Observation, meaning and theory: Review of For and Against Method by Imre Lakatos and Paul Feyerabend [Book Review]
Times Higher Education Supplement 1:30-30 (2000)
Authors |
|
Abstract |
Imre Lakatos and Paul Feyerabend initially both accepted Popper's philosophy of science, but then reacted against it, and developed it in different directions. Lakatos sought to reconcile Kuhn and Popper by characterizing science as a process of competing research programmes, competing fragments of Kuhn's normal science. Feyerabend emphasized the need to develop rival theories to facilitate severe empirical testing of accepted theories, but then, as a result of a disastrous mistake, came to hold that theories that are incompatible with one another cannot be compared empirically. He ended up rejecting method in science. All four philosophers, Popper, Kuhn, Lakatos and Feyerabend missed the decisive defect in Popper's philosophy of science: persistent acceptance of unified theories only when endlessly many empirically more successful disunified rivals are available means that physics makes a big, highly problematic metaphysical assumption about the nature of the universe: it is such that some kind of underlying unity exists in nature. We need to adopt a new conception of science. In order to subject this implicit metaphysical conjecture to sustained critical assessment in an attempt to improve it, we need to see science as making a hierarchy of metaphysical assumptions about the knowability and comprehensibility of the universe, these assumptions becoming less substantial and more likely to be true as we ascend the hierarchy. Elements of Popper, Kuhn and Lakatos are to be found in this picture, but it also differs radically from all three. It more closely resembles Einstein's mature views about the nature of science.
|
Keywords | Karl Popper Paul Feyerabend Imre Lakatos Albert Einstein Philosophy of Science Scientific Method Science and Metaphysics Falsificationism Scientific Research Programmes |
Categories | (categorize this paper) |
Options |
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Download options
References found in this work BETA
No references found.
Citations of this work BETA
Similar books and articles
Popper, Kuhn, Lakatos, and Aim-Oriented Empiricism.Nicholas Maxwell - 2005 - Philosophia 32 (1-4):181-239.
For and Against Method: Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence.Imre Lakatos, Paul Feyerabend & Matteo Motterlini - 1999 - University of Chicago Press.
Imre Lakatos and Paul Feyerabend for and Against Method: Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the Lakatos–Feyerabend Correspondence. [REVIEW]Brendan Larvor - 2000 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 51 (4):919-922.
Imre Lakatos and Paul Feyerabend, For and Against Method: Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the Lakatos–Feyerabend Correspondence. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999, Cloth US $34.00. ISBN: 0226467740.Imre Lakatos, Paul Feyerabend & Brendan Larvor - 2000 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 51 (4):919-922.
For and Against Method: Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence by Imre Lakatos; Paul Feyerabend; Matteo Motterlini. [REVIEW]Richard Brown - 2001 - Isis 92:643-643.
Reconstruction of the Process of Fundamental Theory Change.Rinat M. Nugayev - 1989 - Kazan University Press.
For and Against Method, Including Lakatos' Lectures on Scientific Method, and the Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence. By Imre Lakatos and Paul Feyerabend. [REVIEW]J. Preston - 2002 - The European Legacy 7 (2):258-258.
Lakatos' Modification of Popper's Falsificationism.Mo Liu - 2005 - Dissertation, University of Edinburgh
A Critique of Popper's Views on Scientific Method.Nicholas Maxwell - 1972 - Philosophy of Science 39 (2):131-152.
Understanding Scientific Progress: Aim-Oriented Empiricism.Nicholas Maxwell - 2017 - St. Paul, USA: Paragon House.
For and Against Method: Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence. Imre Lakatos, Paul Feyerabend, Matteo Motterlini. [REVIEW]Richard Brown - 2001 - Isis 92 (3):643-643.
A Tale of Three Theories: Feyerabend and Popper on Progress and the Aim of Science.Luca Tambolo - 2015 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 51:33-41.
Analytics
Added to PP index
2016-10-04
Total views
100 ( #116,923 of 2,506,349 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
4 ( #170,234 of 2,506,349 )
2016-10-04
Total views
100 ( #116,923 of 2,506,349 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
4 ( #170,234 of 2,506,349 )
How can I increase my downloads?
Downloads