Can Kuhn’s explanation of critical discussion only in times of crisis be justified?

In this blog post, we’ll explore whether Kuhn’s explanation that critical debate only occurs in times of crisis is justified.

 

Thomas Kuhn, a philosopher of science who coined the term “paradigm,” defined it in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions as “a total framework or set of concepts that combines the scientific perceptions, theories, conventions, ideas, ideas, and values that dominate an era. Specialized research activities based on a particular paradigm are called normal science, and because normal science attempts to fit the subject of research into the framework provided by the paradigm, normal science inherently suppresses novelty. This is also the most basic characteristic of normal science, and Kuhn argues that conventional views of science are shaped by this very basic characteristic, and when the existing paradigm can no longer avoid the anomalies that destroy the established traditions of scientific activity, the search for a new paradigm that will finally lead to a new basis for doing science begins. To summarize, Kuhn argues that normal science does not aim for new facts or theories, and that critical discussion only occurs when a paradigm stops working effectively. Since explanations of history, as well as the history of science, need to be factually accurate, we need to see if Kuhn’s explanation can be justified. After describing what exactly Kuhn means by “scientists engage in critical debate only in times of crisis,” I will present FireAbend’s rebuttal and criticize areas that FireAbend does not address.
In order to understand Kuhn’s account, it is necessary to have a precise understanding of “crisis” and “critical discussion”. A scientific revolution is an event that marks the end of a period of normal science and a paradigm shift. Kuhn explains that paradigms are established through paradigm-free research, and paradigms are crisis-ridden when anomalous cases emerge during the period of normal science. This is followed by a transition from the old paradigm to a new one. The anomalies that trigger the crisis are phenomena that cannot be explained by normal science, even though they are activities that are consistent with normal science. In order to solve particularly important problems, normal scientists relax the rules of problem solving and use protective hypotheses, which Kuhn calls “crises” in which the paradigm is blurred and the rules of normal science are broken.
To understand Kuhn’s position on critical discussion, it’s important to note how he explains the concept of paradigm. Kuhn argued that if there were no shared beliefs (paradigms) that could be taken for granted, then scientists would have to assert and justify their own principles by attacking the fundamental principles of other schools of thought. He believed that doing this without basic agreement was philosophy, not science, and so he came to the conclusion that stopping critical discussion of fundamental principles is the beginning of science. In other words, when a mainstream paradigm exists, research within it should not be questioned for its fundamental principles. Kuhn’s “critical discussion” of the fundamental principles of a paradigm is the same “critical discussion” that is necessary to generate alternative theories. This is because two competing paradigms almost always differ at the most basic level. For example. When the speed of light is very small, relativity’s laws take the same form as Newton’s laws, but the meaning of “mass” is completely different in the two theories. The definition of a compound was the subject of a debate between Dolton and Bertollet, and the two men differed in how they defined it. Since the most basic concepts of the two competing paradigms are different, an alternative theory cannot be generated unless one proceeds to criticize the basic principles. In other words, Kuhn’s “critical discussion” of basic principles is a necessary precursor to the generation of alternative theories. Now that we know Kuhn’s position on “crisis” and “critical discussion,” let’s look at FireAvent’s rebuttal to Kuhn’s account.
Feyerabend is the most prominent refutation of Kuhn’s concept of normal science. He basically criticizes Kuhn’s concept of normal science as a form of specialization that increases the barriers to entry into science through the formation of paradigms, and argues that Kuhn’s concept of normal science is a form of specialism, and that normal science is inappropriate as a methodological prescription. This criticism of the dogmatic nature of normal science has been a controversial one that Kuhn himself has offered, and he responds by explaining that the uncritical acceptance of normal science merely provides a “framework” for scientists to think in, and that in order to say that normal science is dogmatic, it must be “something that can be criticized but is not criticized,” but in fact it is not dogmatic because it is too difficult to criticize. He also shows the positive side of tenacity in sticking to a theory by giving examples of dogmatically defending a particular paradigm with ad hoc hypotheses, which in turn led to new discoveries. Even FireAvent acknowledges that the potential for advancement/improvement of a theory is not something that can be easily determined, and that no theory should be easily discarded because the possibility of error in experimental results or observations, or lagging advances in ancillary science, cannot be ignored.
However, FireAvent argues that no single anomaly can eliminate the existing paradigm in this way, and since paradigm shifts cannot be achieved by adhering to a single theory, there is a need for the “principle of multiplication,” which states that alternative theories must always exist. In order for an alternative theory to exist during a crisis, it must have been created before, i.e., during the period of normal science, and this requires an attempt to solve the problem in a way other than the existing paradigm. In other words, a scientific revolution can only exist if there is a critical discussion of the existing paradigm during normal science.
FireAvent also argues that Kuhn’s account of critical debate only occurring in times of crisis is not consistent with actual history. In the 19th century, three incompatible paradigms coexisted: the mechanistic view, the phenomenological theory of heat, and the electromagnetism of Faraday and Maxwell. FireAvent’s argument is that there was actually an active interaction between these three paradigms, and that without this interaction, the discoveries that led to the relativity revolution, the quantum revolution, and the statistical revolution would not have occurred if each had focused on solving puzzles within its own paradigm. For Kuhn, these cases are so unusual that one might think it would be a stretch to use this argument to refute his explanation. However, FireAvent argues that even if such explorations are few and far between, it is the work of a small group of scientists who cross paradigms, not puzzle solving, that produces major advances in science, which means that Kuhn’s temporal separation between revolution (a period of proliferation) and normal science (a period of monistic scientific activity) fails. After all, revolutions can exist because critical discussions were certainly taking place during the period of normal science.
Aside from being logically impossible and inconsistent with actual history, Kuhn’s argument has additional problems, as FireAvent shows. For one thing, we can’t be sure that a crisis is a crisis. When normal scientists can’t solve anomalous cases with normal science, they try to protect their paradigm by relaxing the rules of the game or coming up with alternative hypotheses. This process leads to paradigm ambiguity, as it becomes impossible to agree on the scope of the paradigm, and Kuhn argues that “all crises begin with a paradigm being ambiguous and the rules of normal science being violated accordingly. However, “ambiguity” and “unraveling” are phenomena that do not have any clear criteria. This means that different scientists may recognize different moments as crises. Paradigms enable ongoing research by presenting problems to be solved and rules to be followed, so anomalies are bound to keep popping up, but not all of them are paradigm crises. This is because normal science is itself an activity of solving anomalous cases as puzzles. Kuhn’s argument is that competing paradigms are incommensurable. There cannot be a “criterion of crisis” that can be applied to both paradigms, which are not even comparable: whether or not a particular case of anomaly is considered a crisis is a matter of perspective. Kuhn argues that crises are indicators of when it’s time to change tools (paradigms), but I’m not convinced that they actually do this.
Kuhn’s account can also be refuted with respect to the role of science in history. Let’s look at Popper’s critique of normal science. Popper says the following

