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The methodology of scientific research programmes. Philosophical papers. Vol. 1. Edited by John Worrall and Gregory Currie
Abstract
Imre Lakatos' philosophical and scientific papers are published here in two volumes. Volume I brings together his very influential but scattered papers on the philosophy of the physical sciences, and includes one important unpublished essay on the effect of Newton's scientific achievement. Volume II presents his work on the philosophy of mathematics (much of it unpublished), together with some critical essays on contemporary philosophers of science and some famous polemical writings on political and educational issues. Imre Lakatos had an influence out of all proportion to the length of his philosophical career. This collection exhibits and confirms the originality, range and the essential unity of his work. It demonstrates too the force and spirit he brought to every issue with which he engaged, from his most abstract mathematical work to his passionate 'Letter to the director of the LSE'. Lakatos' ideas are now the focus of widespread and increasing interest, and these volumes should make possible for the first time their study as a whole and their proper assessment.
... Testing will produce validation or rejection of specific hypotheses, and theories will contain variable amounts of knowledge (i.e., heuristics) according to their number of validated hypotheses. These research programs will compete to explain and forecast facts and the ones with higher heuristics should theoretically prevail over the others (Lakatos, 1978;Bunge, 1998;Niiniluoto, 1999;Popper, 2002;Niiniluoto, 2012Niiniluoto, , 2013Bunge, 2017). The history of science tells us that this is the way science progresses in the long term. ...
... SR argues that some scientific theories are more successful than others because they are better approximations to the truth and can, therefore, make more successful predictions of events. They also contain a greater load of heuristically-explained phenomena (Lakatos, 1978). There are different views about whether demarcation consists of theories being scientific when they can be falsified (Popper, 2002), or corroborated, or likely or neither falsified nor corroborated but containing a higher heuristic than competitive explanations (Lakatos, 1978); however, all of them coincide in determining that scientific theories must be logically consistent, empirically testable, and compete for explaining the wider range of phenomena possible and for making new predictions. ...
... They also contain a greater load of heuristically-explained phenomena (Lakatos, 1978). There are different views about whether demarcation consists of theories being scientific when they can be falsified (Popper, 2002), or corroborated, or likely or neither falsified nor corroborated but containing a higher heuristic than competitive explanations (Lakatos, 1978); however, all of them coincide in determining that scientific theories must be logically consistent, empirically testable, and compete for explaining the wider range of phenomena possible and for making new predictions. Likewise, hypothesis testing is based on the use of logicallylinked true premises, which expose the conditions of the explanans and its path to the explanandum, in pretty much a similar fashion to the deductive-nomological system devised by Hempel (Bunge, 1998). ...
The comparative method in palaeoanthropology has been predominant over the hypothesis-testing scientific method. Multiple interpretations over the same phenomena commonly co-exist given the relaxation of demarcation criteria. The contingent nature of non-reproducible phenomena in palaeoanthropology and the epistemological limits of the comparative method for addressing structural and more systematic palaeobiological processes have made it difficult to discern the extent to which palaeoanthropology is guided by scientific protocols. The imprint of corporative and neo-liberal policies in academia has found in essentially non-experimental disciplines a good field in which academic dynamics are ruled by patronizing networks of academic elites that produce and maintain trends, paradigms that do not need to be subjected to heuristics, research agendas frequently with specific political content, and control of the discourse of the past. Foucault argued that such a power-implanted structure is not intentional but emergent at the institutional level. This translates into a palaeoanthropological praxis that thrives on fact-collecting, and which produces interpretations that cannot be checked against any demarcation boundary to test their heuristics. This is reflected in the fact that paradigms may emerge and disappear in palaeoanthropology without need to confront them with their empirical content. Some examples are presented that justify this assertion
... Research programs can be examined at various levels. Lakatos pointed out that "even science as a whole can be regarded as a huge research program with Popper's supreme heuristic rule: 'devise conjectures which have more empirical content than their predecessors'" (Lakatos, 1978). However, more commonly, an academic discipline consists of several rival research programs vying for attention, aiming to demonstrate their progress (Gillies, 2007;Larvor, 1998). ...
... Lakatos envisioned this competition as constructive, where each program strives to progress due to challenges from its rivals. He even suggested that individual researchers could work within multiple research programs to expedite this process (Lakatos, 1978). ...
... To substantiate his perspective on scientific progress, Lakatos (1978) analyzed historical episodes, such as Niels Bohr's work on light emission, employing "rational reconstructions" of idea development, with historical details relegated to footnotes (Larvor, 1998). The purpose of these reconstructions was to offer a rational explanation of the growth of objective knowledge, rather than a comprehensive historical account (Lakatos, 1970). ...
The investigation of research trends in mathematics education in the global landscape has been prominent in the recent years. However, there is a dearth of literature in investigating research trends in mathematics education in the Philippine setting. Thus, this bibliometric analysis on the research in mathematics education in the Philippines from 2013 to 2023 was conducted. This paper aimed to present scientific information about the distribution pattern of research on mathematics education in terms of discipline, the profile of prominent authors, the key subject areas which given emphasis, and the direction of research. A total of 993 articles were obtained from the Scopus database and were analyzed using the VOSviewer software application to see the research trends in mathematics education in the Philippines. Research articles emerged as the predominant document type, followed by conference papers. The pinnacle of mathematics education research in the Philippines was in 2014. Notably, the research trend in the Philippines for the last five years have observable decrease in mathematics education. Results show that in terms of discipline, problem solving, teacher professional development, and curriculum were typically the key areas of emphasis. Moreover, the top author with the greatest number of citations since 2013-2023 is a female researcher from Mindanao. Furthermore, the mathematics subjects that have the most attention are algebra, proof, calculus, technology, geometry, and modeling. Finally, this paper foresees continued growth in mathematics education research in the Philippines, particularly in the realms of professional development and problem-solving.
... ATOM serves as a critical framework for evaluating the hard cores of research programmes in a consistent and replicable manner (Williams, Forthcoming-b). This approach aligns with Lakatos' concept of scienti c research programmes and allows for a systematic assessment of KCT's progressive or degenerative nature (Lakatos, 1978;Williams, 2022). ...
... Imre Lakatos's (1978) concept of research programmes offers a framework for understanding the evolution of scienti c theories, although it is not without its critics. Unlike Karl Popper's falsi cationism, which suggests that theories should be abandoned when contradicted by empirical evidence (Popper, 1959), Lakatos proposed that scienti c theories are part of larger research programmes that can persist and develop even in the face of apparent contradictions (Lakatos, 1970). ...
... Lakatos argued that research programmes can be evaluated as either 'progressive' or 'degenerating' based on their theoretical and empirical progressiveness (Lakatos, 1978). Theoretical progressiveness refers to the programme's ability to predict novel facts, while empirical progressiveness is demonstrated when these predictions are subsequently corroborated by evidence. ...
