. . . science would be much improved if it ceased to exist. They seem to reject the notion that science can, or has ever, acquired observer independent knowledge of the world. In fact, they seem to think that this is not a valid exercise. By rejecting science own definition, they are not looking to modify but eliminate it. Imagine a critique of feminism that refused to accept women as equal to men, and you´ll see what I mean.
I think that claim about what I'm saying, anyway, is not accurate, but I admit I may have over stated the assumption of objectivity in scientific discourse--I know that many scientists do limit their claims to objectivity. I think I have said several times: I am not saying that science is bad or useless. (Some of my best friends are scientists!) Or I have tried, repeatedly, to say so. I do NOT reject science and I do NOT want it to cease to exist, although I would like to consider whether the abstraction of "knowledge" from "ethics" isn't in and of itself proof that science is a part of a culture that believes that's possible. So I want it to be culturally self-aware.
I find it funny that after three pages some are still insisting that feminism may have some comment on the scientific method (not to be confused with the scientific establishment) but have been unable to put forward what any of those comments might be.
I also believe I have said that the feminism that I work from does, as Lurid points out, operates from a perspective of extreme skepticism about the observation phase of the scientific method, because I think it is critical to recognize that it can not be entirely separated from the presence and effects of observer.
To make an observation there must be an observer present. That observer will be shaped by hir culture. Therefore the observations will be shaped by hir culture. You have disallowed that statement as being about the method because you believe that the observer is separable from culture, and therefore you claim that it is directed against the scientific establishment. I disagree.
First, neither alas nor Deva accept any form of objective knowledge. Now this really needs clarification, since they may well believe in a hierarchy of knowledge that places the boiling point of water at a specified pressure quite high on the list of relative objectivity. I´m also not entirely sure how this attitude sits with quoting historical and political "facts". Presumably, they are also all subject to the same degree of scepticism?
Let me see if I can try better, again, to explain my perspective, where I am coming from on this issue: I'm intrigued by cultures like the Aboriginal culture of Australia who take as their bedrock assumption (as I understand it, from a lay-perspective, and not recently researched, so if there are cultural anthropologists out there please forgive me), that the "real" world, the world that matters, is the "Dreamtime." This basic assumption shapes everything about their culture--perceptions of time (flying by the seat of my pants, but IIRC,) the "Dreamtime" is roughly the "present" and everything else is just "not" the dreamtime--no past no future as we understand it. It's an entirely different mode of organizing "reality." So I'm not so much "angry" about the scientific method, but convinced it cannot help but incorporate the idea that "the physical waking world is the most important world." I'm interested in the ways that it is a product of a peculiar culture with a particular value system which affects
all observations at some level. Some, clearly, more obviously than others.
Here's one experiment, as reported in the NY Times, Science Section, a couple of years ago, that I hope may help clarify things:
SCIENCE DESK | August 8, 2000, Tuesday
How Culture Molds Habits Of Thought By ERICA GOODE (NYT) 1996 words
Late Edition - Final, Section F, Page 1, Column 5
ABSTRACT - Dr Richard Nisbett and colleagues at University of Michigan find that people in different cultures think differently; research upsets long-held assumption of cognitive psychology that whatever the culture, all human thought follows the same basic processes, such as a devotion to logical reasoning, a penchant for categorization and an urge to understand situations and events in linear terms of cause and effect; experiments bear out familiar anthropological division between the 'holistic' East and 'analytic' West; research subjects in China, Korea and Japan pay greater attention to context and relationship, rely more on experience-based knowledge than abstract logic and show more tolerance for contradiction; American subjects tend to detach objects from their context, avoid contradictions and rely more heavily on formal logic; photo (M)
And, yes, I can note with a sense of irony that the SM was used to "discover" this apparent difference. In fact, that's part of my point. I don't take it, or offer it, as containing the "gospel" truth, therefore, just as no scientist would, but as a preliminary study, conducted from a specific Western perspective, asking a particular question, in response to a particular "highly controlled circumstance" in which to make controlled obervations, which may or may not carry out to the complexity of the "real world" which at some level neither we nor the scientific method has full access to.
Thus, I still believe that the SM as we are discussing it here cannot help but include the Western codification of the steps, and places a higher value on rationalistic ways of understanding "reality," a value system that inevitably leads to the use of pejorative terms--"solipsistic," "irrational"--to describe the thinking of those who question the method.
It seems quite reasonable to make the basic assumption that physical "reality," and "facts" about it exist; that science does a good job of codifying and testing these "fact." BUT It is the nature of facts to be perspectival; they must be perceived by an observer, who will, willy nilly, be shaped by hir culture. BUT STOP: That's a good thing: if you had absolutely no frame of reference to understand the world, it would be a ceaseless stream of, basically, inexplicable punches in the face.
(I'm hoping, but not convinced 100%) that I've gotten the paragraphing bugs out of this posting. If it comes up looking really goofy, I'll ask for moderation, but apologize in advance if it is hard to read.)
FYI, Here's a link to a book, with its table of contents, called Feminism and Science (1996), edited by Evelyn Fox Keller and Helen Longino. |
