ORGANON 25:1989/1993 PROBLÈMES GÉNÉRAUX
M arek Sikora (Poland)
S C IE N T IF IC C H A N G E IN T H E L IG H T O F M O D E R N P H IL O S O P H Y O F S C IE N C E : T W O A P P R O A C H E S
I
The Q uestion about tradition in science, about w hen it is con tinu ed and w hen interrupted, will be taken advantage o f to define the tw o m ost typical approaches to science (the term science denotes em pirical sciences here) in m odern philosophy. L et us focus our attention, in particular, on th e question o f change in science, which is a central issue in both approaches. O ne ap proach was given its m ost com plete expression by I. L akatos in his m eth o dology o f research projects, the other one by T. S. K uhn in his book called
The Structure o f Scientific R evolutions. T heir m any differences notw ith stan
ding, both concepts are descended from the sam e source, for they em erged as results o f the debate on K. R. P o p p er’s falsificationism .
Popper was the first to point out - in the m id-1930s - that the question o f the grow th o f scientific knowledge- is the principal gnoseological p ro b lem .1 In his L ogik der Forschung, Popper challenged the long-established radical em piricist view that unlike other hum an activities (m yth, religion, art) science grow s in a cum ulative fashion, that is, sciences develo p by co l lecting m ore and m ore perceived experiences and adding new to previous theories. C riticising logical positivists for ruling out the question o f change in science as a possible philosophical query, for restricting reflections on science to synchronous studies o f logical syntax, sem antics or pragm atic im plications, Popper called for a new approach to science.
Scientific growth, in his view, is not cum ulative but cyclical in nature, and rather than adding new to previous research findings science grow s by continually m odifying previous know ledge as new perspectives are being adopted to look at particular problem s. Because o f change new ordered th eo
ries arise. W hen a theory fails to stand the test o f practice, researchers com e forw ard with a new one. At any given tim e the theory reigns which, as Popper puts it, has “braved” checking tests that confirm ed rather than di sproved them . As in m any previous cases, the current theory m ay be proved false in the future.
Poppers pays particular attention to constant principles ordering succes sive theories. H e recognises those principles as decisive in the developm ent o f science, for they decide w hich o f the rivalling theories are eventually chosen. They m ake the developm ent o f science independent o f scien tists’ idiosyncrasies and im part it a rational character to it. The suprem e principle tells the scientist to confidently form ulate scientific conjectures and at the sam e tim e to disprove them m ercilessly by a relentless quest, for w hatever errors, to disclose and elim inate them. R ational behaviour is essentially cri tical behaviour, im plying a critical approach tow ards science. A researcher will also be versed in logical principles, for com peting scientific theories are alw ays com parable with one another in logical term s. L ogic is the tool that is used, experience is the um pire, when a theory is to be chosen from am ong many.
In P opper’s m ethod, science is view ed less as reliable know ledge (epi-
stem e) than as historically changing know ledge. W hat is not subject to vi
cissitudes o f history are the principles that order a sequence o f successive theories. They m ake up som ething like a “logic” w hich is independent from anything else. That “logic” , says Popper, should be respected by all, as it determ ines the future course o f science.
Popper, then, believed in the rational character o f the developm ent of science, or, m ore precisely, he accepted the idea that definite rational rules o f choice w ere possible to identify. But that was questioned by Kuhn. In His Book on The Structure o f Scientific Revolutions, he launches the following idea supporting it with ample historical evidence: the history o f science cannot be studied meaningfully in logical terms alone, while ignoring possible inter ventions of psychological or sociological factors. No such thing exists as one m echanism o f science that can be completely described using logical terms alone and that could serve the scientist as a touchstone to choose between better or worse theories. New theories are not necessarily logical extensions of pre vious theories. A new theory is not comm ensurate with the old one.
