Knowledge for free people
Knowledge for free people ( English Science in a Free Society ) is a 1976 published work by the Austrian science philosopher Paul Feyerabend .
In the book Feyerabend defends the project of a relativistic and anarchistic philosophy of science . Feyerabend this position had already in 1975 in Against Method ( English Against Method ) presented and formulated three key propositions: First, show the history of science that there is no general method is to adhere to the science. In addition, in principle there can be no generally applicable method, science is only productive under the conditions of methodological pluralism. Finally, from the lack of a generally excellent method, the relativistic thesis follows that the scientific description of the world is not superior to other traditions.
In Knowledge for Free People , Feyerabend also links his position on the theory of science with a conception of social theory and science policy . According to Feyerabend, the multitude of different knowledge traditions suggests a fundamentally new organization of science. Non-specialist scientists and philosophers of science should determine which research programs and world views should be promoted within a society. Rather, citizens should decide on such issues in a democratic process. In doing so, they should also have the right to decide against the prevailing scientific rationality; “Citizens' initiatives instead of epistemology” is therefore a central demand at Feyerabend.
Origin of the work
Knowledge for Free People was first published in English in 1978 under the title Science in a Free Society , three years after the Against Method . Against the pressure to use methods , Feyerabend describes himself as a collage that contains ideas that Feyerabend formulated years or even decades ago. However, his critique of contemporary philosophy of science and the concept of a general scientific method was known only to a relatively small group of philosophers before 1975. The popularity of Against Method changed this situation and led to negative to outraged reactions from scientists and philosophers. On the one hand, Feyerabend's open advocacy of an epistemological relativism was received with incomprehension. On the other hand, the style of the book was criticized as hurtful and aggressive.
Feyerabend felt misunderstood and he found the reactions to Wider the method pressure to be hurtful. As a result, Feyerabend suffered from depression: “My private life was in ruins, I was without protection. I have often wished that I had never written this idiotic book [English: fucking book ]. ”Finally, knowledge for free people also emerged as a defense of the theses against the compulsion to use methods . However, Feyerabend reacted to the criticism, which was perceived as hurtful, with sharp rhetoric. For example, with reference to the critical rationalist Helmut Spinner, he wrote “But Helmut, baby, don't get so upset! What do you want?"
However, knowledge for free people was not just an angry defense of the theses against the compulsion to use methods . In the book, Feyerabend in particular presented his convictions on science policy in detail for the first time. Although the separation of state and science was already called for in the final chapter of Wider die Methodenzwang , a detailed account of Feyerabend's ideal of a free society can only be found in Knowledge for Free People . This ideal had developed in connection with the student movements in Berkeley and at the Free University of Berlin , where Feyerabend taught in the 1960s. Feyerabend describes in particular the cultural diversity in Berkeley as a formative experience. Educational reforms made it possible for minority groups - such as Chicanos , African Americans, and Native Americans - to study at the publicly funded University of California, Berkeley . Feyerabend describes his doubts in this situation as follows: “Who was I to explain to these people what and how they should think? I had no idea about their problems, even though I knew they had many problems. I didn't know their interests, their feelings, their fears, their hopes […]. For this task [what is meant is the teaching of the tradition of Western rationalism] was that of an educated and distinguished slave owner. And I didn't want to be a slave owner. "
In 1979 knowledge for free people was published in German by Suhrkamp Verlag . A year later, a second German-language edition was published, which Feyerabend greatly changed and supplemented. For example, the German-language edition contains an examination of critics such as Hans Küng and Helmut Spinner . Similarly, the English edition in Part 3 contains several chapters in which Feyerabend responds to the Anglo-Saxon criticism by Joseph Agassi and Ernest Gellner , among others . These chapters were z. Some of them have already been published in specialist journals and are missing in the German edition.
Philosophy of science
Tradition and rationalism
Feyerabend's epistemological relativism is based on the observation that there are numerous traditions in societies . Even if the concept of tradition is a central concept of knowledge for free people , it is not precisely defined by Feyerabend. On the one hand, traditions appear as complex ideological systems. For example, the modern tradition of science contrasts with the worldview of the Christian Middle Ages. In addition, “tradition” often means a more specific research context, so that the term is partly similar to the “ paradigms ” of Thomas S. Kuhn or the “research programs” of Imre Lakatos . In this sense, the geocentric worldview (the sun rotates around the earth) forms just as much a tradition as the heliocentric worldview (the earth rotates around the sun). The change in astronomical theory brought about by Copernicus , Galileo and Kepler is thus also to be understood as a change in tradition.
