Realist Methodology and the Articulation of Modes of Production (ص 29)

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Realist Methodology and the Articulation of Modes of Production (ص 29)

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The classical empiricist forcibly argues that both scientific
and practical knowledge is gained through the factual
observation of the world in such a manner that it can be
"seen", “heard" or “touched”, whether by wo/man or machine
and the facts of which are recorded in a systematic manner
and free from any a priori rationalism. (29) This is clear
from H. D. Anthony's comments on Galileo where he states:
Tt was not so much the observations and experiments
which Galileo made that caused the break with
tradition as his attitude to them. For him, the
facts based on them were treated as facts, and not
related to some preconceived idea... The facts of
observation might, or might not. fit into an
acknowledged scheme of the universe, but the
important thing, in Galileo's opinion, was to
accept the facts and build the theory to fit them.
(30)
We should point out one crucial ambiguity in this text. It is
inconceivable that one could conduct an experiment without
having preconceived ideas, for it is exactly the function of
an experiment to test our hypotheses about some aspect or
other of the world. Leaving this aside for the moment the
import of Anthony's comments are that science begins
a posteriori. It begins with the observation of particular
phenomena or events which are stated in the form of factual
statements. However, as every schoolgirl/boy knows, science
is a theoretical discipline which does not refer to
particular instances but rather to particular instances of
universal cases, i.e. cases where we can invoke the operation
of a scientific “law”. Thus, the problem to be explained 1s:
How do we move from the observational statement (read "fact")
"The book on Popper fell from my desk" to the Newtonian = law
15 JP,

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Realist Methodology and the Articulation of Modes of Production

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Alex Pollock

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