The philosophies of science that I find most compelling, such as Paul Feyerabend’s, tend to argue for methodological anarchy as the characteristic of the most historically impactful science. It is not immediately obvious, but I think this is equivalent to arguing that the best science (and any sort of inquiry conducted with a scientific sensibility) is necessarily permissionless. Anarchic permissionlessness though, does not equal chaotic lack of structure. It is just that structure emerges from the nature of the research, rather than generic procedural templates. Investigations always require protocols, even casual ones, but they need not be derived from some abstract high-modernist notion of a uniform “scientific method.”
Do uniformities in the nature of all knowledge justify privileging particular research methods at all? This is an epistemology question to which I have yet to hear a satisfying answer. In some ways this is the most important practical question in the philosophy of science. Whether or not you think you need permission from an authority figure to do research depends on whether or not you think certain methods ought to be naturally privileged.
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