Kuhn’s “normal scientists” are pitiful people who have been indoctrinated with a dogmatic spirit. Their attitude is a threat not only to science but to our civilization itself.

Just as Newton’s mechanical clockwork contributed greatly to the Enlightenment, science has played an important role in the process of replacing God with reason. The conventional wisdom is that science enlightens and advances us, and indeed it has done so, which is why Kuhn’s claim that scientists have only engaged in critical debate during paradigm crises is difficult to accept. This is because the role of science does not change during times of normal science. Critical debate should have occurred at any time for science to continue to fulfill its role.
The final problem with Kuhn’s account of critical debate in times of crisis is related to his wording. In The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Kuhn offers the above explanation while also arguing that critical debate should only occur in times of crisis. If you look closely, within the same paragraph, Kuhn presents the following explanation and claim together

The creation of alternatives is something that scientists rarely do, except at the paradigm-shifting stage in the development of their science, and then only in very special cases in the progress that follows (p.117).
The creation of new extensions of science, as in productive activity, is a kind of extravagance, reserved for occasions that demand it. (p.117)

While the above sentence is more of an “explanation” that, as we have discussed, the creation of alternatives almost exclusively occurs in times of crisis, the following sentence seems to be Kuhn’s personal view that changing tools in non-crisis times is a luxury. Of course, Kuhn pioneered the new field of historical philosophy of science with his approach based on the actual history of science, so one might expect that his position on this topic would be more of a “do” or “have done” statement than a “should” statement. However, I wish Kuhn had been a bit clearer and more consistent about what he was trying to convey.
Kuhn explains that new theories emerge only after seeing significant failures in normal problem-solving activities, but we can see that for a scientific revolution to exist, critical discussions must take place even during normal scientific times, according to FireAvent’s ‘multiplicative principle’, and actual history does not support his explanation. Furthermore, we were able to refute Kuhn’s explanation by thinking about the role of science and how we cannot be sure that a crisis is a crisis. If Kuhn’s account of the history of science is wrong, and if scientists have only engaged in critical debate in times of crisis, as Kuhn suggests, then it might be tempting to think that critical debate should continue to be limited to times of crisis because that is how science has progressed. This is a very dangerous idea, however, because the lack of critical debate when the wrong paradigm was chosen, such as the now-abandoned alchemy or pendulum theory, will prolong the revolution, and much research will be wasted. An accurate account of the history of science is necessary to avoid the contingencies of Kuhn’s inaccurate account.