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20 Beyond Ob;ectivism and Relativism objectivism and relativism? Where is the evidence that such a movement is really taking place? What are the consequences of this transformation for theory and practice, for thought and action? In order to begin to specify more concretely and to answer these questions, let me briefly review some of the recent philosophic controversies that I will be examining in greater detail later on in this book, and suggest some of the ways in which they are intimately related. POSTEMPIRICIST PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY OF SCIENCE In what initially appear to be quite disparate contexts, controversies have broken out about the meaning, nature, and scope of rationality. But why is there a problem here? We have to recognize that we do use the expression "rational" to characterize beliefs, arguments, actions, agents, societies, theories, and even philosophic positions. So the question arises, does the use of "rational" in these disparate contexts have a univocal meaning? Is there something like analogical meaning in these different uses of the term? Is the situation here one of family resemblances? Or is there some other way of explicating the meaning(s) of the word? Some philosophers have argued that the only clear sense of "rational" is applicable to arguments and that what is meant is that the arguments conform to logical canons. But such a severe restriction does not help us to understand what appear to be other legitimate uses of "rational." For example, we frequently think of science, especially natural science, as a rational form of conduct. When we say this, we mean more than that science consists of arguments that conform to the canons of logical reasoning. But the real difficulty (and obscurity) begins when we try to specify precisely what is the "more" that is intended. In recent debates, issues concerning the meaning and scope of rationality have become even more complex and tangled because of the conviction that there are incommensurable paradigms, language games, or forms of life. In the philosophy of the natural sciences, these issues have been in the foreground of discussion since the publication of Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions in 1962. Viewing this book in its historical context, it is now clear that many of Kuhn's controversial theses that seemed so fresh and original had been anticipated by others. This does not diminish the significance or the impact that 21 An Overview his monograph had (and continues to have). It helps to explain it. Kuhn gave expression to and helped to identify issues that were erupting from a wide variety of sources. It is as if Kuhn had touched a sensitive intellectual nerve, and it would be difficult to name another book published in the last few decades that has been at once so suggestive and provocative for thinkers in almost every discipline and so persistently attacked and criticized, frequently from antithetical perspectives. Kuhn even remarks about his book, "Part of the reason for its success is, I regretfully conclude, that it can be too nearly all things to all people."26 Kuhn argued that there is something fundamentally wrong and askew with the image or conception of science that had been elaborated by most mainstream or "orthodox" philosophers of science, a conception that was itself a blending of deeply entrenched dogmas inherited from traditional empiricism and rationalism. He attempted to sketch an alternative "image of science" which he claimed did far greater justice to the ways in which scientific inquiry is actually conducted. The typical pattern of development that he outlines can be divided into a series of stages. It begins with a preparadigmatic stage where there is little or no agreement about subject matter, problems, and procedures among competing "schools." This school phenomenon is followed by the emergence and acceptance of a dominant paradigm by scientists-"universally recognized scientific achievements that for a time provide model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners.JJ27 Paradigms guide "normal science/, a type of "puzzle solving" through which the dominant paradigm is made more determinate and precise as it is applied to new phenomena . The pursuit of normal science, with its increasing specificity and precision, leads to the discovery of discrepancies and anomalies that resist solution. Although the "fit" between a paradigm and "nature" is never perfect-there are always some discrepancies that the paradigm cannot explain-a stage may be reached at which there is a growing sense of crisis, a questioning about the adequacy of the very...

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