, given the preponderance of evidence for intelligent life having come to be on its own in multiple instances is so astronomically low. The logical extension is that we are not special and we too are subject to the same odds

I don't have "issues" with acknowledging that science and what we call fact or "conclusive" knowledge is really just our best guess at present based on very partial information. But it strikes me that perhaps you do, and very much so.

Here is something I'd like to you consider:

The issues you state are your own, or belong to those who must have certainty and dogma, rather than the intellectual humility and open-mindedness required for constant revisions to theory and knowledge that science demands.
A true scientist deals only in probabilities and in current interpretation of [X] fact or situation or theory. Not in certainties or dogma...though many poor scientists do cling to dogma and rigidity and hiearchies, exactly like a patriarchal religion.

It appears you keep stumbling on the issue[s] that you find problematic.
So here's something else to consider:

Ask yourself why it is you have to label and judge either ideas or people as problematic. And then ask yourself that if someone is telling you that those labels and ideas are not what I've been speaking about at all (such as I have repeated said to you)...and BTW are neither accurate nor relevant as you have posited them to anyone but you LOL...then what do you get or receive from continuing to put something upon others which they do not accept for themselves? And which they have not been speaking to you about?

It is, granted, one way to separate or self-define, by the act of defining yourself against others. But I would argue it is not a robust or liberating way to do so, because you are not able to apprehend others as they are when you only relate to others through the false or artificial constructs you create. You are not really telling me who I am. In fact, you are barely engaging with me and what I've actually said, at all. Instead, you are telling me who you are and you posit me as a straw man, regardless of what I say apparently Additionally, the construct itself is artificial and limiting, even to your implicit goal of discussion religion v science (which is what I HAVE been talking about).

So what does that gain for you?
If you really want to deal with me as I am, address the topic I HAVE been speaking to...which is intellectual honesty and paradigmatic growth and evolution within the scientific perspective, and within the human perspective more broadly. As well as within the individual's perspective.
That is where I find the topic interesting and that's what I've been speaking to. Not the dualisms you posit or construct, which are more for you and you alone, in your search to define (but perhaps also to limit) yourself as you see fit.

Peace & blessings
7L
__________________
Bound by conventions, people tend to reach for what is easy.

Here we must be unafraid of what is difficult.

For all living beings in nature must unfold in their particular way

and become themselves despite all opposition.

-- Rainer Maria Rilke
  #473  
Old 08-11-2019, 06:15 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 7luminaries
Altair, I offered that not because I am deeply tied to it. Instead, I offered it as one possibility which can and may be reasonably considered.

As I have said and as you have not yet acknowledged, many cosmologists and planetary scientists also include it as a reasonable possibility, given the preponderance of evidence for intelligent life having come to be on its own in multiple instances is so astronomically low. The logical extension is that we are not special and we too are subject to the same odds

Then there's the simulation hypothesis, ancestor simulation and Bostrom's trilemma. I'm not saying I buy into any of them, but they are interesting to ponder.
  #474  
Old 08-11-2019, 06:54 PM
Altair Altair is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 7L
As I have said and as you have not yet acknowledged, many cosmologists and planetary scientists also include it as a reasonable possibility, given the preponderance of evidence for intelligent life having come to be on its own in multiple instances is so astronomically low.