Knowledge Capital Theory (KCT) posits a causal link between educational outcomes and economic growth. This study critically examines KCT through a Critical Realist (CR) lens, leveraging two novel datasets: Rosetta Stone and Harmonized Learning Outcomes (HLO). These datasets offer a more comprehensive view of educational performance across diverse global contexts, addressing limitations in data and methods currently used in International Large-Scale Assessments (ILSAs).
The study employs an updated Abductive Theory of Science Method (ATOM) framework within a CR perspective, combining quantitative analysis with qualitative inquiry to discuss underlying mechanisms and contextual factors influencing the education-economy relationship.
Analysis reveals a complex picture of KCT's empirical and theoretical status. Regression models with the conditioned Rosetta and HLO data produced R² values of 0.43 and 0.21 respectively, indicating a significant relationship between cognitive skills and economic growth. However, a logarithmic model for the HLO data yielded a higher R² of 0.389 compared to 0.211 using linear conditioning, challenging KCT's linear assumptions.
The study identified several atypical countries, suggesting the influence of factors such as resource-dependent economies, industry concentration, and economic instability. While providing support for KCT's core claims across a broader range of countries than previous research, these findings highlight the need for more nuanced interpretations.
This research raises fundamental questions about applying Lakatosian concepts in social sciences, suggesting a reinterpretation of Lakatos' framework as a heuristic tool rather than a strict evaluative criterion in open social systems. It proposes a dual approach in educational economics: pursuing empirical progressiveness while developing more sophisticated theoretical models that accommodate open systems' complexities.
By incorporating CR and ATOM, the study provides a methodological framework for future ILSA research that better accounts for the multifaceted nature of educational outcomes and their economic impacts. This approach offers policymakers contextually relevant insights for developing effective educational policy, while giving researchers tools for more comprehensive analyses of the education-economy relationship.
The findings have implications for educational policy, particularly regarding Sustainable Development Goal 4, highlighting the need for context-sensitive approaches to education reform that consider the complex interplay of factors influencing the education-economy relationship.
... After all, if you have more confidence in your theory than in the observation or experiment, it would not be irrational to stick by your theory. And, as a matter of fact, the history of science is rich with examples of successful theories that have weathered the storm of failed predictions (Chalmers, 2013;Lakatos, 1978). Newtonian Mechanics, for example, initially failed to predict the orbits of the Moon, and of Uranus (Chalmers, 2013). ...
... None of these strategies is straightforwardly unscientific. As Lakatos argued, scientists can and should seek to conserve the core theoretical commitments of a research programme by modifying more peripheral elements of the programme until such time as any revisions become manifestly ad hoc and fail to deliver any novel predictions or else, deliver predictions that repeatedly turn out to be false (Lakatos, 1978). So, if progress in consciousness science is to be achieved via theory testing, rather than proceeding via a single definitive experiment, we should expect it to be incremental (Melloni, 2022;Corcoran et al., 2023). ...
It is often suggested that to make progress in consciousness science we need a theory of consciousness—one that tells us what consciousness is and what kinds of systems can have it. But this may be putting the cart before the horse. There are currently a wide range of very different theories all claiming to be theories of consciousness. How are we to decide between them if we do not already know which systems are conscious and what they are conscious of? In this paper I aim to do two things. First, I explain why a theory‐driven approach to consciousness science, even one sensitive to Lakatosian norms and updating in a Bayesian manner, may lead to divergence rather than convergence. Second, I draw on the history of thermometry and natural kind reasoning to sketch a theory‐neutral route towards progress in consciousness science.
... Distinguishing between preferences and choices could be a lifebuoy (or "protective belt", to use Lakatos' [1978] term) for the transitivity axiom (transitivity should be held for preferences not choices). From this point of view, defenders of intransitivity can agree with Williamson's (2024) article containing analysis of risky challenges for intransitive preferences. ...
... Thus, one can conclude that the "mobile assault towers" model seems more general to people. The model has higher "heuristic power" catalyzing understanding of intransitivities via occurrence of analogies than the gears' model which is too domain-specific and counter-intuitive (on heuristic power in more general sense, see [Ippoliti, 2022;Lakatos, 1978;Worrall, 2002]). ...
The status of the axioms of transitivity of dominance (“if x dominates y and y dominates z, then x dominates z” and “if a person prefers A to B and B to C, then that person should prefer A to C”) as key components of rationality is discussed. The discussion is conducted in the context of modern mathematical and natural science studies of systems in objectively intransitive (rock—paper—scissors) relations contradictory to the transitivity axioms. Experiential studies of solving problems about various intransitive objects and relations are described. From an epistemological point of view, it seems reasonable to distinguish between 4 types of situations. (1) Relations are objectively transitive, and problem solvers: (1a) make correct conclusions about them; or (1b) wrongly consider the relations as intransitive. Most cognitive studies are conducted in this paradigm. (2) Relations are objectively intransitive, and problem solvers: (2a) make correct conclusions about them; or (2b) wrongly consider the relations as transitive (e.g., because of taking the transitivity axiom for granted). This has been minimally studied in cognitive psychology. In general, for objectively transitive options, intransitive choices are fallacies. For objectively intransitive options, fallacies are transitive choices of the intransitive options. Topological and graph theoretic approaches are more appropriate to present objectively intransitive objects and systems than metric approaches. Models of intransitive relations in biological studies are worthy of special interest in this context. Teaching intransitivity problem solving should be based on studies how abilities develop in this area and broader educational studies.
... Williams (2022) summarised the primary methodological criticisms made by many researchers, which continue to be made against PISA and KCT. Furthermore, he used the idea of Lakatosian research programmes (Lakatos 1978) to argue that using the two senses of a research programme, the ability to make progress; that of theoretical-explanatory power and the empirical-predictive ability of a research programme, that KCT held features consistent with a degenerative research programme and as such should be considered high-risk in its current formulation (Rappleye and Komatsu 2019; Williams 2022). ...
... Imre Lakatos' philosophy of science, particularly his concept of the 'scientific research programme' (Lakatos 1978), offers valuable insights for evaluating KCT's role in ILSAs. Lakatos argued that a research programme comprises a series of theoretical assumptions that guide its methodologies and that such programmes should be appraised by their progressive or degenerative problem shifts-whether they open up new research avenues or become mired in ad hoc adjustments (Maxwell 2005). ...
