Summary
Attention to criticism and growth! It appears Aristotle had a dialectical method with two main phases: a) doxographic induction — a form of re-collecting ideas of previous generations; it is related to Plato'sanamnesis. b) organisation of knowledge by classification (taxonomy); it is natural in view of Aristotle's organismic outlook. Against common misconceptions: Aristotle was not anti-empirical, nor anti-critical (dogmatic). Doxographic induction is a prime example of critical and “empirical” methodology.
Against Popper: Aristotle's subscription to the ideal of certainty(episteme) is not the main source of dogmatism in the Aristotelian paradigm. A theory of science has to take cognizance of social settings, how these support or repress critical dialectical method.
Against Feyerabend: Galileo's use of re-collection (methodological anamnesis) in his dialogues is not trick persuasion; it is a continaution of an old method, viz., doxographic induction. Granted that it has always had persuasive as well as other psychological aspects. It serves the double function of giving clues, and leading the mind into the frame of a paradigm.
Finally, it is proposed that theory of science and classical scholarship must sometimes call on each other, just like theory of science and history of science.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Literatur
See also my “Huygens' theory of research and Descartes' theory of knowledge”, this journal II/2, 1971 und III/1, 1972. There is also a discussion of problems connected with the method of historical case study. A more detailed discussion of such problems is found in Aant Elzinga,On a research program of early modern physics, with special reference to the work of Chr, Huygens (University of Gothenburg, 1971 — stencil).
I. Düring, “Aristotle's method in biology”, Symposium Aristotelicum Louvain, 24 Aug.–1 Sept. 1960; “Aristoteles, skaparen av vetenskapens metod och språk”,Lychnos (1943). Also, I. Düring,Aristoteles Darstellung und Interpretation seines Denkens (1966, Heidelberg).
In Herbert Spencer lecture, Oxford 10th June 1933 — quoted by Håkan Törnebohm as a motto for his case study,Fysik och Filosofi (1957, Göteborg).
See my “Huygens' theory of research ...”,op. cit. For a general discussion of the term Platonic-Aristotelian deductive ideal of science, see e.g. A. Wedberg,Filosofins historia, vol. I (1958, Stockholm), p. 75 and Ch IV; and vol. II (1959, Stockholm), Ch. II.
This apt term is used by Phillip Frank,Philosophy of Science, the Link between Science and Philosophy (1957, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.), 97 ff.Coherence of all things, and development.
Håkan Törnebohm, “Science of science”, pt. 20: Lectures upon invitation at the CCR Euratom Ispra Establishment 1969;stencil 10. 11. 69 Inst. f. Theory of Science, University of Göteborg (italics his).
cited in Düring,Lychnos, 54.
see e.g. K. Oehler, “Der consensus omnium als Kriterium der Wahrheit in der Antiken Philosophie”,Antike und Abendland, X (1961), 103–129. For the question of classification and growth of science by a dialectical movement fromdoxa, overhypotheses, toepisteme, see I. M. Crombie,An Examination of Plato's Doctrines (1963, London).
Jürgen Habermas, for example, distinguishes a technical-manipulative research motivating interest from a hermeneutic-emancipatory one. The latter has to do with understanding for the sake of self-transcendence. It may take the form of criticism of ideologies. Typically, questions as to the rationality of ends are adressed to human activity, as contrasted with the means-ends rationality of the technical-manipulative interest. According the Habermas school of metascience, the theory of science itself also has the important function ofcontributing to self-transparency, to emancipate the human consciousness from dogmatic hang ups. In this context the function of the metascientists with criticism of ideologies is comparable to the psychoanalysts' who seek to resolve contradictions (conflicts) in a social setting by helping people to insight about themselves. See below p. 31.
Op. cit. (2).
Ludwig Edelstein, “Recent Trends in the Interpretation of Ancient Science”, Weiner and Noland eds.,The Roots of Scientific Thought (1958, New York), 94.
Karl Popper, Introduction (“On the sources of knowledge and ignorance”), ofConjectures and Refutations, the Growth of Scientific Knowledge (1963, London), 3–30, esp. § VII–XI.
The dialectical element in Aristotle's “method of science” is also emphasized by Richard McKeon, in “Aristotle's conception of Scientific Method”, Weiner and Noland eds., 73–89.