I'm aware of that, and have never said this hypothesis isn't a possibility. It's how micro-organisms could've come to earth, but we know that humans, tigers, iguanas, and oak trees have all evolved on earth, and that goes for ''intelligent life'' [definition?] in general.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 7L
Ask yourself why it is you have to label and judge either ideas or people as problematic. And then ask yourself that if someone is telling you that those labels and ideas are not what I've been speaking about at all (such as I have repeated said to you)...and BTW are neither accurate nor relevant as you have posited them to anyone but you LOL...then what do you get or receive from continuing to put something upon others which they do not accept for themselves? And which they have not been speaking to you about? It is, granted, one way to separate or self-define, by the act of defining yourself against others. But I would argue it is not a robust or liberating way to do so, because you are not able to apprehend others as they are when you only relate to others through the false or artificial constructs you create. You are not really telling me who I am. In fact, you are barely engaging with me and what I've actually said, at all. Instead, you are telling me who you are and you posit me as a straw man, regardless of what I say apparently Additionally, the construct itself is artificial and limiting, even to your implicit goal of discussion religion v science (which is what I HAVE been talking about).
Quote:
Originally Posted by 7L
So what does that gain for you?
If you really want to deal with me as I am, address the topic I HAVE been speaking to...which is intellectual honesty and paradigmatic growth and evolution within the scientific perspective, and within the human perspective more broadly. As well as within the individual's perspective.
That is where I find the topic interesting and that's what I've been speaking to. Not the dualisms you posit or construct, which are more for you and you alone, in your search to define (but perhaps also to limit) yourself as you see fit.

Please return to the topic at hand, 7L. It's about evolution, and not Altair.

It would be nice if you could discuss the topic and drop the stuff about me ''pacifying'' myself ''intellectually and emotionally'', lacking the ''water element'', and saying that things like justice and meaning are ''beneath'' me and that I find them ''distasteful'', ''limiting myself'', seeking to ''define myself'' and what not.

None of this is true, and more importantly it is not relevant.

I am not important, the topic is. I kindly ask you to analyse/discuss the content, and not the person.



Let me try again... [since you joined the discussion later I will summarize]:

This concerns evolution by natural selection. Some people believe that there are ''missing links'', but they aren't there. Also, some have suggested that evolution can't explain variation in species [including humans], but actually it can.

I have explored the issues that arise when adding a supernatural component to life's journey on earth [again; I'm not talking about origins]. We find a sort of ''guided evolution'' back in some appeals to design. However..

No design or 'guided' meaning/purpose can be found in nature. Species aren't fixed or eternal and evolution is a natural phenomenon. There is no ''guide'', external or internal, that makes species think they should develop wings or have black fur. Natural selection is just that: natural. Variety in animals, plants, fungi, etc. is natural.

Of course, if evolution can be explained without a supernatural component [and it can] than it concludes that adding any other ''layers'' into the mix is simply not parsimonious.

It doesn't really matter where we look. We could look at our wisdom teeth, the consequences of the collision of the Americas, human skin colour, leopard fur, antibiotic resistance. There are natural explanations for natural phenomena.


Also, I am not creating a dichotomy between ''science and religion''. I have explored non-creationist spirituality. There are paths out there that lack creationism, and some don't reject evolution by natural selection.
  #475  
Old 09-11-2019, 03:43 PM
7luminaries 7luminaries is offline
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Altair, hello there!
To be clear, I never said anything about justice or meaning in regard to you. I think those may be items you yourself may have discussed with others elsewhere on the thread.
Instead, I asked you whether you engage in rigid thinking, slavish adherence to paradigms, strawman constructs, and deprecating of others (equating their positions to idiocy and delusion i..e., Santa Claus).
I observed that objectively it might seem like one might be engaging in these things for reasons noted, but I did not state that conclusively. Those were just observations for you to consider, since you know yourself and I do not.

And TBH, I have only read a few bits on the thread, being reasonably well-versed on the topic and on the science, all caveats included, and WITHOUT being slavishly bound to any one position.
Let me make that clear. I have no horses in this race. I would agree, but not aggressively or slavishly, that whilst evolution and natural selection are generally useful interpretations of what is known of our historical record...

...nonetheless, there are likewise many well-known caveats and shortcomings to the mainstream paradigm which have been noted, thoroughly researched, and supported through oppositional challenge -- by many, many mainstream biologists and chemists over the last few decades. This does not make the mainstream paradigm wholly "wrong", nor the challengers wholly "right", necessarily. It does mean our knowledge is vastly incomplete and and our mainstream paradigm, contradictory &/or unsupported on some of the foundational propositions or assumptions that it makes or rests on.

