For the last month or so I have been studying the work of Thomas Kuhn; author of the (in)famous ‘Structure of Scientific Revolutions.’ The angle I have been taking in an article I am working on focuses upon the disciplinary procedures of scientific communities. In ‘Structure’ Kuhn uses the words ‘mass persuasion’ and ‘force’ to describe how the paradigm (or ‘disciplinary matrix’) is enforced. For him this is a necessary part of science to allow the requisite agreement amongst communities of practitioners to focus on ‘puzzle solving’ within that paradigm.
The only problem I have with his thesis is that either for wont of thought, or more likely a deliberate professional decorum, Kuhn does not describe many of these disciplinary procedures. All he gives the reader to go on are the fact that after every revolution in science textbooks are re-written to reflect the new paradigm, and give the impression that the existing paradigm is simply a smooth continuation of the former paradigm. In such ways, according to Kuhn, scientific texts render invisible their discontinuities and decisionistic moments. But are textbooks the only place that ‘committed communities’ enforce their paradigm?
The example of ‘climategate‘ (the hack into the emails of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia) perhaps demonstrates how the taxonomy of these mechanisms could be extended. One of the things people were most shocked by was the unit’s director, Phil Jones, attempting to manipulate the peer-review process to keep out climate sceptic’s papers. Now, in this situation, there is an intersection of politics and science that places a level of scrutiny upon the scientific discipline that it is not normally subject to. For those of us in academia, however, the idea that the reviewers and editors of academic journals are not driven by some ideal, objective pursuit of truth is hardly surprising. We all find that for our own work we end up targeting the kind of journals we imagine would be sympathetic to the work; we seek to conform to what we imagine the editors will look favourably upon. Of course, one might retort, that is in social science; surely the periodicals and practitioners of hard sciences should seek to reflect the objective nature they study?
The more you read of maverick and non-conventional scientists, though, the more your faith in this is shaken. For instance, it has been reported that in the current climate in which intelligent design theorists have been attempting to undermine evolution, that scientific papers with even vaguely critical reflections upon evolution have been finding it hard to get published. Likewise, in Lee Smolin’s ‘The Trouble With Physics’ he reports the same thing amongst the string theory community, which militantly polices its critics and look down upon any theoretical theorists working in another avenue.
Reading Kuhn makes you appreciate that these instances are not exceptional. They are, in fact, necessary for the very practice of science. Phil Jones’ fate was sealed not by any particularly unusual practice, but simply by the normal practices of science being exposed violently under the gaze of the public eye, where they look more like the actions of a concerted conspiracy rather than the everyday workings of the discipline.
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