Fantasy Philosophy: Thomas Kuhn

Written by Worm on October 20, 2005

Insofar as “truth” can be regarded as a verifiable scientific fact, Thomas Kuhn’s arguments about the nature of science and scientific revolutions would, it appears, make him a cognitive relativist. The two parts of his argument that I find most relevant in making this point are, firstly, his assertion that no scientific theory, past or present, is successful at explaining all natural phenomena, and secondly, that there is no neutral and objective way to record phenomena outside of pre-existing scientific paradigms. Couple with this the evidence he provides of a new theory actually changing previously recorded data, and the connected concept that a new scientific theory can significantly change the scientific community’s understanding of disparate phenomena that were previously thought to be well understood, and one finds that Kuhn presents a strong argument for scientific facts being wholly relative to the individual observer. Even with the utmost application of human reason, truth in this sense is dependent on the prevailing scientific paradigm, and, up to the present time, the paradigms of science have remained unstable and changing, with no end in sight.

Kuhn, in his evaluation of what causes scientific theories to change, draws attention to “anomalies” in the natural world, that is, certain known phenomena that the prevailing scientific paradigm cannot explain. Upon closer examination, these anomalies can be problematic, and require a change of paradigm to account for them. The competing paradigms, (old and new,) basically represent models of “truth”, i.e. how the natural world works, and a new one may function better than the old to explain the known set of natural phenomena. However, Kuhn points out that we have yet to arrive at a scientific paradigm that is free of all anomalies. As a consequence, looking ahead from our current scientific paradigm, one can anticipate that our understanding of the natural world will require a new model of scientific fact. And given the history that Kuhn cites, we may also anticipate that any number of facts that seem self-evident today may be negated in the course of adapting to a new model.

Whether or not truth and fact are equivalent is relevant to the issue of cognitive relativity, but if they are, it becomes difficult to escape the conclusion that facts only exist in the human mind, at least in Kuhn’s analysis. He suggests, reasonably, that the phenomena that are observed by scientists remain the same, even as the scientific paradigm changes. But there is apparently no neutral way to record the observation of such phenomena, without somehow applying current understanding in the selection of what is reported, and how. If there is such a way for humans to transmit information purely objectively, it hasn’t been discovered, or appear near to being discovered. Given, then, that facts as we know them are bound to the prevailing scientific paradigm when they are established, and that the paradigms of science periodically change, sometimes radically, what we consider to be facts are therefore dependent on the paradigmatic perspective of their observer.

What can one say to counter that argument? I suppose one could argue that objective truth does exist, but that no human will ever truly know it. Or, perhaps, that science, while a very useful enterprise, is in the final evaluation founded around the truths of the universe, but not on them. If the phenomena do indeed remain the same, then something must be said to be true of them, even if we can never render a true measure or recording of them.

-- Written by Worm on October 20, 2005