Thomas Kuhn delves into the concept of paradigms, and how they work within a given scientific field.  I am, however, still slightly confused about exactly what a paradigm is…  The way in which they are described feels similar to how one would attempt to explain Plato’s forms–multiple aspects of them are described; yet, none truly capture the full meaning of the concept.  From what I understand, paradigms are a generally accepted model; alternately, they can serve as a template from which to base new studies (as is more the case in the scientific wourd).  Paradigms can also be replaced when new theories start to go against previous ones (hence the term “paradigm shift”).  Which raises another question: who gets to decide that new findings (observed within the current paradigm’s parameters) might be indicative of an upcoming paradigm shift?  Kuhn mentioned that “a new theory… is seldom or never an increment to what is already known” (7), so how different do these findings have to be if they are not to be considered incremental, and therefore within a reasonable limit? 

In the lecture Dr. Peet made the suggestion that mechanics aren’t sitting around discussing whether the science presented to them is accurate, they just accept what they hear on the news as fact.  I would like to challenge that comment.  I have been a “blue collar” worker for over 25 years now, so I feel lumped in to that category with those mechanics.  I feel that this is a very bold statement and perhaps a dangerous misconception.  That statement seems to suggests that critical thinking is limited to the "hallowed halls of higher learning”.  It has been my experience that, not only is critical thinking and active questioning alive and well in the “blue collar” world, but that even the active questioning of science, which is specifically at issue here, is a wide spread phenomenon.  One need look no further than the wide spread disbelief in global warming here in Alberta to find evidence of that.  By contrast, when the statement was made in the class, neither a class full of university students, many of them science majors, nor the other two professors in the room took issue with it and challenged it critically.  So, the question I pose is this:  Is critical thinking, in fact, limited to universities and institutions of higher learning where people are either paying or being paid to do this sort of thinking and write about it, or is it just as prevalent where people are not paid for it, and therefore less inclined to write an essay or publication of their thoughts?

1 Corinthians 3:18-20

Do not deceive yourselves. If any of you think you are wise by the standards of this age, you should become “fools” so that you may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. As it is written: “He catches the wise in their craftiness”; and again, “The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile.”

Would you say that history has somehow conflicted with the concept of science? I mean in the book it says that " the concept of science has developed from historical records”, but then we also see that from a historic point view a new concept of science cannot be establish if we keep studying historic data just for the sake of "answer questions posed by the unhistorical stereotype drawn from science texts” those textbooks quite often try to say that science is completely based of just “observation theories and laws. It feels like history is trying to keep up with science but then something knew comes up because as Scientifics we are often questioning and making knew discoveries based in old experiments using modern science. And so, who is wrong here? History for trying to determine and explain the mistakes and stereotypes that go around science or science for portraying “normal science” as an investigation based entirely in “one or more past scientific achievements, achievements that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundations for its further practice”. “paradigms” are what shapes students to emerge into the scientific world and that is exactly something that history suggest provoke some difficulties down the road, not having certain paradigms for the development of science.

In chapter one, Kuhn talks about the previous view of looking at the history of science as the compilation or compounding of individual scientists work and inventions in an affect that led to an increase in knowledge and wisdom. He then suggested that in reality, when historians tried to pin point specifics for when inventions were done it was very difficult, often vague, which is when they realized that changes in the way that science was done did not arise from the compounding of knowledge, but really the points of revolution in ideology. I was wondering if by realizing that we have been looking at the history of science wrong, we can create better scientists that do better work or is this really just a nice thing to know and has only bearing on the philosophy and history of science rather than everyday lives of scientists?
In chapter two, Kuhn discusses the need for paradigms for a discipline of science to actually mature, where it can make discoveries that were not thought possible. However, through the maturing of various disciplines of science they start to become so isolated from each other, that you would have to part of the discipline to be able to understand the research that they are preforming. Many people do not like the divide between the common people and scientists or even scientists and other scientists. However, can we really lessen the gap when everything has become so specialized, when research has become so specific? Is there actually something wrong with disciplines of science only being understood specifically by those within it or should there be general understanding of disciplines and the leading research by everyone, even the common public as it was before? What would this even look like?