International Large-Scale Assessments (ILSAs), such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), play a crucial role in evaluating educational performance globally. This paper explores the limitations of the current ILSA methodologies, which are grounded in Knowledge Capital Theory (KCT) (Hanushek and Woessmann 2022) and logical empiricism, arguing that they fail to capture the complexities of educational systems. This study addresses the question: How can a Critical Realist (CR) framework improve the methodological foundations of ILSAs? Using an updated Abductive Theory of Method (ATOM) (Haig 2018), this paper proposes a shift towards CR to better recognize latent variables and the multifaceted nature of educational outcomes. This study shows that adopting CR and the updated ATOM model provides a more comprehensive understanding of educational phenomena, which has significant implications for educational policy and practice. The findings suggest that this methodological evolution can enhance the interpretative and explanatory power of ILSAs, offering a more nuanced approach to international educational assessments.
... Sin embargo, el estudio del papel que juegan estas, así como su incidencia en el cambio científico, no es nuevo. De hecho, las comunidades científicas, como objeto de estudio, fueron ya abordadas por filósofos de la ciencia del siglo pasado (Merton, 1942; Popper, 1945 Popper, y 1948Kuhn: 1969;Lakatos, 1971). Y este es, precisamente, el tema del presente escrito, ¿cómo es que Tomas S. Kuhn e Imre Lakatos concibieron el papel que juegan las comunidades científicas en el cambio científico, en relación con el modelo desarrollado por Karl R. Popper? ...
... However, the study of the role they play, as well as their impact on scientific change, is not new. In fact, scientific communities as an object of study were already addressed by philosophers of science in the last century (Merton, 1942;Popper, 1945Popper, y 1948Kuhn: 1969;Lakatos, 1971). And this is precisely the subject of this paper: how Tomas S. Kuhn and Imre Lakatos conceived the role of scientific communities in scientific change, in relation to the model previously developed by Karl R. Popper. ...
Partiendo de la idea de que la ciencia es un esfuerzo humano colectivo para adquirir conocimiento, recientemente vienen cobrando importancia los estudios sobre las comunidades científicas y sus prácticas (O'Connor: 2023). Sin embargo, el estudio del papel que juegan estas, así como su incidencia en el cambio científico, no es nuevo. De hecho, las comunidades científicas, como objeto de estudio, fueron ya abordadas por filósofos de la ciencia del siglo pasa-do (Merton, 1942; Popper, 1945 y 1948; Kuhn: 1969; Lakatos, 1971). Y este es, precisamente, el tema del presente escrito, ¿cómo es que Tomas S. Kuhn e Imre Lakatos concibieron el papel que juegan las comunidades científicas en el cambio científico, en relación con el modelo desarrollado por Karl R. Popper? Concretamente aquí presentamos un doble debate; por un lado, el que sostuvieron Kuhn y Lakatos, en contra de la concepción de Popper, sobre las comunidades científicas; por otra, el que sostuvieron ambos filósofos entre sí, sobre el mismo tema. Para desarrollar ambos debates, en primer lugar, y siguiendo un orden cronológico, presentamos la postura popperiana. Posteriormente, desarrollamos el tema del 'dogmatismo limitado'-que es la forma en que los especialistas llaman a la postura que, tanto Kuhn como Lakatos, sostuvieron para oponerse a Popper (Carrier, 2016). Una vez planteado esto, exponemos el debate sostenido entre sendos filósofos. Concluimos nuestro artículo presentando una valoración de los aportes que nos dejó este amplio debate sobre el papel que juegan las comunidades científicas en cuanto el cambio científico.
... Redundant, incompatible or contradictory theories coexist because they fail to harness the explanatory power to overcome one another (Kuhn, 1962;Lakatos, 1978). Every single new, naïve and hopeful proposal of integration or replacement is evidence of this. ...
This article orbits the promise of Sociology and presents the sociology of promises -- or, more precisely, the science of promises, aimed at addressing all sociological curiosities and encompassing all that is sociological. In introducing the General Social Theory of Compromises (G-STOC), a framework designed to overcome the fragmentation of traditional social theories and address their limitations in explaining social behavior, a breakthrough is presented in eight main takeaways that are simultaneously ontological, epistemological and theoretical: (1) social coercive powers derive from actual or virtual agency; (2) virtual agency derives from promises; (3) all anger and disappointment derive from broken promises; (4) promises are always in dynamic reciprocal sets called compromises; (5) compromises are heuristic devices underlying all social relationships; (6) all social phenomena involve compromises; (7) to explain is to describe relationships and (8) sociological explanation, therefore, derives from the description of compromises and their history. The above tenets begin to outline a powerful and coherent framework and their proper appreciation is bound to have a profound impact in Social Science. Emphasizing theoretical novelty and superior heuristic power while avoiding convoluted syntheses of competing theories, the author advocates for clear conceptual and theoretical grounds to enable a complete and integrated explanation of social phenomena. With this innovative approach, the paper invites scholars to engage critically with G-STOC and explore its potential to unify and enhance the study of the social world, offering new insights about its complexities.
... Nonetheless, it remains possible to undertake an informal assessment of sincerity given the current state of World 3 knowledge (Popper, 1974b(Popper, , p. 1080. In particular, collective critical rationalism may be used to evaluate the sincerity of a test by assessing the extent to which (a) p(e, b) ≪ ½ and (b) h′ represents a significant accepted theory that predicts contradictory results to h (e.g., Lakatos, 1968Lakatos, , 1978Laudan, 1997, pp. 314-315; see also Bandyopadhyay & Brittan, 2006, p. 264;van Dongen et al., 2023, p. 521). ...
One justification for preregistering research hypotheses, methods, and analyses is that it improves the transparent evaluation of the severity of hypothesis tests. In this article, I consider two cases in which preregistration does not improve this evaluation. First, I argue that, although preregistration can facilitate the transparent evaluation of severity in Mayo's error statistical philosophy of science, it does not facilitate this evaluation in Popper's theory-centric approach. To illustrate, I show that associated concerns about Type I error rate inflation are only relevant in the error statistical approach and not in a theory-centric approach. Second, I argue that a preregistered test procedure that allows deviations in its implementation does not provide a more transparent evaluation of Mayoian severity than a non-preregistered procedure. In particular, I argue that sample-based validity-enhancing deviations cause an unknown inflation of the test procedure's Type I (familywise) error rate and, consequently, an unknown reduction in its capability to license inferences severely. I conclude that preregistration does not improve the transparent evaluation of severity in Popper's philosophy of science or when deviations are allowed.
... Lakatos (1992 relembra que, para visões justificacionistas 7 , por centenas de anos, o conhecimento científico significou conhecimento provado, tanto pela força do intelecto quanto pela evidência dos sentidos. ParaLakatos (1992), Popper teve o mérito de perceber que tal compreensão foi abalada e caiu por terra, principalmente devido à derrocada da inabalável física newtoniana após 150 anos de vigência e de sua substituição pela teoria da relatividade, ainda que, segundo Lakatos, houvesse tentativas infrutíferas de resistência de alguns empiristas lógicos de buscarem o ideal pela alternativa da verdade mais provável ...