K u hn ’s incom m ensurability argum ent derives from the view that all scientific terms are burdened by theory.2 Thus theory rejects the logical positivist distinction betw een theoretical and observation-based scientific term s and questions the purely em pirical m eaning o f scientific term s - al term s are theoretical in nature. As there is no way to distinguish m eanings o f terms functioning in different theories in such a fashion as to dem onstrate a com m on neutral language in those theories, then it is fair to say that the sam e term s have different m eanings in different theories. A lthough scientists
Science Change in the Light o f Modern Philosophy 57 use the sam e term s in their descriptions, their term s m ean d ifferent things. The m eaning o f a term depends on its context. No term can be m eaningfully considered in isolation, for it should alw ays be assum ptions, a paradigm . W hen different paradigm s are involved, Kuhn says, the sam e term s m ean different things in different paradigm s.3 A ccordingly, it is not m eaningful to say that Einsteinian concepts are either identical or contradictory with N ew tonian ones, but only that they are incom m ensurate w ith each other.
Transitions from paradigm to paradigm cannot possibly be explained, Kuhn argues, w ith rules o f logic alone. Change in science is not rational, or rationally reconstructible, as P opper claim ed, and it does not end up in the realm o f a “logic o f scientific discovery.” K uhn was positive that to explain change, or m ore properly, revolutions, in science, non-logical factors have to be taken into account, that is, psychological as w ell as sociological.
K u hn ’s argum ents w ere debated heatedly. Som e critics tried to identify decisive m ethodological criteria for the choice of theories. I. L akatos, a d is ciple o f P op p er’s, cam e forw ard w ith one such attem pt. In a study called
F alsification a nd M ethodology o f Scientific R esearch P rogram m es, L akatos
undertook to develop and reinforce rationality standards he borrow ed from his m aster w hich guaranteed the continuity o f scientific developm ent.
M ethodologies o f scientific research program m es are based on the a s sum ption that the real question in science is less to evaluate one theory than a series o f theories. It is not o f one isolated theory but o f a series o f theories that we can say they are scientific or not scientific, L akatos says. A series o f theories should be view ed as a continuous entity for tw o reasons. First, all theories presuppose definite sets o f propositions, or a hard core o f pro p ositions, as Lakatos puts it. Secondly, com m on m ethodological rules hold within a series. The rules are “derived” from a scientific hypothesis w hich is a set o f strong heuristic principles governing the developm ent o f the series of theories. In this sense, a series o f theories can be said to be a research program m e.
The core o f a research program m e can be a broad or narrow set o f laws, w hich is its fixed unchanging part. Lakatos believes there are rules that ban the application o f the m odus tollens to the program m e core in the event o f prediction disagreeing with observation. Lakatos calls the m ethodological rules that protect the program m e core the p rogram m e’s negative heuristic.
The core is surrounded by a protective belt com posed o f supplem entary hypotheses and initial conditions. Supplem entary hypotheses indicate condi tions for a phenom enon described in the explanandum to occur. U nlike the core, the protective belt changes and evolves continually. A nom alies that can harm theories are referred to the surrounding belt. As a theory is com ing under grow ing pressure from anom alies, the th eory’s protective belt Tn (the nth theory o f the program m e) is being changed to becom e Tn+^.4 T he new theory w hich em erges from the addition o f new initial conditions and sup
plem entary hypotheses m ust meet the falsification principle. Theory T is view ed as falsified on the ground of the m ethodology o f scientific research program m es when a new theory 7, has been put forw ard that has the fo l low ing qualities: 1) T j has a surplus o f em pirical evidence over T, or, it speaks o f new facts w hich are im possible to explain or even ruled out by
T; 2) Tj accounts for the previous success of T, that is, all o f the non-rejected
part o f T is contained (within the boundaries o f observation error) in the substance o f Tj ; and 3) part o f the em pirical surplus o f T j is confirm ed.5
A research program me is progressive, in Lakatos’s view, when its new theories meet the falsification principle. If new theories fail to meet conditions implicit in the falsification principle, the program m e degenerates. It ceases to be fruitful, and the propositions making up its core lose their explicatory capac ity. The program me is then discarded along with its core. A new hypothesis is substituted to provide a foundation for the new programme.
W hat undoubtedly distinguishes the m ethodology o f scientific research program m es from P o p per’s falsificationism is the b elief that no theory can really becom e falsified, how ever big the evidence against it m ay be, before a new better theory has appeared. Falsification for L akatos is essentially a “historical” feature, a process unfolding in tim e. But even in such a m odi fication, can falsification be defended against K uhn’s reservations? Lakatos transfers the problem o f change in science from a level o f theory to that of research program m es, and so the question arises about an objective (i.e., non-sociopsychological) choice betw een rivalling research program m es.