Thus, your stating that all is satisfactorily explained goes against the cogent, well-researched, oppositionally-validated (replicated) work of many mainstream researchers over the last few decades. Increasingly, there is little to no argument in the mainstream earth science disciplines that these foundational caveats and contradictions exist (contrary to your statements). The argument is really more just about what to make of their existence. I.e., the discussion is more around what does it all mean for the interpretation, the storyline? What does it mean for the paradigm? And no one knows yet...because we must first expand the paradigm to acknowledge the reality of these things (which is occurring now) and then allow for further research in these areas. If it is not possible to "resolve" things at our current level of development, then as with most scientific disciplines, clearly we will have to learn to live with far more uncertainty and with a much broader and less rigidly defined conceptual paradigm.

I have observed that you seem very set on pronouncing your particular view of truth as the right one whilst the others' views are wrong if they do not exactly align in what you deign is or is not acceptable. If this is the case, then your challenge and that of others slavishly tied to any particular paradigm, interpretation, or mindset/perspective is to realise the solid, grounded, evidential reality of these foundational limitations. And that yes, many of the contradictions and challenges are mind-bending and potentially far-reaching in their implications.

But this is what is so invigorating and fascinating for me...the intellectual honest and rigour regarding research and support (including oppositional challenge) that has been slowly introduced over the last few decades into the mainstream paradigm of earth sciences. And the associated expansion and liberation of conceptual thought and research into these newer areas of real challenge and real scientific query.

I find these challenges put forth by committed scientists in the field to be particularly compelling and thoroughly researched and vetted, and whilst I don't want to get into a tedious discussion...as I said, at every stage in the process, from the origins of life to the origins of complex cells, to the origins of multiple interlocking chemical systems, to the origins of complex life, etc...the odds as derived from repeated experiments by rigorous scientific experiment are astronomical and cannot be supported by available time frames on earth or even in the universe at large. The odds are that astronomical and even when experiments have been set up favourably cannot be obtained (through random chance &/or by the observed laws governing natural selection).

Meantime, the subject scientists themselves increasingly can no longer rigourously deny the foundational caveats and contradictions...even though some may privately wish to continue to discount these challenges. What these earth sciences are coming to realise is that rigid mental attitudes and slavish adherence to a paradigm -- regardless of real scientific challenges presented -- has simply served to hamper further research into those areas requiring more attention. And that does not serve them or their disciplines well. So they are learning on the ground what the true spirit of science really is, and what it really looks like. The spirit of science is bold and courageous, it is a contentious forum of challenges and thought, and it is free-thinking and unbound as it rigourously pursues the truth.

I can PM you loads of links spanning the last 10-15 years up to the present. But point being, it is not the topic of the thread per se which held any real interest to me, as I am well-versed on the state of these sciences and the challenges at hand -- and should these disciplines fully embrace the true spirit of science in researching these challenges, then the sky is the limit. For myself, I have a voracious mind and I seek only to know what is. I do not have to have reality fit any particular box, so long as I am free to explore and others are equally free to explore -- without censure or deprecation

What IS of interest to me in this thread is how any one of us could be so tied to our imperfect and still hugely evolving knowledge base that they would aggressively cling to any particularly rigid or narrow scientific perspective. And worse, that they would label others in so many words as idiots or as delusional for taking a broader view completely within the realm of both science and reason (even if what is increasingly mainstream acceptance of the reality of these challenges is still seen as cutting edge by the old guard ). There is something personal, something personally triggering, in aggressively staking out this sort of a position. And that IMO calls for some self-reflection by you, if for no other reason than the rather aggressive behaviour seems like a serious commitment and the name-calling beneath that of a mature and reasoned individual

I know many scientists in the past have reflexively fallen for this trap and have behaved as such until more solid evidence of the challenges was repeatedly quantified...but to continue to do so at the present is rather intellectually lazy and denies the reality of the solid and substantial challenges. So this aggressively defensive approach is becoming more passé by the moment within the disciplines themselves, and more accepted as simply areas of further research that need to be addressed.