Examinam-se os discursos que se encontram por detrás de meios de divulgação científica de um livro e um vídeo postado na internet. Os discursos são analisados a partir de uma leitura epistemológica, motivado pelo interesse de que esse conteúdo compõe as disciplinas de Evolução dos Conceitos de Física. Mostra-se que as narrativas construídas pelos diretores, escritores e protagonistas que elaboram esses materiais de divulgação veem carregados de concepções indiretas ou visões explícitas acerca da ciência. Além de apontar essas concepções mediante análises epistemológicas, também é proposto ao docente da disciplina de evolução o emprego de mídias que estão à sua disposição e tratá-las na forma como são aqui apresentadas e avaliadas. Assim, torna-se possível que os estudantes possam aplicar e, consequentemente, aprender com mais significado, os conhecimentos envolvidos com esse conteúdo.
... Theory enables researchers to summarize prior knowledge on a particular effect, pose risky but meaningful predictions, develop fit-for-purpose studies with appropriate research designs aimed at testing the predictions against observation, interpret the observations relative to predictions including support or falsification, and provide a basis for subsequent tests (e.g., Davis et al., 2015;Hagger et al., 2017;Trafimow, 2009). Consistent with the principles advocated by classic empiricists (e.g., Lakatos, 1978;Meehl, 1990), theory testing is a time-consuming and iterative process, with each study representing a data point that contributes to the accumulating body of evidence for the theory-predicted effect, bounded by the limitations and caveats of the methods adopted and associated auxiliary assumptions (St Quinton & Trafimow, 2022). The cumulative evidence garnered from these tests provides an opportunity to evaluate the utility of the theory as well as its sufficiency, assumptions, boundary conditions, and limitations, and serves as a basis for future research aimed at developing it further (Ajzen, 1991;Gonzalez-Mulé & Aguinis, 2018;Trafimow, 2022). ...
Testing theoretical predictions in sport and exercise psychology typically involves simultaneous tests of networks of proposed effects among psychological constructs and outcomes. One approach that holds considerable promise in advancing theory in this and other fields is the application of analytic techniques combining meta-analysis and multivariate analyses such as structural equation modeling to test theoretical predictions in synthesized data from multiple studies. In this review, we provide an overview of this approach to theory testing in research in sport and exercise psychology. We provide a nontechnical overview of its basic principles and outline the advantages it affords, including: leveraging of the large sample size from multiple data sources to provide robust averaged point and variability estimates of theory effects with high statistical power; capacity to provide overall evaluations of theoretical models across available research and guideline ranges for the expected size of theory effects in subsequent tests in primary studies; ability to test mechanistic effects, namely, mediation effects and effects of study-level and, in some cases, sample-level moderator variables on theory effects; and capacity to test predictions of both current and novel theories. We outline forms of meta-analytic structural equation modeling procedures and methods available to test theory predictions and provide a series of examples that illustrate their application to test theories in sport and exercise psychology. We conclude by summarizing some of the limitations of this approach and recommend some future innovations to, and applications of, the approach that are expected advance cumulative knowledge of theory in the field.
Peter Lewin and Nicolas Cachanosky seek to rehabilitate the concept of the average period of production (APP) introduced into Austrian capital theory by Böhm-Bawerk (1930). In their works, they argue that the financial concepts of Macauley’s Duration and Modified Duration are appropriate measures of the average period of production. For this reason, the most relevant aspects of the Austrian Business Cycle Theory (ABCT), i.e. the lengthening and shortening of the production structure, can be captured by them. In fact, the introduction of this concept into ABCT is pointless, since it only shows the sensitivity of the economy to changes in interest rates. Meanwhile, it does not help us understand a number of other phenomena that can be observed over the business cycle. By focusing on APP as represented by duration and modified duration, we are only referring to how the average value of all investments in the economy changes under the influence of a change in interest rates, ignoring other important phenomena that take place over the course of the business cycle.
This paper argues that we ought to conceive of the Dark Energy problem—the question of how to account for observational data, naturally interpreted as accelerated expansion of the universe—as a crisis of underdetermined pursuit-worthiness. Not only are the various approaches to the Dark Energy problem evidentially underdetermined; at present, no compelling reasons single out any of them as more likely to be true than the other. More vexingly for working scientists, none of the approaches stands out as uncontroversially preferable over its rivals in terms of its rationally warranted promise, i.e. the reasons to further work on, explore, and develop it. We demonstrate this claim by applying a Peircean economic model of pursuit-worthiness in terms of a cognitive cost/benefit estimate—with the instantiation of theory virtues as key indicators of cognitive gains—to the four main Dark Energy proposals (the cosmological constant approach, modified gravity, quintessence, and inhomogeneous cosmologies). According to our analysis, these approaches do not admit of an unambiguous, or uncontroversial, ranking with respect to which ansatz deserves distinguished attention and research efforts. The overall methodological counsel that our analysis underwrites recommends a pragmatic double research strategy forward: to encourage and foster theory pluralism and the search for tests—with the goal of enhancing the testability of the CDM model and “testing it to destruction".
Objective
While much research has been conducted on retention, attrition, and college completion among those who voluntarily withdraw from college, few studies have focused on involuntary withdrawal in the form of academic dismissal. Even less scholarship has examined the subsequent restoration of academic momentum for returning students. Furthermore, the lack of appropriate theoretical models directed at readmitted students with past records of academic failure has created a dilemma for institutions. Particularly, when trying to assess readmission policies and establishing programs or interventions to promote academic success and persistence to graduation. This study explores factors that influence restoration of academic momentum among students returning from academic dismissal.
Method
Using a sequential, partial mixed methods approach, descriptive and qualitative data was collected through a survey ( N = 171) and student interviews ( N = 11) at a large, public community college.
Results
Findings disconfirmed past research that academically dismissed students are primarily underprepared scholastically while confirming life events as a key contributor to dismissal. Results also demonstrated the importance of faculty support and active learning as well as the value of advisors as contextualized change agents in the academic restoration process. Finally, it was evident that returning students possessed motivational attributes conducive to restoring academic momentum, including a strong growth mindset, academic resilience, and high self-determination.
Contributions
This study affords a Reconceptualized Restorative Academic Momentum Model of Success to guide and understand the academic and psychosocial experiences of students returning from academic dismissal centered on pre-college influences, classroom teaching and learning experiences, support services, and student motivational attributes.