Traditions are held together by shared beliefs and methods. According to Feyerabend, one tradition among many is so-called rationalism. Feyerabend describes the ideology of contemporary philosophy of science as "rationalism" , which allows only a limited number of standards and rules. All approaches that do not meet these standards would be rejected as absurd by rationalists. The concept of rationalism in the book remains as vague as the concept of tradition, but it is obvious that Feyerabend's conception is mainly directed against the critical rationalism of Karl Popper . For Feyerabend, however, “rationalists” are ultimately all scientists and philosophers who believe in a generally valid scientific method. The standards of the rationalists are verification , falsification and epistemic values such as simplicity, consistency and predictive ability.
Rationalism is only one tradition among many, but according to Feyerabend it imagines that it is the only correct tradition and that it formulates generally applicable standards. In this way, rationalists appear as intellectual Stalinists who, with the help of their positions of power in the scientific community, want to impose a certain tradition on society as a whole. However, a free society can only be achieved if “all traditions have equal rights and equal access to centers of education and other centers of power.” The predominance of scientific rationalism must therefore give way to pluralism in which citizens can freely choose traditions .
Arguments against rationalism
Rationalists can defend the general validity of their tradition with the following argument: There are of course numerous traditions that apply different standards for the evaluation and justification of convictions. However, such standards often lead to false beliefs, while the rational method is the best guide for exploring reality . Hence, the sciences are determined by the rational method and therefore rational standards should be promoted in science and society.
According to Feyerabend, this argument is flawed in two respects. For one thing, the natural sciences do not adhere to the standards of the rationalists at all. Feyerabend refers here to an argument from the history of science that was already developed by Thomas S. Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions and radicalized by Feyerabend himself in Against Method . The great scientific revolutions in particular do not obey the rationalist model. The change from the geocentric worldview to the heliocentric worldview cannot be understood as the result of the rational weighing of data and arguments. The model developed by Copernicus had numerous problems and even after Galileo's astronomical observations it was rational, according to Feyerabend, to stick to the old, geocentric worldview. Galileo made his observations with the help of the newly developed telescope, but in Galileo's time there was no reason to accept that telescope observations actually correctly depict celestial phenomena (and not instrument artifacts). Already in Against Method , Feyerabend describes the implementation of the heliocentric worldview as follows: “Because of his style and his skillful methods of persuasion, Galileo has the upper hand, because he also writes in Italian and not just Latin and because he addresses people who are emotionally against them old ideas and the standards of erudition associated with them have been adopted. ”The studies of the history of science should show that the great scientific innovations were irrational according to rationalistic standards . Productive, scientific research must not adhere to the dictates of one method, rather it must try, abandon and vary methods in an opportunistic way.
The second argument against the rationalist method is based on the question of how the superiority of a tradition could be established. It is of course not enough for rationalists to declare that their standards are superior to those of other traditions; they have to demonstrate the claimed superiority. According to Feyerabend, this is impossible because there are no criteria independent of tradition for the superiority of a tradition. It is true that the rationalists will see their methods as superior with reference to the goals and standards they have set themselves. However, this is not surprising, every tradition can justify itself with reference to self-set goals and standards. For the decision between different standards or traditions you need standards (sometimes called “super standards”) and these are only available within one tradition. The relativistic conclusion is that it is not possible to judge traditions from a neutral perspective as better - worse or true - wrong. Traditions must consequently be regarded as equal, claims to general validity are no more than authoritarian claims to power. The radical nature of this argument becomes clear in Feyerabend's description of a mystical method:
- “But a mystic who can step out of his body by his own strength and face God himself will hardly be impressed that two carefully wrapped and not particularly clever human children made it with the support of thousands of scientific slaves and billions of dollars, some clumsy Perform jumps on a dry stone - the moon - and he will regret the decline and almost total destruction of the spiritual faculties of man as a result of the scientific-materialistic climate of our times. Of course you can laugh yourself to death at this objection - there are no arguments against it. "
Anything goes
Feyerabend's relativistic interpretation of traditional pluralism leads him to the well-known slogan anything goes . If the various traditions cannot be assessed from an independent perspective, all traditions and methodological standards should also have the same opportunities to present themselves and assert themselves. However, according to Feyerabend, one should not make the mistake of misunderstanding anything goes as a new methodological requirement:
- Anything goes is not the one and only principle of a new methodology recommended by me, on the contrary, I emphasize that the invention, verification, application of methodological rules and standards is a matter of concrete scientific research and not of philosophical dreaming.
