File spoon-archives/feyerabend.archive/feyerabend_1999/feyerabend.9910, message 7


Date: Tue, 5 Oct 1999 06:28:13 -0700 (PDT)
From: Einat Adar <leaders_2-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: PKF: what is "anything goes"?



Terry's answer to Teo's question is very
interesting and
instructive, however, I disagree with him on
several points,
as I tend to interpret Feyerabend as being a more
radical
anti-rationalist. 

Here are my objections:

1. Feyerabend opposes any classification of
scientific work.
Therefore, it is misleading to say that 
> 'Anything goes' applies to all the various
stages that one
> might posit in one's theory of how to produce
"something of
> value" - problem solving: how to conceive of
the problem
> initially, how to come up with ideas about how
to deal with it
> (for instance, drink wine, meditate, have a
party, form a
> discussion group, read everything about the
subject area, read
> nothing about the subject area, etc.), how to
implement whatever
> approach you decide on (viz. individual work,
teamwork, etc.,
> etc.), and how to defend your approach against
detractors.

In fact, inviting your detractors to a party,
making them drink
too much and then making them sign a paper
saying: "This
fellow's theories are wonderful and true" is as
legitimate as
any other defence.

Perhaps I am being tedious, but I think that you
are using here
the distinction between context of discovery and
context of
justification that Feyerabend has shown to be a
harmful fantasy
-- for instance, his reconstruction of the
Copernican
revolution in "Against Method".

2. Scientific problems are emergent, not only
because science
advances in revolutions, but also because new,
and successful,
theories change the way we see things -- our
natural
interpretations. Later commentators naturally
interpret the
phenomena in the light of the dominant theory,
and find it hard
to understand how earlier scientists didn't see
the problem
-- unless, of course, they are made aware of the
theories'
"pollution" of their common sense. "New TYPES of
experiments"
give rise to new types of questions. 

To sum up: Scientific problems, just like
scientific facts,
depend on theories.

As I understand it, "anything goes" is not a
prescription. It
doesn't mean that we should take care to have
many alternatives
that recognize the usefulness of each other.
Feyerabend's is a
humanistic approach -- do whatever is good for
you as a human
being. If I believe that fascism is a better
approach for
politics, religion, social interaction,
economics, etc., then
why not also for science?
Fascist methods are good for fascist regimes, for
as long as
they survive.

I also disagree with Scott Casellas that 
> Feyerabend certainly never thought that
anything goes
for he gives excellent _theoretical_ reasons to
adopt this
approach, apart from the historical findings. The
story of
Galileo is important, because Galileo had no
rational reason to
adopt the Copernican theory, and he used
rhetorics as a
substitute for reasoning.

As Feyerabend explains in AM and elsewhere, we
cannot rely on
"facts" and experiments to judge our theories,
because our
description of reality makes use of a language
that already
contains assumptions about the world, it's
availability to
observations, the utility of our senses and
measurment tools,
etc. Therefore, each theory, when accepted,
changes the
structure of _reality_, let alone that of
science. Analysis of
the history of science only brings these changes
to light.

However, I totally agree with John Fox's
(well-written!) answer.
If only saying this was enough...

I think there is no simple answer to Teo's
question. Every
answer reveals it's author's personal
inclinations and
interpretive style, but, hey, anything goes, and
I personally
prefer disagreement to uniformity.

-- 
Einat

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