L et us try to answ er this query by com paring L ak ato s’s m ethodology with K u h n ’s approach. In particular, we shall look at the question o f change in science from the angle o f interpretative procedures follow ed by both philosophers. W hat are their attitudes tow ards theory and experience and are they linked to each other? How do these philosophers account for discoveries o f new facts? I am sure these are all m eaningful questions w hich, when answ ered, can cast a different light on the controversial issue o f change in science.
II
First a w ord on interpretation. Philosophers o f science generally agree (even though scientists m ay not) that there are tw o dichotom ous interpreta tive procedures governing the relationship betw een theory and experience:
1) an em pirical interpretation of theory in w hich observations (proposi tions form ulated in virtue o f experience) are linked up to theoretical prop ositions; and
2) a theoretical interpretation o f experience in w hich theoretical propo sitions are linked up to observation-based propositions.6
Science Change ill the Light o f Modern Philosophy 59 Both procedures are directed tow ards the sam e goal, seeking as they do to establish the theory vs. fact relationship. The difference is that the form er o f the tw o im plies the cognitive prim acy o f experience before theory, w hile the latter im plies the opposite order.
Both Lakatos and Kuhn are doubtful about the distinction betw een purely em pirical and purely theoretical propositions. As neither o f them believe that propositions can ever be really free o f theoretical com ponents, they reject any interpretation im plying a duality o f theoretical and em pirical propositions.
In his m ethodology, Lakatos follow s Popper in taking for granted that all results o f observation are trapped in som e theoretical p resum ptions and so nothing like “pure fact” really exists. This is true o f direct experience (i.e., observations), which is not free o f certain preconceptions about the functioning o f the subject’s cognitive system , and it is true o f indirect e x perience (experim ents) w here the establishm ent o f fact m ay be affected by factors such as know ledge o f the subject, efficiency o f m ethod and tech niques used in experim ents, or the appearance o f a yet unknow n p hen o m e non. All results o f experience (direct or indirect) alw ays call for interpreta tion, and that in turn calls for a theory.7
If each observation is encum bered w ith theoretical presum ptions, what is the em pirical foundation o f science? To indicate it, L akatos takes advan tage - not uncritically though - o f P o p p er’s notion o f base propositions, w hich o f course are conventionally accepted individual existential p ro p o si tions m aking it possible to disprove hypotheses purporting to u sher in a scientific law. Such a hypothesis can be form ulated as a negation o f an existential proposition. Base propositions are accepted or rejected as the re sult o f decisions or agreem ent and in this sense they are co nv entio ns.8 P opper apparently draw s quite an arbitrary line betw een theory and observation. O bservations, and even m ore so observation-based propositions and p ro p o sitions about results o f experim ents, are alw ays interpretations o f observed facts, interpretations in the light o f a theory.9
As critics charged Popper with inconsistency, for not all scientific prop ositions w ere falsifiable in his approach, L akatos m odified his m aste r’s sug gestions. The real problem encountered in the m ethodology o f scientific re search program m es, is not so m uch to evaluate a theory as to evaluate a series o f theories. Falsification of a series does not lead up to its definitive “d isp ro o f’ but m erely to its “rejection,” in the sense o f m aking a decision to stop studying it. Lakatos narrow s dow n P o p p er’s conventionalism but does not elim inate it from science altogether. Like Popper, L akatos thinks there is no way to escape decisions about pronouncing som e propositions as observation-based and other ones as th eo retical.10 W heth er it is fact or theory, w hat w e have to do w ithin a test situation will be decided by our ow n m ethodological choice, Lakatos argues.
H e cautions, how ever, against proclaim ing conventionalism in this sense as the opposite o f objectivity. O bjectivity, in his view , is preserved in science. O bjectivity is w arranted no longer by a confrontation o f theory with base propositions but by a confrontation o f two theories w ithin a program m e and the rivalry of tw o program m es on o f which accounts for the success o f its com petitor (rival) and supersedes it by theoretically anticipating new facts (it’s “heuristic pow er” ). This brings us to the crucial problem o f how can facts be established? Or, is the establishm ent of facts decided by scientific or non-scientific m otives?
