Rob, (01)
Thanks for the excerpts from Kuhn. They provide rather more light on
the subject. (02)
One passing observation: (03)
> p.g. 167
> 'The very existence of science depends upon vesting the power to
> choose between paradigms in the members of a special kind of
> community.
> (04)
I'm not sure that this is the essence of science, but it is certainly
true that good science owes much to the peer review process. And Paola
is correct in her accusation that that process produces both false
positives and false negatives from time to time. Any science has its
fads, and their success inevitably depends on their partial truth and
their ability to resolve some known problems. The peer process will
often reward fad-consistent work, and denigrate "revolutionary" work
that is inconsistent with the fad. (05)
At the same time we must realize that every quack thinks himself a
revolutionary -- this exploder has seen a few examples -- but there are
hundreds of quacks for every real revolutionary. The peer process weeds
out the quacks with high reliability. In return for preventing the
cluttering of the literature with the works of 99 goats, we must forgive
that process for its occasional sacrifice of a lamb. (06)
As to funding scientific research, the sad fact is that you have to kiss
a lot of frogs to find a prince. Some funding managers are better at
choosing more promising frogs, but the ratio of princes to funded frogs
is still very low. Can you really blame them for believing that a fad
science is the mark of a promising frog, when the majority of the
council of proven princes tells them so? (07)
-Ed (08)
--
Edward J. Barkmeyer Email: edbark@xxxxxxxx
National Institute of Standards & Technology
Manufacturing Systems Integration Division
100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8263 Tel: +1 301-975-3528
Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8263 FAX: +1 301-975-4694 (09)
"The opinions expressed above do not reflect consensus of NIST,
and have not been reviewed by any Government authority." (010)
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