[Philosophy of Science]: Thomas Kuhn, a famous philosopher of science, likened scientific paradigm shifts to political revolutions. Here is his analysis on political revolutions ... This genetic aspect of the parallel between political and scientific development should no longer be open to doubt. The parallel has, however, a second more profound aspect upon which the significance of the first depends. Political revolutions aim to change the political institutions in ways that those institution themselves prohibit. Their success therefore necessitates the partial relinquishment of one set of institutions in favor of another, and in the interim, society is not fully governed by institutions at all. Initially it is crisis alone that attenuates the role of political institutions as we have already seen it attenuate the role of paradigms. In increasing numbers individuals become increasingly estranged from political life and behave more and more eccentrically within it. Then, as the crisis deepens, many of these individuals commit themselves to some concrete proposal for the reconstruction of society in a new institutional framework. At that point the society is divided into competing camps or parties, one seeking to defend the old institution constellation, the others seeking to institute some new one. And, once that polarization has occurred, political recourse fails. Because they differ about the institutional matrix within which political change is to be achieved and evaluated, because they acknowledge no supra-institutional framework for the adjudication of revolutionary difference, the parties to a revolutionary conflict must finally resort to the techniques of mass persuasion, often including force. Though revolutions have had a vital role in the evolution of political institutions, that role depends upon their being partially extra-political or extra-institutional events. Source: Essay on Rationality, Objectivity, and Values in Science by Thomas Kuhn.
Posted on: Wed, 08 Oct 2014 04:12:15 +0000
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