The Normative Structure Of Science

We discover scientific knowledge in various natural science fields such as biology or chemistry. A common misconception about the natural sciences is that both the knowledge they reveal to us and the scientific method used in discovering this are purely analytical. This means that these sciences are rigid in facts and do not contain any subjectivity or creativity. However, the scientific method is not a rigid system of pursuing measurable facts. It contains fallacies and biases. In testing hypotheses, performing observations, or reasoning inductively, science is undoubtedly flawed and erroneous. Paradigms, commonly seen as infallible and containing rather insignificant errors, contribute to many of the errors involved in scientific

Science is one of man’s most powerful tools in interpreting his status in the universe; however, with this great power comes great responsibility, and therefore, there must be reasonable expectations and restrictions, but does that mean that restrictions need to be placed to limit the pursuit of science? Or rather, does society need restrictions to limit how science is to be used? Literature and historical events both point to the single truth that society, not science, must be checked.

“Part of science is to be taken as significant and expressible within E, and the rest as non-significant and falling outside E. The E portion is subject to attributions of truth and falsehood, belief and evidence, whereas the non-E portion is not. Yet the fictionalist cannot spurn the latter wholly, since he is prepared to admit its functional ‘legitimacy’ and, hence, its interest for the scientist. At most, he can deny it to be either true or false.” (Scheffler 185).

Science is one of the most essential tools awarded to the human race to ensure its evolution and longevity. Without science, it is plausible to imagine that the entire human race would have been wiped out of existence. The factual and unbiased nature of science in conjunction with the empirical method prevents findings from being based on the agenda of any one individual or groups of people. Early scientists such as Rene Descartes, Isaac Newton, and Francis Bacon strived to ensure that “science should be a demonstrative process involving careful deductive reasoning and documentation rather than a purely mental exercise carried out in isolation” (Dziak, 2016 p.1). However, in today’s society, it is a sad sight to see the manipulation of science in support of social and political agendas.

NYS Science Standard mandates that second graders learn that each generation of animals goes through changes in form from young to adult. This completed sequence of changes in form is called a life cycle. Therefore, this unit will concentrate on this aspect. This curriculum unit is called “The Life Cycles” and the focus content areas are ELA and Science. However, this unit also promotes art, social skills, and math. This unit is intended for a second grade classroom. This specific second grade classroom has fifteen students, in which one has ADHD and two are ELLs, whose primary language is Spanish. The purpose of this unit is to make students aware that each living thing has a life cycle and that although similar, life cycles differ from species to species.

Scientific advancements are, as any advancement, inherently ahead of their time, and those who herald such progress are often seen as immoral or even evil by their respective societies. These individuals have morals that do not conform to the ethics of society because their values are based on beliefs that are deemed wrong by the majority. This is to say that no one willingly does something that is immoral; rather one finds such controversial activity to be justified either by means of a contrasting belief, or an overwhelming desire that supersedes one’s morality. This motif is present

Science is a controversial subject very much like Judicial System. Although Science is largely composed of observation,

These duties are not as straight forward as they appear. On the surface, scientists appear to have but one duty: contribute. However, this is a simplistic view of a matter which carries an extreme weight on society. A scientist must go gently to discover the unknown. His creation must become his master. A scientist must be prepared to accept the full consequences of his work, no matter what the personal cost is. To simply create and then abandon one’s creation

Science surrounds just about every aspect of human interaction but where does this scientific knowledge come from? The communication of scientific knowledge trickles in a fashion opposite to that of the filtration of water through a carbon scrubber, where the highest concentration of pure scientific knowledge exists within the prestigious community of scientists and scientific knowledge within the academic and public communities has to be filtered from the other particles of ideas, leaving much room for interpretation. This paper will explore these different interactions among various communities and how it shapes communication of scientific knowledge.

Because the communication of findings, necessary in the social structure of science, imparts validity challenges to the work there needs to be means by which the scientist can facilitate both communication and validation of the work. This, I suggest, is achieved through the documentation of the scientific process via specific techniques that serve to create both a simulated direct observation and a perceived replicability.

Endorsement is used everywhere from the recognition of a product to the recognition of a person. Inseparable with endorsement is the science lying behind. For decades, science has been the unbiased criteria of being. In a way, science has grown into such a fetish that we hardly remember the human’s role in creating it. However, conducted and interpreted by socially biased human beings, science, far from liberating people from dominance and hierarchy through “value-free truth,” reinforces the current power structure and legitimates domination of both nature and people. On one hand, science is used as a social control by the people in power; on the other hand, every individual is subject to the society, affected by and contributing to

Interestingly, recent investigations revealed that the Comtean hierarchy would be grounded empirically, shedding light on the fact that the sciences do differ, perhaps along the lines suggested two hundreds years ago by Comte (Simonton, 2004; Fanelli & Glänzel, 2010; 2013). After examining in empirical studies a series of indicators – to state a few, citation immediacy, article length, title length, shared references, use of graphs, anticipation frequency, average age at receiving Nobel prize, lecture disfluency – Balietti, Mäs & Helbing (2015, p. 22-23) reported significant differences across the different sciences. Those differences not only depict the level of fragmentation of the sciences according to their level of complexity, but they also neatly mirror the classification of the sciences described by Comte. Cole (1983) had not found evidence in empirical studies in support of the existence of the Comtean hierarchy up until he proposed to differentiate between two classes of knowledge, designated as core (the starting point for graduate education where sciences are better distinguished from one another) and the research frontier (all research currently being conducted) as shown in figure 3. The data demonstrates that at the research frontier, we cannot systematically distinguish between sciences at the top and at the bottom of the hierarchy: "all sciences knowledge at the research frontier is a loosely woven web" (p. 111). This critical observation will be factored

Longino begins by considering problematic definitions of objectivity in science, such as those given by the Positivists and many empiricists. She argues that objectivity in science is safe, due to the nature of the social structure of science. Scientist’s values are justified and accounted for in her contextualist account of objectivity, and it is this multitude of values within a community that result in objectivity.

Each of us are different in many ways and that fact cannot possible be disputed by anyone who has any back ground in the human sciences, as it has been scientifically proven that we all have unique finger prints, DNA, hair, looks, behavior and facial expressions and the combination of these things make us unique "personality types" so to speak. We also function from two different perspectives and we need to understand how each one of us functions. We each like to think that we are special (which we are) and in that portrayal system, we mostly portray what we perceive we want people to think about us. On the other side of the coin we have a reality in what we truly believe about ourselves and the way we feel inwardly. Many of us become disillusioned with our true inner picture, simple because of a misunderstanding of our personal purpose in life.

Science enables critical evaluation of phenomena in the world around us, based on evidential hypotheses. The use of the scientific method has allowed reliable scientific claims to be made, leading to the belief that science is rational. A claim made on the grounds of scientific experimentation is more widely accepted than a statement perceived to be common sense. However, scientific experimentation cannot explain the rationality of science. Over time, the theories of philosophy in science have evolved in an attempt to explain why science is rational.