Is Science An Open Or Closed System?

Question 1

How is science closed system - denial of legitimacy

Answer 1

Polyani
Belief system rejects alternative worldviews by refusing to grant legitimacy to their basic assumptions.
For example, creationism rejects outright the evolutionists’ knowledge-claim that earth is billions of years old, therefore species have evolved rather than all having been created

Question 2

Evidence to support Polyani

Answer 2

Dr Velikovsky
Published worlds in collision, put forward a new theory of the origins of the earth, Velikovksy challenged fundamental assumptions of geology and evolutionary biology
Instead of putting theory to the test it was rejected by science community

Question 3

Science is closed - Paradigm

Answer 3

Kuhn
A mature science is based on a set of shared assumptions which he calls paradigms
The paradigm informs scientists about what problems to study, what methods and equipment to use, what will count as evidence.
People are socialised into the paradigm though scientific education & training
A successful career is depends on working within the paradigm - those who challenge the fundamental assumptions of the paradigm are likely to be hounded out of the profession like Velikovsky

Question 4

Science is open - CUDOS

Answer 4

Merton
Sceince is an institution that needs an ethos or set of norms that make scientists act in ways that serve the goal for increasing scientific knowledge
Communism - scientific knowledge is not private property, scientists must share it with the community otherwise knowledge cannot grow
Oganised sceptism - no knowledge claim is regarded as scared, every idea is open to questioning
Universalism - the truth or falsity of scientific knowledge is judged by universal objective criteria regardless of sex, race

Question 5

Science is open - falsification

Answer 5

Popper
Science is open belief system where scientists theories are open to scrutiny, criticism and testing by others
Science is governed by the principle of falsificationism.
Scientists set out to try and falsify existing theories, deliberately seeking evidence that would disprove them
Scientific knowledge is cumulative, it builds of the achievements of previous scientists to develop a greater understanding of the world around us
For centuries, it was held to be true that sun revolved around the earth - Copernicus showed that this knowledge claim was false

Question 6

Science as a social construction

Answer 6

Knorr Cetina
The invention of telescopes or other instruments allows scientists to construct or fabricate new facts
These ‘facts’ are constructed in an artificial laboratory environments which do not resemble the natural world, for example water is purified and animals are sometimes specially bred

Question 7

Science as a social construction - little green men

Answer 7

Woolgar
Scientists are engaged in the same process of ‘making sense’ or interpreting the world as everyone else
When confronted by evidence, from their observations and experiments they have to decide what it means, they do so by devising and applying theories and explanations but they must persuade others to accept their interpretations
Uses the discovery of ‘pulsars’ by researches in 1967
Scientists discovered pulsars, scientists initially annotated the patterns shown on their printouts as little green men.
Recognising this was not an acceptable interpretation within the science community and decided these patterns represented the signals from a type of star unknown to science
Therefore scientific facts are a social construction