Peace & blessings
7L
__________________
Bound by conventions, people tend to reach for what is easy.

Here we must be unafraid of what is difficult.

For all living beings in nature must unfold in their particular way

and become themselves despite all opposition.

-- Rainer Maria Rilke
  #476  
Old 09-11-2019, 04:45 PM
Altair Altair is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 7luminaries
Instead, I asked you whether you engage in rigid thinking, slavish adherence to paradigms, strawman constructs, and deprecating of others (equating their positions to idiocy and delusion i..e., Santa Claus).

I have explained why I brought up the Santa Claus example. Please read it again, it merely functions as an exercise to understand parsimony. And yes, a belief in Santa is, in that light, not that different from a belief in creation.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 7luminaries
What IS of interest to me in this thread is how any one of us could be so tied to our imperfect and still hugely evolving knowledge base that they would aggressively cling to any particularly rigid or narrow scientific perspective. And worse, that they would label others in so many words as idiots or as delusional for taking a broader view completely within the realm of both science and reason (even if what is increasingly mainstream acceptance of the reality of these challenges is still seen as cutting edge by the old guard ). There is something personal, something personally triggering, in aggressively staking out this sort of a position. And that IMO calls for some self-reflection by you, if for no other reason than the rather aggressive behaviour seems like a serious commitment and the name-calling beneath that of a mature and reasoned individual

''What IS of interest to me''

There, I think how that paragraph starts just says it all. How you end the paragraph is yet another dig at me, coupled with an emoticon that indicates you find this all very amusing.

There is no ''science'' behind intelligent design, creationism, or other alternatives put forward (intelligent aliens creating life). Calling me ''rigid'' and ''aggressive'' won't help you here. That's how you choose to interpret it. I think it's good to be honest about what science has discovered and that various belief systems lack evidence. It's simple parsimony but this seems to be enough for you to start calling me all sorts of things. I don't have to do any ''self reflection'' in that. I also did not call anyone here ''idiots''. In both cases, you again accuse me of false things. You need to do self reflection here...

You have accused me of ''pacifying'' myself ''intellectually and emotionally'', lacking the ''water element'', and saying that things like justice and meaning are ''beneath'' me and that I find them ''distasteful'', ''limiting myself'', seeking to ''define myself'' and above this continues, i.e. ''aggressive'', ''slavish''.

Stop the antics and the name calling, 7L.

In my previous post I have done the courtesy of summarizing for you how this discussion in this thread developed, and I have provided arguments that were on-topic. I have also explored non-creationist spirituality so you falsely accuse me of ''creating dichotomies''.

I have repeatedly mentioned these things yet you ignore all of it, and are more interested in other things. It seems you have no interest in discussing the topic of evolution. I understand parsimony can be a tough pill to swallow [for all of us really, in different subjects/topics]. When I point out that people who suggest ''meaning'', ''creation'' and ''intelligence'' are central to the universe are committing man-made projection, I of course risk becoming a target of religious and New Age people. But teleology is what humans do, not the universe. This isn't about me, it's an issue generally known in science.

I know you are generally into your ethical views and politics but when we seek to understand the natural world or 'do science' they are more often than not in the way. I think this is creating a conflict, and because I happen to bring that ''bad news'' in here - especially considering evolution by natural selection does not necessitate some intelligence or creator! - I am equated with that bad news and fair game, and in doing so you have called me a lot of things.

