I don't really prescribe to Popper and his specific rejection of empiricism... I am leaning toward a hermeneutic approach of both holistic and integrative in nature. Rationalism has it's place, but we can certainly rationalize anything, with convincing deductive and inductive arguments. This is it's downfall...
I think that my brother's ice-cream example (great example by the way)
" epistemologies have different flavours and thus - in the same way as strawberry and chocolate are both nice flavours of coloured milk but both are still valid nice flavours of milk - equal right to be called truthful nice flavours of milk if they are based on some internally self consistent socially grounded method, including personal choice." (Mondy, P., 2007)
fits in with what I was reading about objectivity in a critical community, which means that you can have two or more paradigms standing side by side, and both being equally objective and reasonable. This is where one should look for a touchstone...a commonality between a number of paradigms and triangulate certain premises that work in a number of different perspectives. This is where Fereyabend is genuinely great, in that he sees beyond just trying to maintain a single view... But don't you find that if you are too loose in your views, there would be a flip flop from belief in a theory, to rejection then back again...? This can be quite detrimental within the area of high-stakes research...with doctors they may prescribe...but later recant on their previous philosophies...This is socially irresponsible, too.
Hermeneutics has a pyramid structure of Theory (being as objective as one can be)----Philosophy (recognizing reader's perceptions, prejudices and foreknowledge)----and social dynamics (understanding of how context can distort ideas). For educational purposes, this seems pretty sound...
Friday, December 7, 2007
Feyerabend: The case for Methodological Pluralism
I have to say that Feyerabend has a point, when it comes to saying that science has inherent biases, and
that the only way to have an epistemological viewpoint that is free from prejudice, is by having a perspective that is flexible and changeable. But, Berstein (1983) quotes Gadamer by saying there is no knowledge without prejudice, anyway...
I think that Feyerabend's Dadaistic (anything goes approach), and anarchist view of scientific method is a little extreme, especially when it comes to replacing let's say astronomy (a hard science, backed by empirical experience) with astrology (a more touchy feely, yet rational paradigm). The article I was reading, proposed a kind of openness to accepting new ideas, that science should take advantage of other theories and paradigms; such as medicine accepting the help of herbalists and other alternative medicine.
Feyerabend just has far too liberal an interpretation of truth, that he accepts just about any idea (Magic and mysticism). Scientific method may be inconclusive, but it has given us various understandings that are open to verification and falsifiability, but even more importantly they can be practically applied, with reasonable success. Shouldn't we be looking for all those successful applications of theories, and reject those ideas that don't help better our understanding of society. We don't have to hold onto one paradigm, at the expense of beneficial aspects of another (Tibbetts, 1977)
I think that Feyerabend has made it possible to have a more critical view of the nature of scientific method, and probably enabled us to be more open to all potential sources of information...so that we can have a better quality of life, Holistically...
Steven Mondy
Tibbetts, P. (1977) Feyerabend's Against Method: The case for Methodological Pluralism, Sage publications, retrieved Nov, 27, 2007 at http://pos.sagepub.com
that the only way to have an epistemological viewpoint that is free from prejudice, is by having a perspective that is flexible and changeable. But, Berstein (1983) quotes Gadamer by saying there is no knowledge without prejudice, anyway...
I think that Feyerabend's Dadaistic (anything goes approach), and anarchist view of scientific method is a little extreme, especially when it comes to replacing let's say astronomy (a hard science, backed by empirical experience) with astrology (a more touchy feely, yet rational paradigm). The article I was reading, proposed a kind of openness to accepting new ideas, that science should take advantage of other theories and paradigms; such as medicine accepting the help of herbalists and other alternative medicine.
Feyerabend just has far too liberal an interpretation of truth, that he accepts just about any idea (Magic and mysticism). Scientific method may be inconclusive, but it has given us various understandings that are open to verification and falsifiability, but even more importantly they can be practically applied, with reasonable success. Shouldn't we be looking for all those successful applications of theories, and reject those ideas that don't help better our understanding of society. We don't have to hold onto one paradigm, at the expense of beneficial aspects of another (Tibbetts, 1977)
I think that Feyerabend has made it possible to have a more critical view of the nature of scientific method, and probably enabled us to be more open to all potential sources of information...so that we can have a better quality of life, Holistically...