It is difficult to dem onstrate, Lakatos concedes, that one o f the rivalling research program m es accounts not only for facts that the com petitor does, that is, for the “old facts,” but for objectively “ new facts” as w ell. Now and then it takes scientists a very long tim e to notice facts im plicit in a program m e. Scientists cannot reach for “cross-exam ination experim ents,” or experim ents that are capable of disproving a research program m e right aw ay .11 Scientists do not always take a correct view o f heuristic situations. T he kinetic theory is a case in point. It seem ed to lag way behind the phe- nom enalist theory, until the E instein-S m oluchow ski interpretation of Brow nian m ovem ent m ade scientists realise that w hat was long seen as a reinterpretation of old facts (about heat etc.) had turned out to be new facts (in nuclear physics). Those discoveries led to a change o f problem s. “In science, w e do not learn about truth (or likelihood) or falseness (or im prob ability) o f a «theory» but about a relative progress or degeneration o f a research program m e.” 12 A reinterpreted known fact, connected w ith a pro gressive change of problem s, is a new objective fact. E m pirical progress, in L akato s’s view, m akes it possible to choose betw een rivalling program m es: we alw ays choose the program m e that has a surplus o f em pirical substance.
Now let us go back to L ak atos’s view , w hich he took from Popper, that discoveries of new facts are determ ined by im m anent rules o f a third world that are independent o f the acting subject. I do not share L a k a to s’s confi dence that a w ell-defined unchallengeable set o f necessary and certain m ethodological rules o f a third w orld can be identified. Subjectivity, I am sure, cannot be avoided in our cognition. Take, for exam ple, the practical im plications o f a research project. W ith those in m ind, a scientist m ay pick - intentionally or not - one o f several valid interpretations even though nothing shows that any o f the other rivalling interpretation w ould be a less valid choice. The idea that initial assum ptions w ith w hich we take to for m ulate a new problem (or a new research program m e) are given in a P ick wickian sense and that “if we want we can disentangle from their net any tim e,” 13 is debatable indeed.
L et us briefly go back to the question o f pronouncing new facts. W hat is L ak ato s’s definition of anom alies? W hat is their status in his view ? Anom aly, he writes in Falsification and M ethodology o f Scientific Research
Science Change in the Light o f Modern Philosophy 61
Program m es, is a problem appearing in a given research program m e as a
challenge to it. T he problem o f anom aly can be solved in one o f three ways: 1) inside the initial research program m e P (the anom aly then turns into a case confirm ing the program m e P)\
2) inside a program m e independent from P (the anom aly is independent o f P)\ or
3) on the ground o f a program m e rivalling program m e P (the anom aly turns into a counter-exam ple to P).
A nom alies, Lakatos says, are like the puzzles K uhn w rote about in his
Structure o f Scientific R evolution. A nom alies (puzzles) are accounted for,
w ithin the m ethodology o f research program m es, along one o f the above three lines, yet they can alw ays be referred to the initial program m e P. S cien ce’s “internal history,” w hich reflects a rational m echanism o f scientific developm ent, renders all research program m es m eeting the requirem ent o f correspondence com parable with one an o ther.14
Rem oving an anom aly reshuffles the program m e. M odification rules are contained in the p rogram m e’s positive heuristics, but generally as a loose set o f suggestions rather than a strictly-defined canon for scientists. It is never clear w hether such a set of suggestions reflects a p ro g ram m e’s “ob jec tiv e ” heuristic or only one o f several conceivable heuristics scientists can
com e forw ard w ith .15 It is not clear, either, w hich o f the m odifications put forw ard to deal w ith the anom aly is right and w hich is w rong. T h at becom es clear only ex p o st in the light o f further studies.
R ationality, Lakatos argues, w orks m ore slow ly than m ost m etho d olo gists w ould think. Even so, “ scientific change is rational or at least rationally reconstructible.” 16 Rational rules o f scientific procedure follow from the falsification principle. That, in turn, causes changes both inside a program m e and in substituting one program m e for another. The only thing to do is to reconstruct the process o f scientific developm ent in order to show that greater use in theoretical anticipation o f facts (or, a greater heuristic capacity) is w hat ultim ately decides the choice o f both a better theory and a better program m e. L akatos’s m ethodology, accordingly, does allow for objective reasons and rules w hich are conducive to change in science. T hose reasons and rules apply to a m echanism operating in scientific developm ent at large, irrespective o f specific historical conditions.
