Feyerabend and epistemological anarchism. Do you agree?

[Bollocks]

So in my university they were offering some philosophy courses about epistemology and we learned about various philosophers, but the one that shock me the most was Feyarebend with his ideas of epistemological anarchism, it just seems so different to conventional theories and more like an extremist khun.It just seemed wrong, though I could be wrong.

Anyway, having said that do you agree with him? Or is he crazy?

Quick summary for those that don't know: Feyerabend believed that to make science everyone should use whatever method they please and theories were not proved based on evidence but disproving the opposite theory that contradicts your own.

[Ripster42]

So in my university they were offering some philosophy courses about epistemology and we learned about various philosophers, but the one that shock me the most was Feyarebend with his ideas of epistemological anarchism, it just seems so different to conventional theories and more like an extremist khun.It just seemed wrong, though I could be wrong.

Anyway, having said that do you agree with him? Or is he crazy?

Quick summary for those that don't know: Feyerabend believed that to make science everyone should use whatever method they please and theories were not proved based on evidence but disproving the opposite theory that contradicts your own.

Sounds stupid, but maybe I'm just not understanding your summary. How would you disprove the fact that light is a particle? Or disprove that it's a wave?

[Dezerte]

I think science should "open up" a bit more, on that I could agree. But how would this philosophy really work? How do you disprove something if there are no rules that say what is valid or not? I also think there may be a bit of false dichotomy involved in the argument against the scientific method, because I see it as the currently best method of ascertaining the truth and not the best.

[Summer]

Was not familiar with this so read the oh-so reliable wikipedia article on him. Almost fell off my chair when reaching

"Feyerabend was critical of the lack of knowledge of philosophy shown by the generation of physicists that emerged after World War II:

The withdrawal of philosophy into a "professional" shell of its own has had disastrous consequences. The younger generation of physicists, the Feynmans, the Schwingers, etc., may be very bright; they may be more intelligent than their predecessors, than Bohr, Einstein, Schrödinger, Boltzmann, Mach and so on. But they are uncivilized savages, they lack in philosophical depth – and this is the fault of the very same idea of professionalism which you are now defending.[10]"

This pretty much discredits the guy once and for all in my eyes. What rubbish, Feynman was amazing!

Feynman on scientific theory:

[Deleted]

Why are things like this even talked about in a university?

Just let students focus completely on acquiring practical skills that helps them get a job instead.

Let them develop their worldviews in their own time.

[Bollocks]

Why are things like this even talked about in a university?

Just let students focus completely on acquiring practical skills that helps them get a job instead.

Let them develop their worldviews in their own time.

It was an optional course.
Also I disagree, university is meant to open your mind and introduce you to views that one may not be familiar with

[May90]

Quick summary for those that don't know: Feyerabend believed that to make science everyone should use whatever method they please and theories were not proved based on evidence but disproving the opposite theory that contradicts your own.

I've read his book "Against method". I don't think your summary is correct. What he does argue is that modernly accepted "scientific method" is just one of possible ways to make science, and there could exist (or already exist) other methods, frowned upon by the mainstream science, but still giving results. Now, the examples he provides in the book didn't seem convincing to me and looked a bit too esoteric to my taste - but his general argument makes sense to me: just because we have accepted the algorithm and it has been giving us results consistently, doesn't mean other algorithms giving results (perhaps even better ones) cannot exist.

I think science should "open up" a bit more, on that I could agree. But how would this philosophy really work? How do you disprove something if there are no rules that say what is valid or not?

Well, you could disprove something within a certain framework, while not disproving it in general... But yes, I see the complication here.

[Deleted]

It was an optional course.
Also I disagree, university is meant to open your mind and introduce you to views that one may not be familiar with

Well, we can disagree on that part I guess.

I see it as a complete waste of time and resources. It also seems to be used too often by professors that want to steer students into a certain direction, mostly their own.

[alltrueist]

Why are things like this even talked about in a university?

Just let students focus completely on acquiring practical skills that helps them get a job instead.

Let them develop their worldviews in their own time.

The university isn't trade school. Not everyone is auto didactic.

[Shadowferal]

Pretty sure that without philosophy science has always gone to shit. (Probably why it's all profit-driven today)

A scientist that can't remember philosophy should turn in his PHD, since his/her "philosopher's degree isn't important that him/her.

