The Information Infrastructure; Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions and Its Relevance to LIS : The Information Infrastructure; Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions and Its Relevance to LIS LIS 2000Understanding InformationMay 28, 2008
Where We Left Off Last Time:Rise of the New Media : Where We Left Off Last Time:Rise of the New Media Internet
World Wide Web and the Notion of Personal Information Space
Digital Libraries and Archives
Internet 2
The Semantic Web
The iPod Era
Wikipedia
YouTube
Social Networking -- MySpace; Facebook; Twitter
Utility Computing
Composite Documents
Thomas S. Kuhn, 1922-1996 : Thomas S. Kuhn, 1922-1996
Kuhn’s Assumptions : Kuhn’s Assumptions A scientific community cannot practice its trade without some set of received beliefs.
These beliefs form the foundation of the "educational initiation that prepares and licenses the student for professional practice".
The nature of the "rigorous and rigid" preparation helps ensure that the received beliefs exert a "deep hold" on the student's mind.
Normal science "is predicated on the assumption that the scientific community knows what the world is like" —scientists take great pains to defend that assumption. To this end, "normal science often suppresses fundamental novelties because they are necessarily subversive of its basic commitments.” Research is "a strenuous and devoted attempt to force nature into the conceptual boxes supplied by professional education.”
A shift in professional commitments to shared assumptions takes place when an anomaly "subverts the existing tradition of scientific practice" (6). These shifts are what Kuhn describes as scientific revolutions—"the tradition-shattering complements to the tradition-bound activity of normal science.” New assumptions (paradigms/theories) require the reconstruction of prior assumptions and the reevaluation of prior facts. This is difficult and time consuming. It is also strongly resisted by the established community.
When a shift takes place, "a scientist's world is qualitatively transformed [and] quantitatively enriched by fundamental novelties of either fact or theory.”
The Nature of Normal Science : The Nature of Normal Science "Normal-scientific research is directed to the articulation of those phenomena and theories that the paradigm already supplies.” It is achieved by extending the knowledge of those facts that the paradigm displays as particularly revealing, increasing the extent of the match between those facts and the paradigm's predictions; and further articulation of the paradigm itself. In other words, there is a good deal of mopping-up to be done.
Mop-up operations are what engage most scientists throughout their careers: Mopping-up is normal science; This paradigm-based research is "an attempt to force nature into the preformed and relatively inflexible box that the paradigm supplies.”.
no effort made to call forth new sorts of phenomena; no effort to invent new theory (and no tolerance for those who try).
anomalies usually not even noticed (tunnel vision/one track mind); no effort to discover anomalies; when anomalies pop up, they are usually discarded or ignored.
Priorities of the Paradigm : Priorities of the Paradigm The paradigms of a mature scientific community can be determined with relative ease.
The "rules" used by scientists who share a paradigm are not easily determined. Some reasons for this are that
Paradigms can determine normal science without the intervention of discoverable rules or shared assumptions . In part, this is because
it is very difficult to discover the rules that guide particular normal-science traditions.
scientists never learn concepts, laws, and theories in the abstract and by themselves.
They generally learn these with and through their applications.
New theory is taught in tandem with its application to a concrete range of phenomena.
"The process of learning a theory depends on the study of applications.”
The problems that students encounter from freshman year through doctoral program, as well as those they will tackle during their careers, are always closely modeled on previous achievements.
Scientists who share a paradigm generally accept without question the particular problem-solutions already achieved.
When scientists disagree about whether the fundamental problems of their field have been solved, the search for rules gains a function that it does not ordinarily possess.
Anomaly and the Emergence of Discovery : Anomaly and the Emergence of Discovery Normal science does not aim at novelties of fact or theory and, when successful, finds none. Nonetheless, new and unsuspected phenomena are repeatedly uncovered by scientific research, and radical new theories have again and again been invented by scientists.
Fundamental novelties of fact and theory bring about paradigm change. So how does paradigm change come about?
Discovery—novelty of fact.
Discovery begins with the awareness of anomaly.
The recognition that nature has violated the paradigm-induced expectations that govern normal science.
A phenomenon for which a paradigm has not readied the investigator.
Perceiving an anomaly is essential for perceiving novelty (although the first does not always lead to the second, i.e., anomalies can be ignored, denied, or unacknowledged).
The area of the anomaly is then explored.
The paradigm change is complete when the paradigm/theory has been adjusted so that the anomalous become the expected. The result is that the scientist is able "to see nature in a different way.” A caveat, however: discovery involves an extended process of conceptual assimilation, but assimilating new information does not always lead to paradigm change.
The process of paradigm change is closely tied to the nature of perceptual (conceptual) change in an individual—Novelty emerges only with difficulty, manifested by resistance, against a background provided by expectation.
Crisis and the Emergence of New Theories : Crisis and the Emergence of New Theories As is the case with discovery, a change in an existing theory that results in the invention of a new theory is also brought about by the awareness of anomaly.
The emergence of a new theory is generated by the persistent failure of the puzzles of normal science to be solved as they should. Failure of existing rules is the prelude to a search for new ones. These failures can be brought about by
observed discrepancies between theory and fact—this is the "core of the crisis.”.
changes in social/cultural climates (knowledge/beliefs are socially constructed?).
There are strong historical precedents for this: Copernicus, Freud, behaviorism? constructivism?
Science is often "ridden by dogma"—what may be the effect on science (or art) by an atmosphere of political correctness?
scholarly criticism of existing theory.
Such failures are generally long recognized, which is why crises are seldom surprising.
Neither problems nor puzzles yield often to the first attack (75).
Recall that paradigm and theory resist change and are extremely resilient.
Philosophers of science have repeatedly demonstrated that more than one theoretical construction can always be placed upon a given collection of data.
In early stages of a paradigm, such theoretical alternatives are easily invented.
Once a paradigm is entrenched (and the tools of the paradigm prove useful to solve the problems the paradigm defines), theoretical alternatives are strongly resisted.
As in manufacturing so, too, in science—retooling is an extravagance to be reserved for the occasion that demands it.
So Why are We Interested in Kuhn’s Ideas? : So Why are We Interested in Kuhn’s Ideas? Because science is predicated on the idea that new ideas, information and knowledge become “science” only when published and thereby subjected to scrutiny by peers, the nature of science itself tends to dictate the volume, scope, and content of scientific publication, and by extension aids in defining basic bibliothecal problems, ranging from collection development to IR and reference and preservation. (Are other areas of intellectual activity identical to science? We presume that the answer is “no,” but it is also reasonable to assume in the absence of contradictory information that structural similarities far outweigh differences.)
Because we, meaning librarians and information specialists, presumably need and benefit from a framework to allows us to understand and define our relationship to the larger information environment.