J. E. Raven,Plato's Thought in the Making (1965, Cambridge), 190.
The classification turn in research is closely linked with justificatory argument; where, as syllogism it stands for something more than its narrow modern sense of argument depending upon insight into the relations of class-inclusion. In general it is referred to as the drawing of conclusions from accepted premises. (Raven,op. cit., 22). Also every dialectical argument is either an induction or a syllogism (Raven refers toTopics, I, 12).
It may be questioned if the births at which Socrates assisted really gave living offspring. See Mats Furberg,Vision och skepsis (1969, Stockholm), which contains a thought-provoking discussion of dialectics and related methods of analysis.
Karl Popper,The Open Society and its Enemies (1962) 2 vol.
On this school see, Gerard Radnitzky,Contemporary Schools of Metascience vol. II (1968, Lund), 19 ff, and 147 ff. There has been an interesting debate between representatives of this school and the Popper group — a dialectical vs. a criticist approach: Heinz Maus and Friederich Fürstenberg ed.,Der Positivismusstreit in der deutschen Soziologie (1969, Neuwied/Berlin). A specific issue in the hermeneutic dialectical school is the question of factors which bear up “criticism and growth” in a communication community. Prophets of this school have had close associations with the “anti-authoritarian” movement of students and intellectuals during the latter part of the protest-sixties. They find their ideal for a utopian and anti-authoritarian ethic in the ideal typical scientific community, which is a construct of their minds. In actual fact their contribution to the “protest potential” of the students has been to channelize it into tamer channels, which keep the steam from finding the really vulnerable seams of the form of society protested against. In this school see, e.g. J. Habermas, “Toward a theory of communicative competence”,Inquiry 13, (1970) forthcoming; and in Habermas-LüchmannTheorie der Gesellschaft oder Sozialtechnologie — was leistet die Systemforschung? (1971, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt a.M.). Also, Habermas: “Summation and response”,Continuum 8 (1970), Nr. 1–2, 123–133.
Karl Popper,Conjectures and Refutations, 12f.
ibid., (“Back to the Presocratics”), 151. Popper sees it at the same time as the emergence of aplurality of doctrines, vs. one school doctrine. The idea of theoretical pluralism has been developed consistently, but to absurd lengths (anarchy) by Paul K. Feyerabend.
One should bear in mind that Popper's reconstructions of past works are often “likely stories”. For a trouncing critique of his treatment of Hegel in theOpen Society and its Enemies, see e.g. Walter Kaufmann,From Shakespeare to Existentialism (1960, New York), 94–128.
Theophrastus,Metaphysics (with transl., comment & introd. by W. D. Ross and F. H. Forbes, 1929, Oxford).
Ernan McMullin calls Galileo's use of recollection in his dialoguesanamnesis. See McMullin, “The History and Philosophy of Science”, in Roger H. Struever ed.,Historical and Philosophical Perspectives of Science (1970, Minneapolis), 35–41. He claims that Aristotle makes different interpretations in different contexts, a relativist one in the context of things moving on the boat, an absolutist one in the world-scheme context. This is a contradiction within the Aristotelian paradigm itself, which he means contributed to the replacement of it.
Paul K. Feyerabend, “Problems of Empiricism II”, inThe Nature and Function of Scientific Theory, R. G. Colodny ed., 1970, Pittsburgh). The relevant part of McMullin's article (above note 24) is a criticism of Feyerabend's attempted case for Galileo's irrationalism.
In an important recent paper Popper has criticized the subjective idealism of empiricriticists (including the modern, so called logical empiricists). He proposes instead an objective idealism which attributes an objectivity and autonomy to problems, arguments, ideas, theories, etc. These are supposed to exist in a “third world”, in which science largely generates its own theoretical problematics and problem shifts. K. R. Popper, “Epistemology without a knowing subject”, inLogic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science, vol. III, van Rootselaar & Staal eds. (1968, Amsterdam), 333–373.
De par. an. transl. under editorship of J. A. Smith and W. D. Ross,The Works of Aristotle (1912, Oxford).
see above. Also, A. Antweiter,Der Begriff der Wissenschaft bei Aristoteles (1936, Bonn). For a discussion of division of science into branches,Phys. II 7, 198a 30 E 1).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
I thank Dr. A. Ziggelaar of the Royal Danish School of Education, Copenhagen, for his helpful criticism of an earlier draft of this article.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Elzinga, A. Some remarks on a theory of research in the work of Aristotle. Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 5, 9–38 (1974). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01809869
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01809869