The crisis of contemporary science

ISSN： 0368-492X

Source： Kybernetes: The International Journal of Systems & Cybernetics, Vol.35, Iss.3-4, 2006-03, pp. : 497-521

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Abstract

Purpose ? To present a new approach to scientific thinking (paradigm) that avoids the shortcomings and inconsistencies of the prevailing Newtonian approach. Design/methodology/approach ? The signs of a science in crisis are reviewed and some of its shortcomings are compiled and connected to some misleading fundamental assumptions of the reigning paradigm of science. Calls attention to a current fundamental misunderstanding of the human capacity of observation ? especially the negligence of the conceptual feedback loops of the human mind that make up the core of human learning capacity. Findings ? When using a subject-oriented approach (SOA) to science, which takes off from the individual knowing the subject (methodological solipsism), it is possible to consistently construct a knower's science where all today's misleading assumptions can be successfully removed. This effort results in an abstract constructivist epistemology, where the reversed cause-effect chain severely upsets the classically trained mind ? especially in natural science. Research limitations/implications ? There is a great deal of work left to examine the soundness of these ideas and pave the way for such a profound re-orientation of traditional science that as a first step will be concerned with elucidating and explicating a wide range of problems and concerns in set and decision theory, logic, and mathematics. This is essentially to launch a research programme in these areas that as a next step includes all natural and social sciences that will appear in a new light when viewed from a first person, SOA. Practical implications ? There is no other way for science to evade the prevailing crisis but to involve, in its very Kuhnian sense, a radical change of paradigm. In this view, the realist confusion, which is responsible for the genesis of Cartesian dualism and a row of other inconsistencies met with intoday's science, will slowly vanish, as will the embarrassing gulf between the natural and social sciences as well as humanism. This new ?world-view? that seems radical to the scientist will appear natural to the everyday man ? but its impact on human culture will be monumental. Originality/value ? The SOA to science is based on a reversed cause-effect thinking that will have a heavy influence on the way people think about the world and is accordingly a concern of all human beings as well as each researcher ? of whatever of discipline.