Ill
Kuhn presented a very different approach to the question o f scientific change. In his Structure o f Scientific R evolutions and subsequent studies, K uhn turned down the idea that scientific developm ent was a continuous process. Changes, or, m ore properly, revolutions, in science do not com e
about as a result o f constant w ell-defined m ethodological rules. E xplanation o f those revolutions “cannot be eventually anything but psychological or sociological in character. This m eans it has to be a description o f a system o f values, ideologies, as well as an analysis o f institutions through which the system is transferred and im posed.” This is the m ain idea o f K u h n ’s. R ather than considering its m any im plications here, let us concentrate on those only which are connected w ith the question o f change in science.
In K uh n ’s view, w e can speak o f continuity in science only w hen science has reached a m ature stage, w hen it has becom e “norm al science.” A “nor m al” science is one in which som e o f its results (theories, law s along with their applications, research m ethods) have been recognised as a pattern or paradigm o f research work by “scientific com m unities.” A doption o f one com m on paradigm by a m ajority o f the scientific com m unity restricts the studied problem s. R esearch work is not designed to check a paradigm , for it boils dow n to bringing the problem down to a low er generality level. Scientists then focus their attention on those problem s only w hich they re cognise as particularly im portant in the light o f the adopted paradigm . That is w hat m akes their w ork efficient and wins the com m unity’s support. Pro blem s addressed w ithin normal science look like puzzles. L ike puzzles, the problem s have guaranteed solutions w hich are legitim ate under th e paradigm .
N orm al science is definitely cum ulative in character, “being extraordi narily efficient in its endeavour to expand the scope and increasing the p re cision o f scientific know ledge.” 18 It is not geared to the discovery o f new things. N o effort is m ade to find solutions to new phenom ena inside such science, but only to bring them in agreem ent with the im age determ ined by the paradigm . Y et new facts are being discovered, new theories are being p ut forw ard. W hat is the explanation behind this?
New discoveries, says the author o f the Structure o f Scientific R evo lu
tio n , are not isolated events but prolonged episodes w ith repeated structu
re s .19 They have their point of departure in anom alies, w hich appear when forecasts based on the binding paradigm fail. E m erging anom alies increasin gly attract attention. Scientists m ake repeated efforts to overcom e them . In that m anner, the paradigm is m odified, and m any versions o f it appear. A strong and lasting aw areness o f anom alies is a sign o f a science being in crisis. The crisis begins to undercut scientists’ confidence in the paradigm , w hile its rules for solving problem s are being eased. As a consequence, scientists begin to take notice o f rivalling theories w hich let the anom alies appear in a different light.
A lthough confidence in the paradigm is w aning, tradition is a pow erful obstacle to the spread of rivalling theories. In science, Kuhn says, canons are very difficult to break up. Every new thing hits a barrier o f entrenched beliefs. A t first, anom alies are not treated seriously. They are often ignored, and only things anticipated in keeping with the paradigm are acknow
Science Change in the Light o f Modern Philosophy 63 ledged.20 O nly when anom alies are around for a long tim e do scientists acknow ledge them and a crisis is provoked in science. The crisis is an initial condition to identify and put forw ard new theories that are to supersede the current paradigm .
The anom alies alone are not enough for the paradigm to be rejected: some facts are always around that are at odds with the paradigm , yet they are not view ed as counter-evidence but only as normal problem s which can be solved within the paradigm. W hat is indispensable to the rejection o f a paradigm is a rival, or a new more satisfactory paradigm capable of accounting for the value not merely on the grounds o f a confrontation of theory with experience. W hich paradigms are to be accepted and which rejected, results therefore not only from comparisons with nature, but also with one another.
C ho o sin g from am ong rivalling th eo ries breeds p ro b lem s th at can n o t be solved inside the scope o f logical rules. T he new p a ra d ig m sup p lies new notional categ o ries, w hich fo r th eir p a rt turn, w hat u n d e r the p rev io u s p aradigm used to be an anom aly, into a predictable thing - a scien tific fact. K uhn uses the term revolution to describe the passage from the old to a new paradigm . A fter such a revolution, although the w orld has not changed, scientists live in a different w orld.21 This w ay, continuity in science is broken up.
