Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Kuhn’s Deconstruction of the Scientific Method as a Road Map to Social Epistemology

Authors: Kole Jimoh A

DOI: 10.23880/phij-16000153

Volume 3, Issue 3

Abstract

The idea that truth, knowledge and rational thoughts is fundamental to the theory of knowledge. In his work “structure of scientific revolution”, Kuhn disagrees with this idea in his detailed analysis of how scientific paradigms are developed. Scientist accept the dominant paradigm until anomalies are thrown up. Scientist then begin to question the basis of the paradigm itself; new theories emerge which challenge the dominant paradigm and eventually one of the new theories become accepted as the new paradigm. (Anselm 1) The significantly shifted focus to the socio-cultural dimensions of knowledge, which current discussions within social and collective epistemology is exploring to enrich our process of knowledge practice. This paper attempts to presents Kuhn’s idea of paradigm shift as a welcome attitude to knowledge inquiry as new paradigm better explains the observations, pave way for other models of knowledge acquisition also and offers a model that is closer to the objective, external reality

Keywords: Knowledge; Science; Epistemology; Objectivism

View PDF