Why were theories being resisted by experts instead of embraced and incorporated into developing research? How does resisting truth lend itself to the positive developments in ongoing research and how has that accepted practice of rejection shaped the sciences? Is it possible that too much research could lend itself negatively to scientific research by diluting it? Perhaps it would be beneficial to incorporate relevant information instead of rejecting it completely? A balance between looking to the past and accepting the future? (P.7)
Kuhn states that fundamentals are rarely disagreed upon; however, what if these fundamentals were incorrect to begin with? Does it make the theories that are built upon them inaccurate? (P.11)
Writers on physical optics felt they had to build their fields anew based upon existing foundations. Does this belief of starting over slow down developments in research or perhaps speed them up? Would this rebuilding produce a lack of consistency in results? (P.13)

All matter is made up of atoms. This is the biggest most general statement for all of chemistry it is the over arching paradigm. No matter what specific field of chemistry you’re in, everyone agrees and believes in atomic theory. And in order to try and make my point without a diagram, I’m going to call this paradigm level 1. All other paradigms in chemistry still fall under the level one paradigm. Kuhn makes reference to a the phenomena in the context of optics as the, “Standard set of methods or phenomena that every optical writer felt forced to employ and explain” pg. 13. Over the years there have been many progressions as to what an atom looks like, and the debates are still going on today, yet everyone seems to agree that all matter is made up of these tiny units. Even though, we can’t prove it.

If an atheist and a religious person were having a discussion, and the religious man couldn’t answer the atheists questions about Gods love, or why there is evil. So the religious man replies by saying “you can’t understand it because you’re a sinner”, the atheist wouldn’t consider his friends religion to be very rational because he can’t explain it outside of its own context.

We’re using the same kind of reasoning to prove atoms exist. If we pretend that they exist, we can use x ray crystallography and scanning tunnelling microscopes to “prove” they do. But that’s proving a theory within its own context again. Even in our classes here at kings, there are many different models we use to explain the phenomena (ex, Lewis structures, MO theory), and a lot of the models don’t work when overlapped, meaning they can’t both be true.  Yet no one questions atomic theory. It’s just our models that aren’t accurate enough.

We’ve accepted atomic theory as truth and moved on. Gone a whole lot farther with research, and have ended up creating sub paradigms within the field of chemistry.

So when ground breaking research happens and we hit a “crisis point” you don’t end up challenging the whole level one paradigm. You end up challenging the sub paradigm much more localized to your area of study. You challenge the model. There may be a paradigm shift, but then you move on and keep the research moving forward (maybe in a different direction)  in lieu of the shift.  But no one comes back to question the level one paradigm.

But what if its wrong? Doesn’t that mean that we  just end up digging ourselves deeper into the paradigm we’re in? Making it harder and harder to get out?

The last thought I want to tag on is this is,  on page 16, Kuhn briefly mentions that technology plays a vital role in the emergence of new science. And makes the argument that much of the knowledge we have today could not have been casually discovered, and so, the conclusions scientists drew in the past are no more or less scientific than the conclusions we draw today. Because our technology is still primitive compared to what will exist 100 years from now. But there is one major difference, today we have the ability to store much more information. We don’t even have to remember it, our computers can do that. The amount of evidence we’ve amassed on the basis that atomic theory is true, dwarfs the amount of evidence supporting a scientific paradigm in the past. Which is why I’m not sure we will be able to shift a level one paradigms in any field again.

In the first three chapters in the book, The Structure of Scientific Revolution by Thomas Kuhn, Kuhn delves into the notion of paradigms and “normal” science, and how historical scientific ideas shape the way a contemporary scientist approaches their insights. Kuhn suggests that paradigm’s both restricts science into a rigid box yet are necessary for developing a better understanding. Is the “normal” method of doing science the best method even if it isn’t ideal? How could a scientist potentially do their research outside of the rigid box that Kuhn describes?
I also was intrigued in the first chapter when Kuhn tried to discuss the role of History in science and how contemporary science might completely disregard a old scientist’s brilliance without bringing to the table the context and constraints of which the scientist had to do his work by. Which could possibly cause contemporaries to potentially overlook past important discoveries. With that I bring the question should there be more biographical accounts of past scientists be added to the modern scientific canon?