Classifying Science: Phenomena, Data, Theory, Method, Practice

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Springer Science & Business Media, 3. 11. 2007 - Počet stran: 288

Classification is the essential first step in science. The study of science, as well as the practice of science, will thus benefit from a detailed classification of different types of science.

In this book, science - defined broadly to include the social sciences and humanities - is first unpacked into its constituent elements: the phenomena studied, the data used, the theories employed, the methods applied, and the practices of scientists. These five elements are then classified in turn. Notably, the classifications of both theory types and methods allow the key strengths and weaknesses of different theories and methods to be readily discerned and compared. Connections across classifications are explored: should certain theories or phenomena be investigated only with certain methods? What is the proper function and form of scientific paradigms? Are certain common errors and biases in scientific practice associated with particular phenomena, data, theories, or methods? The classifications point to several ways of improving both specialized and interdisciplinary research and teaching, and especially of enhancing communication across communities of scholars. The classifications also support a superior system of document classification that would allow searches by theory and method used as well as causal links investigated.

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Classifying Science
1
Classifying Phenomena and Data
23
Classifying Theory
51
Classifying Method
99
Classifying Practice
155
Drawing Connections Across
199
Classifying Scientific Documents
217
Concluding Remarks
239
References
269
Index 279
278
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Strana 154 - But, acknowledging that no observations or interpretations are perfectly repeatable, triangulation serves also to clarify meaning by identifying different ways the phenomenon is being seen (Flick, 1998; Silverman, 1993; see also Smith, Chapter 34, this volume).
Strana 14 - Each standard and each category valorizes some point of view and silences another. This is not inherently a bad thing —indeed it is inescapable.
Strana 107 - ... so far as it can be done, to include all of them within the pale of the science ; else we shall infallibly bestow a disproportionate attention upon those which our theory takes into account, while we misestimate the rest, and probably underrate their importance.
Strana 122 - The problem with experiments is that they tell you nothing unless they are competently done, but in controversial science no-one can agree on a criterion of competence. Thus, in controversies, it is invariably the case that scientists disagree not only about results, but also about the quality of each other's work.
Strana 72 - Practical wisdom is not concerned with universals only; it must also recognize particulars, for it is practical, and practice concerns particulars...
Strana 152 - To some critical consumers of social research, the admission that our methods are fallible may seem to "prove" the ultimate futility of empirical social science. However, growing knowledge of the individual weaknesses of our methods has led many researchers to reach a different conclusion: social science methods should not be treated as mutually exclusive alternatives among which we must choose and then passively pay the costs of our choices. Our individual methods may be flawed, but fortunately...
Strana 16 - ... does not help us much in research work, not even in arranging its results, as long as we are not able to combine the classification of single items with the presentation of interrelations between them.
Strana 162 - Rationality, Relativism, and Cognition Philosophical theories of science are generally theories of scientific rationality. The scientist of philosophical theory is an ideal type, the ideally rational scientist. The actions of real scientists, when they are considered at all, are measured and evaluated by how well they fulfill the ideal. The context of science, whether personal, social, or more broadly cultural, is therefore typically regarded as irrelevant to a proper philosophical understanding...
Strana 97 - Basic to my argument is the assertion that no one genre of theory of the sort considered here can reasonably claim to yield the full range of insights required for our analytical needs. The best case for progress in the understanding of social life lies in what I see as the expanding fund of insights and understandings derived from a wide variety of theoretical inspirations.
Strana 182 - This book, on aspects of methodology, starts from the premise that methodological writing is of limited use to practising social researchers, who are pursuing a craft occupation, in large part learned 'on the job', through apprenticeship, experience, trial and error, rather than by studying general accounts of method.

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