Com parisons of theories from before and after the revolution do not boil down to reinterpretations o f individual established facts. N othing like a neutral fact and its interpretation exist. Kuhn m akes a strong point o f the im possibility of such an interpretation, as no unchanging foundations seem to exist for that. Each interpretation, he says, is inextricably bound up with a paradigm . “Interpretation (...) can only cause a m ore particu lar reform u lation o f the paradigm , but not its correction.”22 It follow s that scientists subscribing to two different paradigm s, will attribute different m eanings to theoretical term s occurring in laws even though their w ording or the term s used in either case are the same.
So, Lakatos and Kuhn agree at least that the m eaning o f a scientific term depends on its theoretical context. Y et Lakatos questions K u h n ’s view that the m eaning o f any scientific term found in a theory changes radically as soon as the theory has changed.
T heir respective ways o f presenting the notion o f anom aly dem onstrate the m ain difference betw een L akatos’s and K uh n’s positions. To Lakatos, an anom aly is som ething like a puzzle. Its explanation, no m atter w hether provided within the research program m e P or in its com petitor, o r perhaps in some other research program m e w hich is neutral tow ards P, does not break up the continuity o f science. There is still that “internal history” w hich accounts for the rational (or logical) aspect o f grow th o f scientific know ledge and so furnishes a foundation for com paring all scientific term s w ith one another.
Kuhn refutes that com parison o f anom alies to puzzles. P uzzles are prob lem s that norm al science deals with. They have guaranteed solutions which are legitim ate under a given paradigm . A nom alies appear w hen the p ara d ig m ’s anticipated governing rules fail. A nom alies disturb tradition-bound scientific practices, prom pting scientists to look for and adopt new uncon ventional studies. A nom alies spawn discoveries o f new facts and form ula tions o f new theories w hich are incom m ensurate with previous ones.
To conclude, let us go back to the query asked at the outset about tradi tion in science, specifically about when it is continued and w hen broken up. R ealising the broad theoretical im plications o f this question, let us only look at the problem o f scientific change in L ak ato s’s and K uhn’s approaches. I think that two lines o f tradition can be identified inside L a k a to s’s m etho dology o f research program m es: an internal and a supra-system ic. T he in ternal tradition is confined within a single research program m e. It is that tradition that causes the program m e to grow, or to produce its successive versions. The other line o f tradition, which I call the supra-system ic tradition, goes beyond the confines o f a program m e to encom pass the w hole area o f scientific research. It m arks a quantum leap in the developm ent o f science, indicating a substitution of one system (or program m e) for another, richer one. Lakatos bases both research traditions on “objective standards,” on what are com m on to all science sets o f m ethodological standards, regardless o f th eir respective historical references.
K uhn takes a slightly different view o f tradition. To be accurate, he does envisage an internal tradition m uch like L akato s’s w hich operates inside a given paradigm . B ut as Kuhn recognises no criteria above individual p ara digm s, there is no question about any supra-system ic tradition in his ap proach. T ransition from one paradigm to another is a “conversion” rather than an objective choice. Individual scientists, Kuhn believes, are unable to com prehend at the sam e tim e, theories divided by a scientific revolution or to confront them with the real work or with one another.
1 K. R. P o p p er, L o g ic o f S c ie n tific D isco v e ry . N ew Y ork. 1961, p 15.
2 T h e sa m e id e a w a s p u t fo rw a rd in d e p e n d en tly and at th e sa m e tim e by P. K . F e y e ra b e n d .
3 T. S. K uh n , S tru k tu ra rew o lu c ji n a u k o w y c h [P o lish tra n sla tio n ], W arsa w , 1968, p. 118. T. S. K uh n , The S tr u c tu re o f S c ie n tific R e v o lu tio n s ,2 n d ed n . e n la rg e d , T h e U n iv e rsity o f C h ic a g o P ress, C h ic ag o , 1970, p. lO lf, “A p p a re n tly N e w to n ian d y n a m ic s h as b e en d e riv e d fro m E in ste in ia n , su b je c t to a few lim itin g c o n d itio n s. Y e t th e d e riv a tio n is sp u rio u s. (...) B ut th e p h y sica l re fe re n ts o f th e se E in ste in ia n c o n c e p ts a re b y n o m eans id e n tic al w ith th o se o f N e w to n ia n c o n ce p ts th a t b e a r th e sam e n a m e .”