From the wiki article:

In his books Against Method and Science in a Free Society Feyerabend defended the idea that there are no methodological rules which are always used by scientists. He objected to any single prescriptive scientific method on the grounds that any such method would limit the activities of scientists, and hence restrict scientific progress. In his view, science would benefit most from a "dose" of theoretical anarchism. He also thought that theoretical anarchism was desirable because it was more humanitarian than other systems of organization, by not imposing rigid rules on scientists.
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The restriction of ideas probably explains why "paradigm shift" is such a surprise and obviously much needed.

When a distinguished scientist says something is possible, he is
almost certainly right; but when he says something is impossible, he
is often wrong.

- Arthur C Clarke
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The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.

---Albert Einstein

[nextormento]

Back in the day I found the idea refreshing. In that I think we need consider, question, and deliberately attack from time to time the underpinnings of any discipline.
But in the courses we had we framed it more on the dichotomy that philosophers wanted science and scientists to be more interested in philosophy (something Feyerabend would support), whereas some folks think philosophy needs to pick up the slack and become more science-ish. Was a fun course, but nothing much in depth really.

Be what it may, I think the rise of things like PlosONE (with their "only needs to be methodologically sound" review system) is an indicator that the idea of everything-goes is being cemented in our reality.

[Bollocks]

I've read his book "Against method". I don't think your summary is correct. What he does argue is that modernly accepted "scientific method" is just one of possible ways to make science, and there could exist (or already exist) other methods, frowned upon by the mainstream science, but still giving results. Now, the examples he provides in the book didn't seem convincing to me and looked a bit too esoteric to my taste - but his general argument makes sense to me: just because we have accepted the algorithm and it has been giving us results consistently, doesn't mean other algorithms giving results (perhaps even better ones) cannot exist.


Well, you could disprove something within a certain framework, while not disproving it in general... But yes, I see the complication here.

Yeah I wanted to make a quick summary of everything encompassing all of his ideas briefly. The ideas you mention are discussed on his first chapters in which I agree with. However then he talks about the possibility of validation through ad-hoc and his views on the progress of science are rather controversial , to not say the least.

[McFuu]

Quick summary for those that don't know: Feyerabend believed that to make science everyone should use whatever method they please and theories were not proved based on evidence but disproving the opposite theory that contradicts your own.

That isn't science, that is more akin to debate. Science isn't a debate between 2 competing theories. It's based on facts and evidence that either prove or disprove your theory. But in the course of disproving your own theory, unless you find evidence that supports the competing theory, you've done nothing to strengthen its position.

[Gheld]

That's basically the exact opposite of empiricism and just enables scientific discussions to be shot down instead of opening up discussions (and minds) by allowing multiple theories to prevail as is the current state of the scientific method.

[Underverse]

What other method is there, other than using evidence?

[Bollocks]

That isn't science, that is more akin to debate. Science isn't a debate between 2 competing theories. It's based on facts and evidence that either prove or disprove your theory. But in the course of disproving your own theory, unless you find evidence that supports the competing theory, you've done nothing to strengthen its position.

Perhaps I should be more specific. He says that evidence can be interpreted in multiple ways and used to prove multiple theories that may contradict each other, thus in such situation unconventional methods need to be used. For examplease galileo didnt prove his theory using evidence, because his evidence supported the opposite theory so he used ad-hoc to prove it.

[nextormento]

What other method is there, other than using evidence?

Consensus and adversarial debate, I imagine.
We have absolutely no evidence going for the inflationary epoch: it's an ad-hoc conjecture that conveniently solves many problems we'd had without it. But despite that lacking it enjoys very broad consensus in cosmology.
We also have things like string theory (which, I'm aware, it's cool to hate on it/them). Which we still have no evidence for, and are hard to falsify. But it is a field physicists consider worth exploring.
The heliocentric model was developed entirely without evidence going for it. It just looked nice, and rational; certainly less of a mess than geocentrism. Galileo didn't argue the model to be correct, but that there was no reason to dismiss it in the first place.

[May90]

What other method is there, other than using evidence?

You can use evidence to come to various conclusions, sometimes illogical ones.

[Pull My Finger]

Feyerabend was a really cool cat. Especially in his older days.

I'm happy that I've been made familiar with things like that during my university days. As someone said: university isn't trade school. That's "higher education" for you. It's great and absolutely necessary, as our society continues to prove every day, with its overabundance of educated idiots and sociopathic professionals.

[Shadowferal]

It is by logic that we prove, but it is by intuition that we discover.

"Science is facts; just as houses are made of stone, so is science made of facts; but a pile of stones is not a house and a collection of facts is not necessarily science."

~ Henri Poincare
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Bah!
Intuition, imagination, and inspiration are far more important than knowledge which becomes sterile without such to poke, prod, and sting knowledge forward.