Categorical diagnosis, a pillar of the medical model, has not worked well in psychiatry where most diagnoses are still exclusively symptom based. Uncertainty continues about whether categories or dimensions work better for the assessment and treatment of idiopathic psychoses. The Bipolar Schizophrenia Network for Intermediate Phenotypes (B-SNIP) examined multiple cognitive and electrophysiological biomarkers across a large transdiagnostic psychosis data set. None of the variables supported neurobiological distinctiveness for conventional clinical psychosis diagnoses but showed a continuum of severity. Using numerical taxonomy of these data, B-SNIP identified three biological subtypes (Biotypes) agnostic to DSM diagnoses. Biotype-1 is characterized by reduced physiological response to salient stimuli, while Biotype-2 showed accentuated intrinsic (background or ongoing) neural activity and the worst inhibition. Biotype-3 cases are like healthy persons on many laboratory measures. These Biotypes differed in imaging and other electrophysiological measures not included in subgroup creation, illustrating external validation. The Biotypes solution also replicated in an independent sample of psychosis cases. Biotypes are differentiable by clinical characteristics, leading to a feasible algorithm for Biotype estimates. Identifying Biotypes may aid treatment selection and outcome prediction. As an example, preliminary cross-sectional B-SNIP data suggest that Biotype-1 cases may have physiological features that predict a more favorable response to clozapine. While psychosis Biotypes reveal physiological heterogeneity across cases with similar clinical characteristics, data also suggest a dimensional vulnerability for serious psychopathology that cuts across diagnostic boundaries. Both categorical and dimensional diagnostic approaches should be considered within idiopathic psychosis for optimum diagnosis, care, and research.
Paul Feyerabend and Imre Lakatos were the closest of friends and disputing intellectual comrades until Lakatos’ early death in 1974. Against Method (1975) was to have been co-written as For and Against Method, with Lakatos delivering his own historicist and rationalist attack on Feyerabend’s skepticism about universal scientific method. This chapter describes their complementary and competing ideas on some major episodes from the history of science, including a shared critical appraisal of Newton’s philosophy of method compared to his scientific practice. Feyerabend’s views in Against Method on the emergence of Western rationalism in the Presocratics is deepened by Lakatos’ anti-foundationalism in mathematics, as developed in the posthumously published Proofs and Refutations: The Logic of Mathematical Discovery (1976). In the philosophy of science, Feyerabend argued that Lakatos’ methodology of scientific research programmes was an ‘anarchism’ in disguise, with that appraisal placed here in the context of Lakatos’ Hegelian historiography and its Hungarian intellectual sources.
The location of the living human being in the animal world is a long-standing discussion, with recurrences from time to time. Perhaps one of the most significant for contemporary Western thought was the course that Kojeve gave between 1935 and 1939 on the phenomenology of Hegel’s spirit, not so much not only because of the teaching itself but because of the resonances on the rest of French thought and in a certain sense European in general. Bataille, Lacan, Levy-Srauss, Foucault, and Agamben, among others, refer to the turn this course represented for human interpretation.
Based on this interpretation, several unavoidable concepts can be identified, without which this discussion would be meaningless: the concept of homo has been indistinctly associated with sapiens, faber, zoon politikón, ludens, conscious, or drive. The first has had a clear expression in the anthropological tradition or non-pragmatic sociology, leaving the last two reserved for psychology and psychoanalysis.
In an approximation to the Freudian text of 1915 Drive and destinations of drive, which J. Lacan made in his Seminar 11, “The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis”; specifically, in the class of May 6, 1964 “Disassembly of the Drive,” he reminds us how essential one of the concepts of psychoanalysis is for the analytic experience: the drive (Trieb). This term, with a long history of clarifications and ambiguities in Freud’s work, is found throughout the entire corpus of his metapsychology, basting together the rest of the concepts and giving the body to a theory of the human psyche. Thus, the drive, rooted in psychoanalytic interpretations, which “every analyst (is) knows by existence” (Lacan, Les quatre concepts fondamentaux de la psychanalyse. Le séminaire, livre XI. Éditions du Seuil, 1964, p. 60); however, it has been “used” at will, according to what each theoretician needed for what he had to address.
At the very core of this discussion is the relationship with Pathos. The recognition or not of the living human and its type variants, pathology as a result of the non-pathological or pathos as indissoluble from the cultural essence have been some of the central questions. However, autism has appeared as an uncomfortable stone, whether one enters via “normality” toward the “pathological” or vice versa. It has even had a problematic history in the psychoanalytic tradition as well.
In this way, since the notion of autism began to be legitimised in the psychoanalytic tradition to name certain subjects—particularly infants—a diverse and challenging use was made of the Freudian notion of drive in its interpretation.
Then, to ask: how could “drive theory” explain what psychoanalysis considers “autism”? What are the difficulties in the dialogue between these two signifiers? Are these difficulties due to the misunderstanding of the word autism, as some hypothesise? Or to the different meanings of the drive in Freud, as others think? Or perhaps, are there other epistemic reasons that block these two concepts in the psychoanalytic theoretical gear?
We hypothesise that the appearance of autism came to shake up all this tradition for which the human subject was a fracture in the animal evolutionary continuity, both that of consciousness/unconscious—which exceeds the possibility of discussion in this space—and the “drive thesis,” which is the one that concerns us. In this sense, the opposition continuism-discontinuism would now be, for the phylogenetic, put into question, to be eventually replaced by an asymptotic continuism, more assimilable to the Spinozian bet.
This chapter explores the references to Sigmund Freud’s theory of drives in the interpretative approaches to child autism. Notably, it analyses the psychoanalytic thesis that proposes a constitutive failure in primordial times to understand the genesis of autism. The work explicitly presents a revelation of drive theory’s importance for the approach to autism. It also drives the exploration of the modes of appropriation and the use of said theorisation to explain the autistic phenomenon. Finally, the chapter discusses the analysis of the difficulties presented to the psychoanalytic authors when trying to accept autistic functioning and their theoretical choices to interpret it according to drive’s theory.
How can modern neural networks like language models be useful to the field of language acquisition, and more broadly cognitive science, if they are not a priori designed to be cognitive models? As developments towards natural language understanding and generation have improved leaps and bounds, with models like GPT‐4, the question of how they can inform our understanding of human language acquisition has re‐emerged. As such, it is critical to examine how in practice linking hypotheses between models and human learners can be safely established. To address these questions, we propose a model taxonomy, including four modelling approaches, each having differing goals, from exploratory hypothesis generation to hypothesis differentiation and testing. We show how the goals of these approaches align with the overarching goals of science and linguistics by connecting our taxonomy to the realist versus instrumentalist approaches in philosophy of science. We survey recent work having adopted each of our modelling approaches and address the importance of computational modelling in language acquisition studies.