So it is not about banishing methodological rules and standards from the sciences with the slogan anything goes . However, scientists should be able to choose these rules and standards themselves. If they have the impression that they will not get any further with the existing standards, they should all have the freedom to change, add to or abandon these standards. With this revision there are no fundamental limits - anything goes .
Critique of Relativism
Feyerabend argues for his relativistic pluralism of methods by contrasting two possibilities: On the one hand, it could be that methods and standards can be evaluated and one thus arrives at a universally valid, universal and ahistorical method. Or there is no such evaluation criterion and one has to accept the equality of traditions and methods. Other philosophers have argued that these two attitudes are not the only ways to respond to the method problem. For example, the scientific theorist Alan Chalmers argues that the rejection of a universally valid, universal and ahistorical method does not necessarily have to lead to an anarchistic anything goes .
In a detailed analysis of Galileo's telescopic observations, Chalmers tries to show that Galileo and the representatives of the geocentric worldview by no means lived in completely different methodical worlds between which no rational exchange would have been possible. Although Galileo and his opponents actually accepted different observations, they shared many central methodological assumptions that provided the basis for an argumentative exchange. “The underlying general idea is that parts of the web of goals, methods, standards, theories, and observable facts that science constitutes at any given time can be progressively changed. The remaining, unchangeable part forms the background for the justification of the change. ”Methods can actually be changed, but there are also common basic convictions that enable a rational discussion about the change in method.
A second starting point for criticism is Feyerabend's combination of methodological pluralism and relativism. Pragmatists like the late Hilary Putnam, for example, agree that there is no generally applicable method of describing the world. Methods are only better or worse in a context of goals. Such a pragmatic advocacy of methodological pluralism does not mean, however, that all traditions are acceptable or that they can even lead to a correct description of the world. Context and reality set limits to the amount of acceptable modes of description.
Society and science
The separation of state and science
According to Feyerabend, theocratic societies suffer from the lack of separation between state and religion , Marxist societies from the lack of separation between state and Marxist philosophy . Similarly, modern western societies suffer from the amalgamation of state and science. From birth to death, people are forced into a scientific and technical environment that they cannot decide against. Scientific subjects such as physics and history are compulsory at school. Pupils cannot decide whether they would rather devote themselves to the study of legends and myths. Feyerabend distinguishes between two basic attitudes that one can adopt towards the diversity of traditions:
- “ 1. The opportunistic acceptance and modification of what is useful (whereby the criteria of usefulness change from problem to problem and epoch to epoch) and
- 2. The (intellectual or physical) destruction of all traditions except one and the dogmatic insistence on this. "
According to Feyerabend, relativism is a variant of opportunistic absorption, while modern Western societies are designed to destroy non-rationalist traditions. According to Feyerabend, individual freedom of expression does not change anything in the totalitarian character of modern scientific societies . One can discuss Feyerabend's idea using the example of religious freedom . A society can have serious deficiencies in terms of religious freedom, even if individuals can choose their religion. This is the case, for example, when only one religion is allowed to be taught in schools and universities, it is massively supported by the state, is a prerequisite for academic positions, is almost alone in the media, representatives of other religions are socially stigmatized and so on .
Feyerabend's central argument for the plurality and equality of traditions is based on his epistemological relativism: There is no tradition that is superior to all others and leads to the only true description of the world. Traditions are only better or worse relative to people's interests, wishes and goals. The enforcement of a single tradition in society is therefore unjustifiable and simply an authoritarian, liberty-hostile process.
