language

Sam Pawlett epawlett at uniserve.com
Wed Mar 24 15:39:28 PST 1999



>
>
> why might i want to do this.

Because it is a more defensible position than claiming that the laws of thermodynamics are inherently ideological.


> there is a conceptual connection, not an
> accidental one, between an epistemological position which shapes how social
> research is conducted and the political practices (uses to which it is put)
> which are engaged in the name of that research.

Wrong way round. Political practice and social relations shape scientific research. This does not mean that there is no such thing as objectivity and objective truth or that science and epistemology cannot get at both.


>
> i'm not saying that all science is ideological.

ok. what claims does science make that are ideological? or what part of science is ideological?


> i will say that
> science--positivist or interpretivist--that's not critical is a science
> that will inevitably effect accomodation to the status quo

Yes, but that does not mean it is false. The bourgeoise do need science that is objective and true in order to further technological advancement. Some bourgeoise scientists even believe that scientific knowledge is a good unto itself.


> .
>
> >by telling the truth to the best of their knowledge and abilities.
> Knowledge is
> >fallible. A scientific theory may be wrong.
>
> yes. and....
>
> you need to explain why.

It may be disconfirmed or replaced with a better theory e.g. Newtonian mechanics being replaced by quantam mechanics.


>
>
> is this just because the researchers conducting the research are biased?
> is this just because the research becomes dissociated from it's 'innocent'


>
> roots?
>

Depends on the circumstances. Science in general is driven by the needs of the capitalist class and takes place within capitalist social relations and division of labor. Marx and Engels recognized this yet still believed a theory (their own) could be objective and objectively true.


>
> >>
>
> >mathematical formulae are necessarily true a priori.... 2+2=4 is true
> regardless
> >of ideology.
>
> social science that is conducted by running regression analyses on survey
> data is about representing society as consisting of individuals. they are
> necessarily unrelated to one another by virtue of the procedures required
> in such research. that kind of research tells us little about how society
> works, how classes form and dissemble, etc.

Right. Quantitative methods in social science have problems. There are problems with the notion of a statistical law. Barkley pointed out some with regards to econometrics. Such methods will lead to impoverished explanations for the reasons you point out above.


>
>
> i'm not saying that positivist/interpretivist research is useless. i'm a
> sociologist. but i'm really skeptical of the claim that science can so
> easily be made to be 'objective' and that truth can be isomorphically
> grasped.

Skepticism is good. I don't really disagree much here but you seem to be confusing ontological questions (what exists) with epistemological ones (how we can know what exists). The objectivity of truth and the attempts to know it are different claims. The latter will be more open to influence from external factors than the former. Truth can be understood a number of ways, through convergence, self-evidence and empirical confirmation to name a few.

Sam Pawlett



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list