This chapter delves into the origin of ‘resilience thinking’ and how it evolved from ecology to be used in social sciences. While widely used, resilience lacks a unified definition, manifesting differently within disciplines. Resilience theory has evolved into a tool for analysing complex interactions in socio-ecological systems, and such an interdisciplinary approach calls for complex systems thinking. However, its application in social sciences faces challenges due to conceptual ambiguities, normative assumptions, and difficulties defining system boundaries. Despite these challenges, the paper suggests that resilience thinking could serve as a bridging concept, fostering interdisciplinary research and prompting critical reflections on societal dynamics. We also discuss the applicability of resilience theory and resilience models to the law as a complex system, presenting its notable limitations, analysing the possible advantages of the use of resilience as a scientific research programme, and emphasising the dangers of using it as a metaphor. Using the transfer of property as an example, we propose an alternative model of system response by the law in relation to external stimuli based on Jean Piaget’s theory of adaptation.
Scholars have long debated what is the role of inequalities in organised violence, but the causal mechanisms remain unclear. I argue that mainstream approaches (e.g. deviance, subcultures, grievances, rational choice and Marxism) fall short because they overlook that organised violence is an intensive form of work. These perspectives often exoticise individuals involved in violence for profit or political purposes. Violence is not a deviant feature of social life but an integral part of collective action. By applying occupational lenses, I position those engaged in violence as a specialised class of manual workers recruited in the protection labour market. Scholars can acknowledge the occupational stratification observed before in research about organised violence by understanding violence specialists as workers. This essay explores how the sociology of work can enhance our understanding of inequality reproduction within criminal organisations, guerrillas, armies, police forces, mercenaries and private military companies.
We theorize why and how strategists develop different types of theories when confronted with different types of problems by combining knowledge and imagination in different ways. We propose that strategists’ epistemic stances affect how they combine knowledge and imagination and whether they develop either analytic theories, or constructive theories of two types: reconfigurative and projective. We theorize how imagination complements knowledge in theory development to generate distinctive strategies and strategic advantages. We argue that analytic theories enable conjectural anticipation, which contributes to early timing of strategic actions; that reconfigurative theories posit novel value dimensions and enable industry shaping; and that projective theories articulate novel possibilities to shape desired and desirable futures. Our ideas advance research on how imagination is leveraged in theory development, future-oriented strategizing, and shaping strategies.
L’objectif de la présente réflexion est de montrer que, proprement compris, les extrêmes du « scientifiquement prouvé » et de l’appel au complot procèdent en réalité d’une seule et même méprise épistémique quant à la nature exacte de ce qui est typiquement considéré comme requis pour connaître en bonne et due forme. En d’autres termes, il s’agira ici de diagnostiquer le point commun (illégitime) sur lequel capitalisent de concert ces deux pôles rhétoriques qui accaparent malheureusement une bonne part du débat public lorsqu’il en vient à être question des sciences et des connaissances que celles-ci développent. Passé ce diagnostic, l’article sera l’occasion d’une modeste recommandation de philosophe à l’égard de la communauté des communicant(e)s de la science. Afin de remplir ces objectifs, l’article prendra d’abord un chemin de traverse en proposant de développer un cas d’étude historique de développement d’une connaissance scientifique donnée (section 2). Ceci permettra de rendre saillant une certaine dynamique épistémique qui sera capturée ensuite par une théorie récente de la connaissance (section 3). C’est sur cette base que seront alors caractérisés le « scientifiquement prouvé » et l’appel au complot, avec pour finalité de montrer que ces deux rhétoriques s’avèrent constituer les deux facettes d’une seule et même pièce (section 4).
Following on from Lynda Walsh’s (Scientists as prophets: A rhetorical genealogy, Oxford University Press, 2013) work that compared the rhetoric of classical prophecy with that of twentieth-century public scientists such as Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking, this talk will take a further look at how prophetic rhetoric, as well as the prophetic persona as described in the sociology of religion following Weber and his characterisation of the prophet, is being utilised in modern science communication. Particularly on the big, potentially world-changing, issues such as climate change, biodiversity loss or nuclear warfare, there are clear affinities between public science and the apocalyptic tradition of prophecy. Using case studies of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and contemporary climate change activism, this talk will look at both the prophetic persona and prophetic rhetoric that is being employed as a way of persuading audiences to the urgency of the matter.
Many suggestions for dealing with the so-called replication crisis in psychology revolve around the idea that better and more complex statistical-mathematical tools or stricter procedures are required in order to obtain reliable findings and prevent cheating or publication biases. While these aspects may play an exacerbating role, we interpret the replication crisis primarily as an epistemological crisis in psychology caused by an inadequate fit between the ontic nature of the psyche and the quantitative approach. On the basis of the philosophers of science Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn, and Imre Lakatos we suggest that the replication crisis is therefore a symptom of a fundamental problem in psychology, but at the same time it is also an opportunity to advance psychology as a science. In a first step, against the background of Popper’s Critical Rationalism, the replication crisis is interpreted as an opportunity to eliminate inaccurate theories from the pool of theories and to correct problematic developments. Continuing this line of thought, in an interpretation along the lines of Thomas Kuhn, the replication crisis might signify a model drift or even model crisis, thus possibly heralding a new paradigm in psychology. The reasons for this are located in the structure of academic psychology on the basis of Lakatos’s assumption about how sciences operate. Accordingly, one hard core that lies at the very basis of psychology may be found in the assumption that the human psyche can and is to be understood in quantitative terms. For this to be possible, the ontic structure of the psyche, i.e., its very nature, must also in some way be quantitatively constituted. Hence, the replication crisis suggests that the ontic structure of the psyche in some way (also) contains a non-quantitative dimension that can only be grasped incompletely or fragmentarily using quantitative research methods. Fluctuating and inconsistent results in psychology could therefore also be the expression of a mismatch between the ontic level of the object of investigation and the epistemic level of the investigation.
The essay deals with the bazaari-subaltern unani medical practices, demonstrating how ccontrary to the predominant view within the studies of South Asian medical practices, unani has been a dispersed and discursive terrain since the beginning with simultaneous presence of the two broad paradoxical spheres of unani practices, such as textual unani on the one hand, and bazaari-subaltern unani on the other in different geographical, social, and cultural locales. Critically examining the recent endeavour of a group of historians to recover “the realm of subaltern therapeutics”, this essay, however, argues that the relationship between the textual unani and bazaari-subaltern Unani medical practices cannot be comprehended properly through a blanket totalising elite-subaltern binary framework. Moreover, the concept of subaltern itself is to be re-examined contextually, particularly to account for the ways in which a textual tradition such as unani itself can be rendered to a state of subalternaity particularly in post-colonial situation. The essay examines the ways in which bazaari-subaltern unani medical public sphere remained outside the textual unani and stateist medical imaginations and control, therefore, was/is declared inauthentic for its practitioners were/are considered untrained, and yet it catered the medical requirements of vast masses during the colonial and post-colonial periods. Bazaari unani medical practices were/are not confined literally only to bazaar, but found in homes and other social locales such as in print medium as well. The essay outlines the nuances of this simultaneity of the two paradoxical spheres with the focus on the critical prevalence of bazaari-subaltern medicine and therapeutics, and the ways in which they can produce their own text without being immanently well-ordered, fixed and complete but ever evolving. Illustrative cases are drawn from provinces of Bihar, Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Delhi, United Provinces.