If you can discuss the topic without resorting to name calling than I am open to further conversation.
  #477  
Old 09-11-2019, 05:07 PM
Altair Altair is offline
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Teleology, (from Greek telos, “end,” and logos, “reason”), explanation by reference to some purpose, end, goal, or function. Traditionally, it was also described as final causality, in contrast with explanation solely in terms of efficient causes (the origin of a change or a state of rest in something). Human conduct, insofar as it is rational, is generally explained with reference to ends or goals pursued or alleged to be pursued, and humans have often understood the behaviour of other things in nature on the basis of that analogy, either as of themselves pursuing ends or goals or as designed to fulfill a purpose devised by a mind that transcends nature.

^^this is what humans are prone to do, we are consciously aware of cause and effect and see purpose in things and goals.

This is natural selection, simply explained...
Quote:
Natural selection is one of the basic mechanisms of evolution, along with mutation, migration, and genetic drift. Darwin's grand idea of evolution by natural selection is relatively simple but often misunderstood. https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evoli...article/evo_25


If there is ''creation'', or an intelligence behind the universe and in nature than we should have evidence for it. If evidence is not available [which is okay!], than we should at least have sound reasons!! for assuming teleology. We could ask what the ''goal'' or ''guidance'' was in the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs, the plague killing a third of Europeans in the 14th century, or many other random events.

Humans were an endangered species after the Toba explosion. I mean wow. Bacteria develop resistances to antibiotics. Again, wow. If everything was ''guided'' or ''evolving'' towards some goal or purpose than the world would be a different place. We just aren't as central as we wanna believe.
  #478  
Old 09-11-2019, 05:42 PM
davidsun davidsun is offline
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Excellent meta-analysis and articulation of the issues involved (IMO), 7L.

Here is a link to a comprehensive summary/synthesis of what's presented in T.S. Kuhn's book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions:

https://www.uky.edu/~eushe2/Pajares/kuhnsyn.html

Here is a copy/paste of the first half (approximately) of the article which may possibly pique readers' interest in reading and contemplating the whole thing:
I Introduction

A scientific community cannot practice its trade without some set of received beliefs. These beliefs form the foundation of the "educational initiation that prepares and licenses the student for professional practice". The nature of the "rigorous and rigid" preparation helps ensure that the received beliefs are firmly fixed in the student's mind. Scientists take great pains to defend the assumption that scientists know what the world is like...To this end, "normal science" will often suppress novelties which undermine its foundations. Research is therefore not about discovering the unknown, but rather "a strenuous and devoted attempt to force nature into the conceptual boxes supplied by professional education".

A shift in professional commitments to shared assumptions takes place when an anomaly undermines the basic tenets of the current scientific practice These shifts are what Kuhn describes as scientific revolutions - "the tradition-shattering complements to the tradition-bound activity of normal science" New assumptions –"paradigms" - require the reconstruction of prior assumptions and the re-evaluation of prior facts. This is difficult and time consuming. It is also strongly resisted by the established community.

II The Route to Normal Science

So how are paradigms created and what do they contribute to scientific inquiry?

Normal science "means research firmly based upon one or more past scientific achievements, achievements that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its further practice". These achievements must be sufficiently unprecedented to attract an enduring group of adherents away from competing modes of scientific activity and sufficiently open-ended to leave all sorts of problems for the redefined group of practitioners (and their students) to resolve. These achievements can be called paradigms. Students study these paradigms in order to become members of the particular scientific community in which they will later practice.

Because the student largely learns from and is mentored by researchers "who learned the bases of their field from the same concrete models" there is seldom disagreement over fundamentals. Men whose research is based on shared paradigms are committed to the same rules and standards for scientific practice. A shared commitment to a paradigm ensures that its practitioners engage in the paradigmatic observations that its own paradigm can do most to explain. Paradigms help scientific communities to bound their discipline in that they help the scientist to create avenues of inquiry, formulate questions, select methods with which to examine questions, define areas of relevance. and establish or create meaning. A paradigm is essential to scientific inquiry - "no natural history can be interpreted in the absence of at least some implicit body of intertwined theoretical and methodological belief that permits selection, evaluation, and criticism".

