On Mar 4, 2007, at 3:04 PM, Christopher D. Green wrote:
Harzem Peter wrote:
On Mar 3, 2007, at 6:26 PM, jim guinee wrote:
"Are grief counsellors going to change their tune? I wouldn't bet
on it."
Is anyone on this list going to make a paradigm shift in their
professional endeavors based on one study?
Why not? Physics did on the basis of one study (Einstein's three
brief theoretical papers in one year).
Actually not. Almost no one took Einstein's theory of relativity
seriously until after Eddington published the solar eclipse study
of 1920. (Indeed, there's a standing joke that when a reporter said
to Eddington that only three people in the world even understood --
much less believed -- the theory of relativity, Eddington quipped
back, "Really? Who's the third?") Many, many more studies had to
come along before relativity came to be generally accepted among
physicists.
Yes, indeed. But, Chris, in the same posting did I not also write :
"By the way, regarding the question of whether more findings support
a position than another one, note that science is not a matter of
democracy and of number of votes. No one, at first, believes or
supports a novel finding or theory."? Of course I should have
written 'Einstein set off a basic change..."
As for Kuhn and paradigms, I think so little of that perspective
that I did not think to comment on the 'paradigm shift' phrase.
Now, it is a different matter when it comes to Popper. You write:
Finally, going Popperian (i.e., sure one study can overturn a
theory) isn't really going to get much more respect. Popper's most
infliuential student, Imre Lakatos, presented example after example
of situations in the natural science in which what initially looked
like a refutation turned out to be simply motivation to adjust
(rather than reject) the theory to accomodate the new data and then
declare the theory to be stronger and broder than ever before.
I am very much for that, and think very highly of Popper. (I gave a
paper in the Centennial celebrations of Popper held in Vienna.)
What changes is the theoretical explanation, not the data on which
the revised theory had been based. Some of the prior data may be
found to be faulty and be discarded, of course. However, there is
an important exception: a single set of data can, indeed, falsify
an theory (but not the data).
Popper's notions of the open society and, related to it, rational
empiricism, and the crucial falsifiability test of a scientific
theory remain as powerful as they were in their time, but much to our
loss nowadays they are not as well remembered.
Warm greetings,
Peter
Peter Harzem, B.Sc.(Lond.), Ph.D.(Wales)
Hudson Professor Emeritus
Department of Psychology
Auburn University
Auburn, AL 36849-5214
USA
Phone: +334 844-6482
Fax: +334 844-4447
E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Personal E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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