This chapter explores the transdisciplinary approach of evolutionary economics, which aims to integrate principles from both economics and biology. Evolutionary economics argues that neoclassical models of centralized market economies based on rationality and equilibrium are oversimplified and unrealistic. Instead, it conceptualizes the dynamics and complexity of real-world market economies as decentralized systems of money-mediated bilateral transactions, stressing the self-organizing nature of their emergence through bottom-up processes without a central auctioneer. Evolutionary economics studies the evolution of economic institutions and systems through mechanisms such as mutation, replication, and selection, akin to biological evolution and emphasizes the imitation and diffusion of external and internal rules to understand the qualitative and dynamic nature of the market economy as observed in financial crises and technological innovations. It also proposes a shift in scientific methodology peculiar to the social sciences to accommodate the complexity, diversity, reality, and evolution differently from natural sciences, advocating for the approaches of Lakatos, Caldwell, and Lawson. The author emphasizes the importance of basic concepts, methodologies, and policies in evolutionary economics, and advocates meta-theoretical “evolutionary perspectives” such as “evolutionary pluralism,” “coevolution of economy and economics,” and “theoretical institutional ecosystem.” He introduces the “micro-meso-macro loop” to explain complex interactions between “replicators” and “interactors” analogous to biological “genes” and “organisms” at multi-hierarchical nested levels of the socioeconomic system, and presents a novel policy framework in evolutionary economics called “Evolutionary Institutional Design (EID),” which aims to influence economic systems through altering both outer and inner institutions at the meso-level.
We look at the main conceptions of the philosophy of science in Popper, Kuhn and Lakatos. Excluded from analysis are Laudan, and Feyerabend’s anarchist theory of science, approaches based on Bayes’ theorem to calculated probability and new experimentalism. The social science that is economics has branched in two directions, formalism, and empiricism, and that has opened an insurmountable rift between the economists from either school. Both formalist-theoretical and empiricist theoreticians are legitimate because, to paraphrase Kant, formalist economic thought without content (that is, without empiricism) is empty, while empiricist economic thought without concepts (or formal theories with mathematical models based on logic) is blind. The market for economic research publications like JCR and SJR is self-referential and oriented to the interests of academics, not to those of economists.
In recent times, academic research has focused on how the concept of the "social" permeates notions of science and knowledge, in the methodologies employed, the results discussed and the relationship between theory and practice. Against this backdrop, feminist epistemology has gained prominence, criticizing the traditional model of science and advocating an interdisciplinary methodology that incorporates individuals from different fields into dialogues, contextualizing knowledge in context and examining the influence of gender on the generation of knowledge. This theoretical article seeks to investigate the link between female representation and knowledge creation, shedding light on the persistent gender gap in academic institutions and research establishments. Furthermore, it aims to contemplate how a more feminist perspective can impact research efforts and social intervention strategies, recognizing the value of women's perspectives in the theoretical discourse on social and gender equality. By highlighting the importance of including different perspectives in science, the article emphasizes the need to promote an inclusive and equitable approach to human progress.
How does scientific knowledge grow? This question has occupied a central place in the philosophy of science, stimulating heated debates but yielding no clear consensus. Many explanations can be understood in terms of whether and how they view the expansion of knowledge as proceeding through the accretion of scientific concepts into larger conceptual structures. Here we examine these views empirically by analysing 2,605,224 papers spanning five decades from both the social sciences (Web of Science) and the physical sciences (American Physical Society). Using natural language processing techniques, we create semantic networks of concepts, wherein noun phrases become linked when used in the same paper abstract. We then detect the core/periphery structures of these networks, wherein core concepts are densely connected sets of highly central nodes and periphery concepts are sparsely connected nodes that are highly connected to the core. For both the social and physical sciences, we observe increasingly rigid conceptual cores accompanied by the proliferation of periphery concepts. Subsequently, we examine the relationship between conceptual structure and the growth of scientific knowledge, finding that scientific works are more innovative in fields with cores that have higher conceptual churn and with larger cores. Furthermore, scientific consensus is associated with reduced conceptual churn and fewer conceptual cores. Overall, our findings suggest that while the organization of scientific concepts is important for the growth of knowledge, the mechanisms vary across time.
This paper challenges the negative attitudes towards labelled proof systems, usually referred to as semantic pollution, by arguing that such critiques overlook the full potential of labelled calculi. The overarching objective is to develop a practice-based philosophical analysis of labelled calculi to provide insightful considerations regarding their proof-theoretic and philosophical value. To achieve this, successful applications of labelled calculi and related results will be showcased, and comparisons with other relevant works will be discussed. The paper ends by advocating for a more practice-based approach towards the philosophical understanding of proof systems and their role in structural proof theory.
In this editorial collection, five sociologists share their opinions on why there has been a recent proliferation of scholarship on Du Bois, and summarize their own position in relation to this intellectual area. Ranging from reflections on how they “discovered” Du Bois's works, through to assessments of American sociology's reception of Du Bois's scholarship, the idea of this brief piece is to provide an insight into some of the potential driving forces behind the boom in Du Boisian scholarship.
Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions is widely but belatedly recognized as the centerpiece of a philosophical shift from logical empiricism to a post-empiricist philosophy of science. The book was also an influential precursor to constructivist sociology of scientific knowledge despite Kuhn’s own ambivalence about that legacy. In several earlier papers Rouse (Man and World 14: 269–290, 1981; Configurations 6:33–51, 1998; Kuhn’s philosophy of scientific practice. In Nickles T (ed) Thomas Kuhn, pp 101–121. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2002; Topoi 32: 59–64, 2013), I introduced an alternative interpretation of Kuhn’s opening promise of ‘a decisive transformation in the image of science by which we are now possessed’, and noted that this second Kuhnian revolution in the philosophy of science had not (yet) occurred. Kuhn was implicitly proposing a shift in philosophical focus from scientific knowledge to sciences as research practices rather than just a post-empiricist conception of scientific knowledge. Ronald Giere (Philos Sci 52:331–356, 1985) offered a different reading of Kuhn’s significance for philosophy of science as initiating a naturalized philosophy of science. Giere also recognized that Kuhn’s naturalistic turn was at that time ‘generally rejected’ by his successors in the discipline. In the twenty-first century, however, both a naturalistic turn and a philosophical focus on scientific practice have become prominent within the discipline. My paper highlights both the continuities and discontinuities between Kuhn’s naturalistic philosophy of scientific practice and the development of those themes in the first two decades of this century.
