Paradigm. Do you know what one is? Do you have one? Are you blinded by it?

[Straybow]

Originally posted by Flinx
When someone has this paradigm about an identifiable group they can be called racist, sexist, homophobic, ageist, classis etc. For example, if a racist thinks all Romany (Gypsies) are smelly lazy ignorant thieves, any Romany that do not fit that description are dismissed/ignored as individual exceptions while anyone who is perceived to have these attributes reinforces the belief. Another person with a different paradigm could think that people like the person in the previous example deny Romany jobs and access to housing and education, forcing them into ghettos, so it is not surprising that some resort to stealing, and the fact that some have escaped this fate is proof that the all could if given the opportunity.

Except that the Romany around here live in gaudily decorated $200k houses and still run roofing and paving scams all over the Southeast instead of doing honest work.

The good part is that they (like any sensible people) are reluctant to piss in their own well (so to speak) therefore what little work they do locally is usually honest.

Originally posted by Agathon
analyticity

[Ramo]

Paradigm.
Do you know what one is?
Do you have one?
Are you blinded by it?

I'm very interested in the product that you're selling.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by nostromo


No he didn't.

But some of his followers have.

[Ari Rahikkala]

I have a paradigm, and I make boreholes with it.

[Nostromo]

Originally posted by notyoueither


No, he didn't, I don't think.

More like he thinks that they are the sum of assumptions and prejudices that any person takes with them into any thing in life, including scientific inquiry.

A paradigm then is simply the crystal through which we all observe the world. You might say the prism has a structure which is reinforced by the viewing through it. Some people have been free thinking enough, been smart enough, and have had enough data at hand that they were able to radically remake the assumptions about important parts of human knowledge. In other words, they shifted the structure of how they and others looked at the world.

This is one of the most common use of the word "paradigm". According to the Wikipedia:

Probably the most common use of the word paradigm is in the sense of world view. For example, in social science, the term is used to describe the set of experiences, beliefs and values that affect the way an individual perceives reality and responds to that perception.

However, this is not exactly what Kuhn meant by "paradigm". Kuhn uses the word to describe the shared commitments of scientific communities. And these communities can be very small. Paradigms are very hard to define precisely. For instance, it is very hard to say precisely what is the newtonian paradigm. Nevertheless, it is possible to describe some of their typical components:

(A) Fundamental laws and theoretical assumptions (Newton's laws of motion form a part of the Newtonian paradigm.)

(B) Metaphysical assumptions. They say what type of entity exists and how they interact. Stuff like: "heat is the kinetic energy of the constituant parts of bodies" or "all perceptible phenomena are due to the interaction of atoms in the void."

(C) Values like: predictions should be accurate; quantitative predictions are preferable to qualitative ones; theories should be simple, consistant...

(D) Exemplars. Kuhn attached a lot of importance to these. What are they? According to Kuhn, they are

the concrete problem-solutions that students encounter from the start of their scientific education, whether in laboratories, on examinations, or at the ends of chapters in science texts. To these shared examples should, however, be added at least some of the technical problem-solutions found in the periodical literature that scientists encounter during their post-educational research careers and that also show them by example how their job is to be done.

[Nostromo]

Originally posted by Agathon


But some of his followers have.

Maybe some muddle-headed relativist. I haven't read a lot of relativists, except Feyerabend. But he wasn't exactly a follower of Kuhn. The only one I can think of is James Burke in "The day the universe changed". The last episode was relativist.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by nostromo
However, this is not exactly what Kuhn meant by "paradigm". Kuhn uses the word to describe the shared commitments of scientific communities. And these communities can be very small. Paradigms are very hard to define precisely. For instance, it is very hard to say precisely what is the newtonian paradigm. Nevertheless, it is possible to describe some of their typical components:...

I agree. Kuhn was on a specific topic. That didn't stop historians from running with the ball.

The same view of human knowledge, prejudice, and 'commitments' can be applied to a whole world of things beyond science.

Present centredism, for instance. The tendency of anyone in the here and now to interpret the events of the past by the yard stick of his or her own values. It makes for good fiction, but judging a 15th century human by the standards of today isn't really helpful in gaining an understanding of what was going on then.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by nostromo


Maybe some muddle-headed relativist. I haven't read a lot of relativists, except Feyerabend. But he wasn't exactly a follower of Kuhn. The only one I can think of is James Burke in "The day the universe changed". The last episode was relativist.

I'm not a Kuhn fanatic, but didn't he change his mind later on?

[Nostromo]

Originally posted by notyoueither


I agree. Kuhn was on a specific topic. That didn't stop historians from running with the ball.

The same view of human knowledge, prejudice, and 'commitments' can be applied to a whole world of things beyond science.

Of course, they're free to use the word. But I don't see the point. There are already perfectly good words to describe what you're talking about, words like "culture" or "world view". Kuhn chose instead to use the word "paradigm" because of the last component I mentioned: the exemplars.

[Nostromo]

Originally posted by Agathon


I'm not a Kuhn fanatic, but didn't he change his mind later on?

Despite the appearances, I'm not a Kuhn fanatic either. But if you're studying science, he's a must. You're right, he changed his mind on a number of issues. He even dropped the word "paradigm" after a while. But AFAIK he never dropped paradigms altogether, he just gave them a different name.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by Agathon
Reading the Rorty paper, he says:



Yeah, but Plato introduces it only to point out why it has to fail, and nobody bothered to listen to him. If more people read the Theaetetus we could finally dump a lot of worthless stuff.

So, If I read Plato's Theaetetus, we can dump philosophy?



Hard to diecide whether it's worth it or not.



ACK!

[Agathon]

No. But you can dump almost everything that was written about knowledge between it and Wittgenstein.

[Straybow]

Wittgenstein was a boozy swine…

I think that's the line from "The Philosophers Song"

[jtsisyoda]

Originally posted by smacksim
I'll take the bait, and thanks for the reply. I didn't expect anything as it didn't seem anyone actually read this, only wrote to it.