With reference to John Stuart Mill's essay On Liberty , Feyerabend formulates yet another argument that is independent of his epistemological position: Citizens do not only have the right as private individuals to choose a tradition and to live according to it. Since they finance and constitute the state institutions, they also have the inalienable right to determine the direction of these institutions: “High schools, elementary schools, state universities, institutions like the National Science Foundation , which are financed by taxpayers' money, are all subject to the judgment of the taxpayers . If California taxpayers want state universities to teach voodoo , folk medicine, astrology, rain dance ceremonies, then those items have to be incorporated into the curriculum. "
According to Feyerabend, the authority of citizens over their institutions must be clarified completely independently of questions of truth; it is simply an inalienable component of a free, democratic society. This is to be accepted even if the truth falls by the wayside in the referendums. The ratio of truth and democracy is, according to Feyerabend the ratio of war quite similar and democracy. In war there are democratic values (such as human dignity) that are so central that they should not be sacrificed for the sake of victory. In the same way, there are democratic values (the right of citizens to determine their institutions) which, even for the sake of the truth, cannot be sacrificed.
The specter of relativism
Feyerabend knows that his advocacy for a relativistic community must appear uncanny to many people: “The laws have not only been made into intellectual, but also emotional guides of their own behavior. Not just an abstract idea, but feelings of compassion, solidarity with the unhappiness of others, disgust for everything that causes pain and violates human dignity, is directed against ritual murders, abandoning small children, severe punishments for offenses that appear void to us, Euthanasia. ”Of course it is disturbing that people should be able to negate everything that constitutes their own intellectual, moral and personal identity . However, the idea of a truly free society implies that people have the right to choose their tradition - however inhuman it may appear from their own perspective. The state only has the right to protect the citizens, to be able to freely choose and also to leave their traditions. "If people find their happiness in slaughtering each other in dangerous war games, let them have this pleasure." According to Feyerabend, those who cannot accept that people are free to choose a radically different way of life simply tries their own ideas imposing authoritarianism on other people from the good or moral life
Much criticism has been leveled at Feyerabend's ideal of a society in which people can freely choose their tradition and way of life. In particular, it has been rejected as a naive and utterly unrealistic utopia . Alan Chalmers, for example, writes: "There is a certain irony that Feyerabend, who in his study of science extensively denies the existence of theory-neutral facts, appeals in his social theory to the far more ambitious concept of an ideology-neutral state." One can also Formulate doubts about Feyerabend's conception of the “free citizen” who should be able to navigate between traditions. It goes without saying that people cannot grow up independent of traditions and moral ideas. It is just as natural that people can often hardly free themselves from the tradition in which they grew up. Of course, one can ask whether and how, given these facts, one can accept that children grow up in an inhuman tradition that teaches the inferiority of certain groups of people.
effect
The effect of Feyerabend's philosophy of science in general and of knowledge for free people is not easy to assess. Feyerabend did not found a philosophical school - a philosophical school would also have contradicted Feyerabend's ideal of an opportunistic pluralism of methods. But even if there are hardly any scientific theorists who philosophize directly in the tradition of Feyerabend, his theses undoubtedly have a noticeable influence on contemporary philosophy .
Such an influence can be observed in the current philosophy of science. Feyerabend's advocacy of a relativistic interpretation of the diversity of traditions has never found many supporters in the philosophy of science. However, his violent attacks on contemporary philosophy of science have actually changed the view of the scientific process. Today's theorists of science usually endeavor to incorporate historical studies more strongly into their work and to take the variety of methods within the sciences seriously. In this sense, experimentalist philosophers of science such as Ian Hacking or pluralistic theorists such as John Dupré forego the formulation of general scientific methods and standards. At the same time, however, they state that the lack of such general standards does not imply a relativistic position.
Another level of influence can be identified in relation to post- structuralism. Knowledge for free people is very similar in content to many post-structuralist approaches, especially with regard to the question of relativism and also the political-science-critical orientation. Nevertheless, there are relatively few explicit references to Feyerabend in post-structuralist literature. This is partly to do with the fact that Feyerabend was more involved in the Anglo-Saxon philosophy debate, while post-structuralism first became popular in France. In addition, Feyerabend's texts mainly relate to the natural sciences (especially physics), while the post-structuralist philosophers often worked from a literary and humanities perspective. Finally, Feyerabend's reception in the post-structuralist and feminist criticism of science is not entirely positive. Feminist science theorists such as Evelyn Fox Keller and Hilary Rose accused Feyerabend of negating the emancipatory potential of modern science through his relativism .