Kuhn famously rejects that science progresses towards a uniquely true account of the mind-independent world. Yet he states that science progresses. Progress comes down to improved problem-solving. It is important to realize that Kuhn talks about the progress of scientific knowledge. This raises the question of in what sense exactly problem-solving is knowledge. This chapter then has two main goals. The first is to explain Kuhn’s account of problem-solving as growth in knowledge by redefining knowledge as knowledge-how instead of knowledge-that. By linking the discourse of scientific progress to recent epistemological debates, I argue that knowledge-how ought to be understood as an ability, and therefore, scientific progress as an improved ability to solve problems and accomplish other tasks of scientific practice. The second goal of this chapter is to assess this notion of progress in relation to the recent debate on the nature of scientific progress, which has been reinvigorated by Bird’s (2007) paper. It will be shown that the epistemological and functional accounts of progress are, in fact, compatible if only the classical definition of knowledge is replaced by its understanding as knowledge-how. This results in a new, epistemological-functional conception of scientific progress.
L’histoire parallèle de l’évolution de l’intelligence humaine et de l’intelligence artificielle constitue un voyage fascinant, mettant en lumière les voies distinctes mais interconnectées de l’évolution biologique et de l’innovation technologique. Cette histoire peut être considérée comme une série de développements interconnectés, chaque avancée de l’intelligence humaine ouvrant la voie au prochain bond en avant de l’intelligence artificielle.
L’intelligence humaine et l’intelligence artificielle sont depuis longtemps liées, évoluant selon des trajectoires parallèles tout au long de l’histoire. Alors que les humains cherchent à comprendre et à reproduire l’intelligence, l’IA est devenue un domaine dédié à la création de systèmes capables d’accomplir des tâches qui nécessitent traditionnellement l’intellect humain.
Ce livre examine les racines évolutives de l'intelligence, explore l'émergence de l'intelligence artificielle, examine l'histoire parallèle de l'intelligence humaine et de l'intelligence artificielle, retraçant leur développement, leurs interactions et l'impact profond qu'elles ont eu les unes sur les autres, et envisage les paysages futurs où l'intelligence humaine et artificielle converge. Explorons cette histoire, en comparant les étapes clés et les développements dans les deux domaines.
Among the most pervasive issues currently debated in the social sciences pertains to scientific misconduct. The discourse on scientific misconduct has burgeoned in the last three decades and has come to permeate multiple arenas, including academia, industry, and public policy. While interest in this area has imparted critical insights into understanding and regulating the phenomenon, some commentators have argued that it is time to expand the scope of what acts precisely qualify as scientific misconduct—beyond its conventional definition that conflates the term with fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism. In responding to this line of critique, this article focuses on a neglected aspect of scientific misconduct, though one which is particularly prevalent in social science research—namely, the case of researchers offering disingenuous claims related to a study's methodology. To explicate how this form of misconduct in science materializes into action, this article revisits Bruno Latour's careful tracing of scientists in laboratories. Through his analysis, Latour captures the disjuncture in the rhetoric and the practice of methodology in empirical research. Integrating Latour's critique with the concept of agential realism, we present one philosophically grounded avenue by which to resolve this form of scientific misconduct in future social science research.
This chapter elucidates the significance of methodology in economic theorizing, starting with foundational definitions. The discussion progresses to an exploration of the pivotal role played by positivism and Karl Popper’s perspectives, followed by an examination of Thomas Kuhn’s paradigms, Imre Lakatos’s research programs and concludes with the consideration of “anything goes” or postmodernism, along with the so-called anarchic approach. The application of these methodological frameworks to economic theories is thoroughly examined throughout the chapter.
There is no alternative to theory-driven ethnography. Some ethnographers may refuse to acknowledge the epistemological bases of their respective methodological approaches, but this amounts to unreflexive rather than atheoretical fieldwork. This essay elaborates three theses along these lines with the aim of sketching out a self-consciously theory-driven approach to ethnography. First, all ethnography is necessarily theoretical whether researchers acknowledge it or not. Without acknowledging this point, ethnography remains a fundamentally unreflexive enterprise. Second, extending upward toward ‘structure’ from empirics illuminates the conditions under which observations tend to hold true. Third, theoretical reconstruction, rather than confirmation or discovery, is the primary goal of ethnography. Drawing on the works of Michael Burawoy, Imre Lakatos, and others, these three theses motivate a defense of what we term ‘hard-core fieldwork’. We distinguish this approach from both grounded theory and more contemporary iterations of empiricism in sociological ethnography.
This article argues that Dewey expresses what seems to be a core enactive commitment to constructivism: that creatures do not encounter pre-existing realities but bring them out by altering their surroundings. He adds that constructivism does not obviate realism because changes, once introduced, really are there in relation to a creature’s capacities. This poses a dilemma. If enaction primarily entails altering the external milieu, then the movement repeats pragmatism, also collapsing a basis upon which many of its authors differentiate their outlooks from ecological psychology’s realism. Yet if constructive activity is largely interior, as enactivists’ language sometimes suggests, then critics may be right in saying that the movement backslides into early Modern solipsism. A broader argument is that enactivists sometimes perpetuate what James characterizes as monistic halfway empiricism. Here, the risk is that researchers hold positions not because of evidence but regardless of it, or stipulate terminological definitions that exclude opposing views ahead of time. Even physics remains ununified, and there may be room for combining antagonistic accounts of mind. Or maybe normally hostile positions like enactivism and functionalism are, with some terminological reframing, reconcilable. The article also touches on historical matters, such as the fact that American philosophy and enactivism have Asian and evolutionary influences, or that they react against common schools. The purpose is to clarify the movements in question and identify where enactivists engage in something like halfway empiricism by orienting themselves against enemies based more in fiction than fact.
We often hear stories of major scientific advances made by individual scientists, such as Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, Alexander Fleming’s discovery of penicillin, or Benjamin Franklin’s discovery of electricity. The narrative of the lone genius is also reflected in the science community, where recognitions and awards are often aimed at individual achievements.
Background
Evidence‐based practice is the principle governing a range of healthcare practices and beyond. However, it has suffered from a lack of philosophical rigour. This paper sets out to analyse the epistemological basis of evidence‐based practice.
Method
The paper uses a conceptual analysis. First, it describes the implicit epistemology at work in evidence‐based practice. Second, it evaluates the implicit epistemological basis.
Results
The analysis indicates that evidence‐based practice lacks an explicit epistemological basis. It shows, moreover, that the implicit epistemological basis is untenable.
Conclusion
There is a need to re‐think the epistemological basis for evidence‐based practice. Evidence‐based practice is out of touch with developments within philosophy of science.
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