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Changing the Focus: From Nature of Science (NOS) to Features of Science (FOS)

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Advances in Nature of Science Research

Abstract

This chapter argues that one weakness of the important and influential nature of science (NOS) research in science education is that it is crucially ambiguous and unclear on important philosophical points, and that a more informed understanding of the history and philosophy of science can rectify these problems. Further it is argued that NOS research would be improved by changing its focus from the essentialist efforts to delineate the nature of science (and associated research on factors affecting its teaching and learning), to a wider and more relaxed programme of enunciating important features of science (FOS) that can contribute to teachers and students having a better and more complex appreciation of the subject they are teaching and learning.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    I have surveyed and commented on this history in Matthews (1994, Chaps. 4, 5).

  2. 2.

    See Lederman (1986, 1992, 2004, 2007) and contributions to Flick and Lederman (2004).

  3. 3.

    This point has been persuasively argued by Gürol Irzik and Robert Nola (2011).

  4. 4.

    An accessible source for some of Whewell’s historical and philosophical studies is Elkana (1984). This includes selections from his Bridgewater Treatises on natural theology.

  5. 5.

    On this, see Elkana (1984, Chap xxii), Laudan (1981) and Yeo (1993).

  6. 6.

    Some excellent recent books on the Enlightenment include Dupré (2004), Hankins (1985), Himmelfarb (2004), Israel (2001) and Porter (2000).

  7. 7.

    One of numerous guides to the achievements of the Scientific Revolution is Gribbin (2002, Book 2).

  8. 8.

    See contributions to special issues of Science & Education (vol. 6 no. 4 1997, vol. 7 no. 6 1998), McComas (1998), Flick and Lederman (2004). See also the literature reviews in Abd-El-Khalick and Lederman (2000) and Lederman (2007).

  9. 9.

    For a critical account of instruments used for NOS assessment from the 1950s to the present, see Lederman, Wade and Bell (1998).

  10. 10.

    Norman Lederman, now professor of science education at the Chicago Institute of Technology, was formerly at Oregon State University. Among his many publications see especially Lederman (1992, 2004). His original Oregon State students included Fouad Abd-El-Khalick, Renee Schwartz, Valarie Akerson and Randy Bell – all of whom have published widely in this field.

  11. 11.

    The list is articulated and defended in, among other places, Lederman et al. (2002, 499–502), Lederman (2004, 303–308), Schwartz and Lederman (2008, 745–762).

  12. 12.

    Laudan first made the claim in his ‘Demise of the Demarcation Problem’ (Laudan, 1983). A recent survey of the ensuing debate, and refutation of the claim, is provided by Robert Pennock (2011).

  13. 13.

    The classic treatment of the ancient and medieval debates about ‘saving appearances’ as the goal of natural philosophy is Duhem (1908/1969).

  14. 14.

    For Berkeley’s positivist critique of Newtonian theory, see Popper (1953/1963).

  15. 15.

    For the outlines of this debate, and a guide to some of the literature, see Matthews (1994, Chap. 8).

  16. 16.

    A classic discussion of the difference between hypothetical constructs (that in principle have existence) and intervening variables (that in principle do not have existence) is Meehl and MacCorquodale (1948). Clarity on this issue is of absolute importance in social science: Is ‘intelligence’ to be understood as a hypothetical construct or an intervening variable? Rivers of ink have been spilt because researchers have not clarified the kind of thing they are looking for.

  17. 17.

    See Matthews (2000, pp. 88–89).

  18. 18.

    The classic statement of this position, but with the causal twist, is Boris Hessen’s 1931 The Social and Economic Roots of Newton’s ‘Principia’. For Hessen’s text and commentary see Freudenthal and McLaughlin (2009). One well-known elaboration of the thesis, in the causal direction, is Freudenthal (1986).

  19. 19.

    For a philosophically sophisticated discussion of some of the issues, see Nola and Irzik (2006).

  20. 20.

    I have argued this claim at some length in Matthews (2000, pp. 245–48).

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  1. School of Education, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    Michael R. Matthews

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    Myint Swe Khine

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Matthews, M.R. (2012). Changing the Focus: From Nature of Science (NOS) to Features of Science (FOS). In: Khine, M. (eds) Advances in Nature of Science Research. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-2457-0_1

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