How are paradigms created, and how do scientific revolutions take place? Inquiry begins with a random collection of "mere facts" (although, often, a body of beliefs is already implicit in the collection). During these early stages of inquiry, different researchers confronting the same phenomena describe and interpret them in different ways. In time, these descriptions and interpretations entirely disappear. A pre-paradigmatic school appears. Such a school often emphasises a special part of the collection of facts. Often, these schools vie for pre-eminence.

From the competition of these pre-paradigmatic schools, one paradigm emerges - "To be accepted as a paradigm, a theory must seem better than its competitors, but it need not, and in fact never does, explain all the facts with which it can be confronted", thus making research possible. As a paradigm grows in strength and in the number of advocates, the other pre-paradigmatic schools or the previous paradigm fade.

A paradigm transforms a group into a profession or, at least, a discipline. And from this follow the formation of specialised journals, foundation of professional bodies and a claim to a special place in academe. There is a promulgation of scholarly articles intended for and "addressed only to professional colleagues, [those] whose knowledge of a shared paradigm can be assumed and who prove to be the only ones able to read the papers addressed to them".

III - The Nature of Normal Science.

If a paradigm consists of basic and incontrovertible assumptions about the nature of the discipline, what questions are left to ask?

When they first appear, paradigms are limited in scope and in precision. But more successful does not mean completely successful with a single problem or notably successful with any large number. Initially, a paradigm offers the promise of success. Normal science consists in the actualisation of that promise. This is achieved by extending the knowledge of those facts that the paradigm displays as particularly revealing, increasing the extent of the match between those facts and the paradigm's predictions, and further articulation of the paradigm itself.

In other words, there is a good deal of mopping-up to be done. Mop-up operations are what engage most scientists throughout their careers. Mopping-up is what normal science is all about! This paradigm-based research is "an attempt to force nature into the pre-formed and relatively inflexible box that the paradigm supplies". No effort is made to call forth new sorts of phenomena, no effort to discover anomalies. When anomalies pop up, they are usually discarded or ignored. Anomalies are usually not even noticed and no effort is made to invent a new theory (and there’s no tolerance for those who try). Those restrictions, born from confidence in a paradigm, turn out to be essential to the development of science. By focusing attention on a small range of relatively esoteric problems, the paradigm forces scientists to investigate some part of nature in a detail and depth that would otherwise be unimaginable" and, when the paradigm ceases to function properly, scientists begin to behave differently and the nature of their research problems changes.

IV - Normal Science as Puzzle-solving.

Doing research is essentially like solving a puzzle. Puzzles have rules. Puzzles generally have predetermined solutions.

A striking feature of doing research is that the aim is to discover what is known in advance. This in spite of the fact that the range of anticipated results is small compared to the possible results. When the outcome of a research project does not fall into this anticipated result range, it is generally considered a failure.

So why do research? Results add to the scope and precision with which a paradigm can be applied. The way to obtain the results usually remains very much in doubt - this is the challenge of the puzzle. Solving the puzzle can be fun, and expert puzzle-solvers make a very nice living. To classify as a puzzle (as a genuine research question), a problem must be characterised by more than the assured solution, but at the same time solutions should be consistent with paradigmatic assumptions.

Despite the fact that novelty is not sought and that accepted belief is generally not challenged, the scientific enterprise can and does bring about unexpected results.

V - The Priority of Paradigms.

The paradigms of a mature scientific community can be determined with relative ease. The "rules" used by scientists who share a paradigm are not so easily determined. Some reasons for this are that scientists can disagree on the interpretation of a paradigm. The existence of a paradigm need not imply that any full set of rules exist. Also, scientists are often guided by tacit knowledge - knowledge acquired through practice and that cannot be articulated explicitly. Further, the attributes shared by a paradigm are not always readily apparent.