Steven Mondy
Tibbetts, P. (1977) Feyerabend's Against Method: The case for Methodological Pluralism, Sage publications, retrieved Nov, 27, 2007 at http://pos.sagepub.com
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Week 2 of Research Methods in Education
Well, having come to the end of yet another week, I have found that things are starting to make sense... The first week was hard in that there was a lot of terminology... but this week has been hard for me, trying to come to terms with many of the concepts and issues in research...I came to a point in which I needed a time line of these 'thinkers' in the history and philosophy of science.... It is amazing how much of a visual person I am...so I looked up any sites that would give me a good look at all of them in relation to one another…
One site (very simple, I know): http://timelineindex.com/content/view/2031
1. Some of the people I have befriended this week...
Plato...Aristotle...Kant...Hume...Popper…. hahahaha
Actually, it was really good to get some perspective on these guys…
2. Also, I have started to get an idea about what goes into making up good research, but I am still at the very beginning... The readings in module 2 helped, but there were just so many questions (especially in the last reading: Gay, 1992)...and I will need some time to digest the information and sort out what I think...
3. One idea that came out while I was reading the module 2 readings was the idea of allowing time to synthesize and formulate other perspectives and reflect on data (Goetz & Lecompte, 1984). I've often thought to myself, that given enough time between tasks, I am bound to come up with major improvements to whatever I am working on. (That reading kinda consolidated it in my own mind ~ each subsequent revision can slowly give more and more clarity). I try to encourage my writing class students to do exactly that – leave time to reflect. They are often (like many of us) in too much of a hurry to finish things, that they rush through something and not give themselves much time to just sit back and mull things over...
4. I also like the idea that a researcher should say to themselves, “So what”? I think that whenever I start working on something in my teaching job (say some internet based activity), I often get so excited in the task at hand (more so than the students sometimes), that I end up forgetting to answer this fundamental question. What purpose is there in what I am doing, and when much of myself is invested in the project, how much do I wish to be critical (or skeptical) of what I am doing? Am I willing to ask myself, if there are any other ways or even more scope to the approach I am taking? As a researcher, can I afford to be so personally involved in the project? How hard is it to take a step back, and distance myself from the undertaking, so that I can be more responsive to data (or text)? Am I able to modify and possibly change my initial work, if the applications of my initial generalizations yield strange results? I hope that I can be flexible enough to do so…
I hope that we all can…
Steven Mondy
Goetz & Lecompte, (1984) Ethnography and qualitative design in education research, Academic press, Orlando.
One site (very simple, I know): http://timelineindex.com/content/view/2031
1. Some of the people I have befriended this week...
Plato...Aristotle...Kant...Hume...Popper…. hahahaha
Actually, it was really good to get some perspective on these guys…
2. Also, I have started to get an idea about what goes into making up good research, but I am still at the very beginning... The readings in module 2 helped, but there were just so many questions (especially in the last reading: Gay, 1992)...and I will need some time to digest the information and sort out what I think...
3. One idea that came out while I was reading the module 2 readings was the idea of allowing time to synthesize and formulate other perspectives and reflect on data (Goetz & Lecompte, 1984). I've often thought to myself, that given enough time between tasks, I am bound to come up with major improvements to whatever I am working on. (That reading kinda consolidated it in my own mind ~ each subsequent revision can slowly give more and more clarity). I try to encourage my writing class students to do exactly that – leave time to reflect. They are often (like many of us) in too much of a hurry to finish things, that they rush through something and not give themselves much time to just sit back and mull things over...
4. I also like the idea that a researcher should say to themselves, “So what”? I think that whenever I start working on something in my teaching job (say some internet based activity), I often get so excited in the task at hand (more so than the students sometimes), that I end up forgetting to answer this fundamental question. What purpose is there in what I am doing, and when much of myself is invested in the project, how much do I wish to be critical (or skeptical) of what I am doing? Am I willing to ask myself, if there are any other ways or even more scope to the approach I am taking? As a researcher, can I afford to be so personally involved in the project? How hard is it to take a step back, and distance myself from the undertaking, so that I can be more responsive to data (or text)? Am I able to modify and possibly change my initial work, if the applications of my initial generalizations yield strange results? I hope that I can be flexible enough to do so…
I hope that we all can…
Steven Mondy
Goetz & Lecompte, (1984) Ethnography and qualitative design in education research, Academic press, Orlando.
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