ABSTRACT
Philosophers have long held there to be something special about science that distinguishes it from non-science. Rather than a shared subject-matter, the distinction is usually taken to reside at the methodological level. What sets the sciences apart from non-scientific pursuits is the possession of a characteristic method employed by their practitioners. It is customary to refer to this characteristic method of science as the “scientific method.” Those disciplines which employ the scientific method qualify as sciences; those which do not employ the method are considered not to be scientific. While most philosophers agree that science is to be characterized in methodological terms, they disagree about the nature of this method. Many take the fundamental method of science to be an inductive method. Others belittle induction or deny its use altogether. It was once taken to be virtually axiomatic that the method of science is a fixed and universal method employed throughout the sciences. Yet, at the present time, it is not uncommon to hold that method depends on historical time-period or cultural context, or that it varies from one field of science to another. While it was once widely believed that there is a single scientific method characteristic of all science, it is now more common to hold that the method of science consists of a multifaceted array of rules, techniques and procedures which broadly govern the practice of science. Indeed, some have concluded that there is, strictly speaking, no such thing as the scientific method. It is possible to distinguish a number of different levels at which methods may be employed in science. At the ground level of data collection and experimental practice, there are methods which govern the proper conduct of an experiment or the correct employment of a piece of equipment. At a slight remove from experimental practice, there are methods of experimental design or test procedure, such as the use of random trials or double-blind tests in clinical trials. At a more remote level are methods for the appraisal, or evaluation, of theories, and possibly theory construction. The methods described in what follows tend, for the most part, to comprise methods of theory appraisal which are designed to provide the warrant for theory choice or theory acceptance. For it is at this level that the bulk of the philosophical debate about scientific method has been conducted. Philosophers sometimes distinguish between two contexts in which a method might be employed in science. The first context, in which a new idea emerges in the
mind of a scientist, has been called the “context of discovery.” The second context, in which the idea receives scientific validation, is known as the “context of justification.” The bulk of methodological discussion relates to the second context. This reflects the once-dominant view that the process of having a new idea is an inscrutable matter of individual psychology, rather than a matter of logic or method. Contemporary philosophers of science place less weight on this traditional distinction than was previously the case. Indeed, many would be prepared to grant a role to method in the context of discovery.