literature
Primary literature
- Paul Feyerabend: Knowledge for free people , 1st edition, Frankfurt, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1979, ISBN 3-518-07502-0
- Paul Feyerabend: Knowledge for free people , modified edition, Frankfurt, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1980, ISBN 3-518-11011-X
- Paul Feyerabend: Science in a Free Society , London, New Left Books, 1978, ISBN 0-86091-008-3
- Paul Feyerabend: Science in a Free Society , new edition, London, Verso, 1982, ISBN 0-86091-753-3
- Paul Feyerabend: Wider den Methodenzwang , Frankfurt, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1980, ISBN 3-518-06007-4 The book contains many arguments that are also carried out and defended in knowledge for free people .
- Paul Feyerabend: Time wasting , Frankfurt, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1995 ISBN 3-518-40693-0 autobiography, contains materials on the genesis of the work.
Secondary literature
- John Dupré , Review of Paul Feyerabend, Science in a Free Society, in Stanford Magazine , 1994, pp. 12-13, Review of Science in a Free Society
- John Preston, Gonzalo Munevar and David Lamb (Eds,): Worst Enemy of Science ?: Essays in Memory of Paul Feyerabend Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000, ISBN 0-19-512874-5 Collection of essays on various aspects of Feyerabend's philosophy
- Noretta Koertge, Review of Paul Feyerabend, Science in a Free Society, in British Journal for the Philosophy of Science , Vol. 21 (1980), pp. 385-90. Review of Science in a Free Society
- Gonzalo Munevar (Ed.) Beyond Reason: Essays on the Philosophy of Paul Feyerabend , Dordrecht, Springer Netherlands, 1991, ISBN 0-7923-1272-4 Older collection of articles
- Richard H. Schlagel, 'Review of Science in a Free Society', in Review of Metaphysics , No. 35 (1981) Review of Science in a Free Society
Web links
- John Preston: Paul Feyerabend. In: Edward N. Zalta (Ed.): Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy .
- Science and Society: An Exchange in The New York Review of Books , Vol. 26, No. 15, October 11, 1979 An exchange of letters with contributions from Feyerabend and others
swell
Quotations from knowledge for free people (see literature section) are abbreviated with EffM and page number.
- ↑ EffM, p. 37
- ^ Paul Feyerabend: Waste of Time Frankfurt, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1995 ISBN 3-518-40693-0 , p. 200
- ↑ EffM, p. 104, footnote 70
- ^ Paul Feyerabend: Wider den Methodenzwang Frankfurt, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1980, ISBN 3-518-06007-4
- ↑ EffM, p. 233f.
- ^ Karl Popper: Logic of Research , 1934, Vienna, Springer, ISBN 3-16-146234-3
- ↑ EffM, p. 12
- ↑ EffM p. 72
- ↑ EffM, p. 184
- ↑ EffM, p. 140
- ↑ EffM, p. 75
- ↑ EffM, p. 97
- ↑ EffM, p. 97
- ↑ Alan Chalmers: "Galilei's telescopic observations of Venus and Mars." in: British Journal of the Philosophy of Science , 1985
- ^ Alan Chalmers: Ways of Science , Berlin, Springer, 6th edition, 2007, p. 138, ISBN 978-3-540-49490-4
- ^ Hilary Putnam: Truth and Convention in: Dialectica , 1987
- ↑ EffM, p. 118 f.
- ↑ EffM, p. 140
- ↑ EffM, p. 167 f.
- ↑ EffM, p. 169
- ↑ EffM, p. 146
- ↑ EffM, p. 147
- ^ Alan Chalmers: Ways of Science , Berlin, Springer, 6th edition, 2007, p. 138, ISBN 978-3-540-49490-4 , p. 128
- ↑ Ian Hacking: Introduction to the Philosophy of Science , Reclam, 1996
- ^ John Dupré: Human Nature and the Limits of Science . Clarendon Press, Oxford 2003, ISBN 0-19-924806-0
- ^ Evelyn Fox Keller: "Feminism and Science", in: Signs , 1982, p. 593
- ↑ Hilary Rose and Steve Rose: "radical science and it's enemies", in: Socialist Register , 1979
