Reimaging Xianity in the wake of Modernism's passing
Textbooks, Revolution, Patches and Paradigms
Tonight, as I was watching Reed as he woke up in the middle of the night (full happy awake – he has gas), I pulled The Structure of Scientific Revolutions off the shelf and began re-reading it. I came across this insightful quote:
Textbooks being pedagogic vehicles for the perpetuation of normal science, have to be rewritten in whole or in part whenever the language, problem-structure, or standards of normal science change.
In short, they have to be rewritten in the aftermath of each scientific revolution, and once rewritten, they inevitably disguise not only the role but the very existence of the revolutions that produced them.
- Thomas Khun, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, p. 137
Each successive paradigm has to normalize and re-remember history so that it is coherent and (supposedly) self sufficient. How true that is!
By they way, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions is one of the best books in the history of the history of science – and in the history of thought as well. It details how programs of thought, or paradigms are created through revolutions and maintained despite what is later seen as obvious problems. People keep patching up the holes in science until the whole edifice falls away in favor of the new paradigm, one which can account for the crisises in the old. I see this happen all the time – and not just in science.
It happens when Christian fundamentalists become atheists (or 3 credit Buddhists); it happens when materialistic atheists become Christians or Muslims. It happened to me when I became a Christian pacifist instead of a nationalistic Christian.
Too many patches; new paradigm.
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| Print article | This entry was posted by Henry Imler on December 4, 2009 at 1:41 am, and is filed under Science, Texts. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site. |
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