4 L a k a to s u n fo rtu n a te ly d o e s n o t e x p la in e x ac tly ho w th e p ro g ra m m e ’s p ro te c tiv e b e lt ch an g e s. H e o n ly ta lk s o f th e p ro g ra m m e ’s p o s itiv e h eu ristic s (’’re se a rc h p o licy ” ) w h ic h re p o rte d ly g o v e rn s th e c o u rs e o f the p ro g ram m e.
Science Change in llie Light o f Modern Philosophy 65 5 I. L a k a to s, F a lsific a tio n a n d M e th o d o lo g y o f S c ie n tific R e s e a r c h P ro g r a m m e s , in: I. L a k a to s , A . M u s- g ra v e (e d s.), C riticism a n d the G ro w th o f K n o w led g e , C a m b rid g e , 1970, p. 117.
6 C f. J. S u c h , D ifferen t in te rp re ta tiv e p ro c e d u re s in sc ie n c e [in P o lish ] S tu d ia M e th o d o lo g ic z n e N o. 6, 1969.
7 M . P rze łę c k i, A M o d e l-T h e o r e tic a l A p p r o a c h to th e P r o b le m o f In te r p re ta tio n o f E m p ir ic a l L a n g u a g e s , un: P rze łę c k i M ., W ó jc ick i R. (e d s.), T w e n ty -F iv e Y ears o f L o g ic M e th o d o lo g y in P o la n d W a rsa w , 1977.
8 C f. K. R. P o p p er, L o g ic..., o p .cit., p. 106. 9 C f. ib id ., p. 107 n. 2.
111 I. L a k a to s, o p .cit., p. 127. 11 Ib id ., p. 173.
12 I. L a k a to s , M a th e m a tic s, S c ie n c e a n d E p iste m o lo g y , P h ilo so p h ic a l P a p e rs, C a m b rid g e 1 9 7 8 , p. 2 1 3 . 13 K . R. P o p p e r, N o rm a l S c ie n c e a n d Its D a n g e rs, in: C riticism a n d th e G ro w th ..., o p .c it., p . 56. 14 L a k a to s d istin g u ish e d b e tw e e n an “ in te rn a l” an d an “e x te rn a l” h isto ry o f sc ie n c e . In te rn a l h is to ry p re sen ts th e ra tio n a l a sp e c t o f s c ie n tific d e v e lo p m e n t (th e o n e w h ic h is in k e e p in g w ith ru le s o f lo g ic ). T h e o th e r h isto ry , as a p ro d u c t o f n o n -lo g ic a l d ev ia tio n s, is o f little a v ail fo r th e u n d e rs ta n d in g o f sc ie n c e .
15 S c ie n tists a lo n e , and n o t a n y g u a ra n te ed o b je c tiv ity , d e cid es th e fu tu re o f a re s e a rc h p ro g ra m m e . H isto ric a l re la tiv ism , w h ic h L a k a to s stau n c h ly o p p o sed , d o e s s e e m to h a v e a fo u n d a tio n .
16 I. L a k a to s, F a lsific a tio n a n d M e th o d o lo g y ..., o p .cit., p. 93.
17 T. S. K u h n , D w a b ie g u n y [T w o Po les]. W a rsa w , 1985, p. 4 0 2 . T . S. K u h n , L o g ic o f D is c o v e r y o r P s y c h o lo g y o f R e s e a r c h , in: C riticism a n d the G ro w th ..., o p .c it., p. 20.
18 T. S. K uh n , S tru ktu ra ..., o p .cit., p. 68. T . S. K u h n , L o g ic o f D is c o v e ry o r P s y c h o lo g y o f R e se a rc h , o p .cit., p. 20.
19 Ib id ., p. 69. Ibid., p. 52. 2(1 C f. ib id ., p. 79. C f. ib id ., p. 62. 21 C f. ib id ., p. 137. C f. ib id ., p. 122. 22 Ib id ., p. 122.
