L1 What is science? Flashcards
What is science communication?
- Communicating scientific information to the public
- Educating the public, shaping political ideas
Why should we communicate science?
- Science should be available to everyone–> we want to move forward
- New insights and directions
- Info should be understandable and readable to the target audience
Why is science important?
It teaches us more about the world, makes us understand things better, and makes us understand why things happen
Why is communicating science to other scientists and non-scientists important?
To other scientists: to increase their knowledge which might help them in their own research
To non-scientists: to increase their knowledge, to raise awareness, and to protect them from misinformation
What is logical positivism and what are the three characteristics?
= science consists of the systematic combination of empirical observation (induction) and logical deduction, which produces reliable knowledge about the world
- Autonomy: scientific research and its outputs are not influenced by external factors
- Neutrality: scientists are not led by personal views, interests or ideologies in their research choices, or data interpretations
- Factuality: values and norms do not play a role in scientific theories
What is the verification theory of meaning?
Only statements from which you can say are true or false, are meaningful
What are characteristics of “logical” in logical positivism?
- Logical analysis of language–> to distinguish meaningful from meaningless (verification theory of meaning)
- Unify all sciences, using one logical language
What is a characteristic of “positivism” in logical positivism?
- No place for things that are not observable
Why does logical positivism fail?
- The truth of universal statements (e.g. laws of physics) cannot be verified, and are meaningless
- Verification rests on induction, but induction cannot be logically justified (all swans are white)
- It assumes we observe the “empirically given”, but all observation is theory-laden
What is the principle of falsification, how does it work, and who believes in it?
Karl Popper
It is demonstrable whether a theory is not true
- A theory is tested by deducing a basic statement, which could be a potential falsifier (theory: all swans are white; basic statement: there is a black swan)
* accept basic statement–> reject theory (falsification)
* don’t accept basic statement–> don’t reject theory (corroboration)–> does not mean theory is true, it is just not proven to be false
What do logical positivism and Popper’s views have in common?
- Science is a rational and formal activity, and all that matters to its evaluation and to understanding it, takes place in the context of justification
- Central to both views is a notion of progress, a notion of science steadily moving in the direction of the ultimate truths about the world
- Both models are prescriptive: they state what science should be like
Who is a famous functionalist, and what is it in the context of science?
Robert K. Merton: Science serves a social function–> providing certified knowledge.
This function structures norms of behaviour, which you need to follow if you contribute to the scientific project
Science is were these behavioural norms are lived up to
What are the norms of behaviour as described by Merton, with the abbreviation CUDOS? Give an example
Communalism = science is a communcal effort
Universalism = we treat each other’s works universally
Disinteretedness = don’t bring own interests to the table
Organized scepticism = being justified in drawing conclusions on the basis of gathered empirical material
E.g. peer review system
What are the principles of Ludwik Fleck?
- Facts are made, not found
- Facts are not timeless; they have history
- Facts are stylized signals of resistance, that oppose arbitrary thinking–> facts keep you from thinking anything you iike
Truth is not a convention, but rather:
- in historic perspective, an event in the history of thought
- in its contemporary context, a stylized thought constraint
- There are (dis)continuities in the development of our knowledge
- We constantly get to know different things
- Only within the different pathways we can meaningfully speak of the growth of knowledge
What is the enculturation & initiation principle?
Becoming a disciplinarian / member of a community of practice / thought collective, requires that one learns practices, values, an orientation to the world.
We learn: what to believe, whom to believe, and how to decide / judge
