PARADIGM

Thomas S. Kuhn's structural account on the production of scientific knowledge constructs a generalized picture of the process by which a science is born and undergoes change and development. For Kuhn, science is a social system. He analyzes the structure of scientific revolutions using several key concepts. He uses the term paradigm for an archetypal experiment or problem solution that implicitly tells scientists how to look at the world. Kuhn's thesis about scientific authority utilizes the notion of normal science which he defines as science that uses a past achievement as a model and guide for formulating and solving new problems about the world which are based on paradigms. In addition, scientific revolutions occur when one paradigm is replaced by another. As a result, paradigms play an important role in both normal science and scientific revolutions. The production of scientific knowledge undergoes six main steps. The first is a pre-paradigm stage in which the natural phenomena that later form the subject matter of a mature science are studied and explained from widely differing points of view. Next comes the emergence of a paradigm, embodied in the published works of one or more recognized scientists, defining and exemplifying the concepts and methods of research appropriate to the study of a certain class of natural phenomena, and serving as an inspiration to further research by its promise of success in explaining those phenomena. The third stage in the development of scientific knowledge is a period of normal science in which theories are explored and scientific puzzles are solved. A critical stage is the discovery of natural phenomena that violate the expectations governed by paradigms. In this stage, new theories are designed to explain these anomalous facts and then an abrupt transition to a new paradigm takes place in which a new conceptual and methodological framework arises which replaces the old. The final stage in the structure of scientific knowledge is the continuation of normal science within the new paradigm. This continues until the whole process repeats itself.