Paradigms can determine normal science without the intervention of discoverable rules or shared assumptions. In part, this is because it is very difficult to discover the rules that guide particular normal-science traditions. Scientists never learn concepts, laws, and theories in the abstract and by themselves. They generally learn these with and through their applications. New theory is taught in tandem with its application to a concrete range of phenomena.

Sub-specialties are differently educated and focus on different applications for their research findings. A paradigm can determine several traditions of normal science that overlap without being coextensive. Consequently, changes in a paradigm affect different sub-specialties differently. "A revolution produced within one of these traditions will not necessarily extend to the others as well".

When scientists disagree about whether the fundamental problems of their field have been solved, the search for rules gains a function that it does not ordinarily possess .

VI - Anomaly and the Emergence of Scientific Discoveries.

If normal science is so rigid and if scientific communities are so close-knit, how can a paradigm change take place? Paradigm changes can result from discovery brought about by encounters with anomaly.

Normal science does not aim at novelties of fact or theory and, when successful, finds none. Nonetheless, new and unsuspected phenomena are repeatedly uncovered by scientific research, and radical new theories have again and again been invented by scientists . Fundamental novelties of fact and theory bring about paradigm change. So how does paradigm change come about? There are two ways: through discovery - novelty of fact - or by invention – novelty of theory. Discovery begins with the awareness of anomaly - the recognition that nature has violated the paradigm-induced expectations that govern normal science. The area of the anomaly is then explored. The paradigm change is complete when the paradigm has been adjusted so that the anomalous become the expected. The result is that the scientist is able "to see nature in a different way".. How paradigms change as a result of invention is discussed in greater detail in the following chapter.

Although normal science is a pursuit not directed to novelties and tending at first to suppress them, it is nonetheless very effective in causing them to arise. Why? An initial paradigm accounts quite successfully for most of the observations and experiments readily accessible to that science's practitioners. Research results in the construction of elaborate equipment, development of an esoteric and shared vocabulary, refinement of concepts that increasingly lessens their resemblance to their usual common-sense prototypes. This professionalisation leads to immense restriction of the scientist's vision, rigid science, resistance to paradigm change, and a detail of information and precision of the observation-theory match that can be achieved in no other way. New and refined methods and instruments result in greater precision and understanding of the paradigm. Only when researchers know with precision what to expect from an experiment can they recognise that something has gone wrong.

Consequently, anomaly appears only against the background provided by the paradigm . The more precise and far-reaching the paradigm, the more sensitive it is to detecting an anomaly and inducing change. By resisting change, a paradigm guarantees that anomalies that lead to paradigm change will penetrate existing knowledge to the core.

VII - Crisis and the Emergence of Scientific Theories.

As is the case with discovery, a change in an existing theory that results in the invention of a new theory is also brought about by the awareness of anomaly. The emergence of a new theory is generated by the persistent failure of the puzzles of normal science to be solved as they should. Failure of existing rules is the prelude to a search for new ones . These failures can be brought about by observed discrepancies between theory and fact or changes in social/cultural climates Such failures are generally long recognised, which is why crises are seldom surprising. Neither problems nor puzzles yield often to the first attack . Recall that paradigm and theory resist change and are extremely resilient. Philosophers of science have repeatedly demonstrated that more than one theoretical construction can always be placed upon a given collection of data . In early stages of a paradigm, such theoretical alternatives are easily invented. Once a paradigm is entrenched (and the tools of the paradigm prove useful to solve the problems the paradigm defines), theoretical alternatives are strongly resisted. As in manufacture so in science--retooling is an extravagance to be reserved for the occasion that demands it . Crises provide the opportunity to retool.

VIII - The Response to Crisis.

The awareness and acknowledgement that a crisis exists loosens theoretical stereotypes and provides the incremental data necessary for a fundamental paradigm shift. Normal science does and must continually strive to bring theory and fact into closer agreement. The recognition and acknowledgement of anomalies result in crises that .... (more follows)
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David
http://davidsundom.weebly.com/
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