1. The reflection paper by Leontyev Ruslan for
the course Foundations of Knowledge: Institutional & Individual
based on the readings of Hectare and Horn Theory of Social order,
Immre Lacatos For and Against Method: Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method,
Thomas Khun The Structure of Scientific Revolution,
Immre Lakatos For And Against the Method
I don’t play around with hypothesis; I only utter what is true.
Isaac Newton
As the light slowly growth in the dark, it distinguishes a figure of a man chained on a
chair. The silence is disturbed by heavy steps of three figures dressed in black. They go up
invisible steps and raise their authority by sitting above the chained man. Their faces are unseen
behind the dark. They solemnly introduce themselves as Demarcation Criteria judges of the
Supreme inquisition order who are just about to start the court procedure.
I suddenly wake up to realize that I am the chained man and that these three figures are
not merely a joke but the real bodies of existing men who are already in the process of my
destruction or at least they had clearly set that goal in their minds; their shadows hover above;
their authority threatens like a king cobra. I try to move but I cannot. Chained by the fear to
anger them I remain motionless. There is no way to escape from them because I am surrounded
by darkness. There is no point in hiding from them in the dark because they are themselves just
merely the darkness or rather the highly condensed version of the dark that I have ever
encountered in my life.
“You”, shouts the first judge while pointing at me his finger, “you are the one, who is
charged by the Grand Inquisition Committee for being engaged into doing pseudoscience of
2. psychology, anthropology and sociology. What do you have to say to justify you shameful
deeds?”
Scary silence is in the air. Nothing of what they say is understandable. “You have to
talk”, adds the second judge impassive to the matter, his voice is loud but lazily prolonged with
noticeable pauses between almost every single word “If you fail to protect yourself you will be
burned in fire. The fire will purify your soul”. Now it seems that the laziness in his voice could
be attributed to the fact that he had already done so for thousands of times.
Fire? Sociology? Anthropology? Those just don’t go together in my mind. I force myself to
speak because I have to react somehow on that strong claim, “Pardon me?”
“Don’t play stupid,” the third judge irascibly enters the conversation “Do not pretend you never
considered the possibility to be brought to the court for studying dangerous pseudoscience of
sociology. The fire will purify your soul from the pests of ideologies”.
“Now, look at the exhibit A”, says Judge number 2 while holding something painfully
familiar in his hand. “Do you recognize that book?”
I read its title A Theory of Social Order by Hechter and Horn (2003).
The judge asks, “Is that the book, which was assigned to you by professor Jacquesson? Do you
admit reading it?” I keep silent.
“Do you know that this heretical book is wrong on the ground and by the very fact of reading it
you are already guilty for commenting the thought crime?”
The judge flips the first pages and reads it out loud,
A theory is explanation. Just what kind of help does a theory provide? …all theories are
explanations of observable phenomena… the preferred theory will provide the best
explanation. Clearly, the most appropriate criterion for selecting between alternate
theories is to choose the theory that provides us with the best explanation of the given
3. phenomenon…Indeed we judge not the existence, but the success, of a science by its
capacity to explain…а theory of phenomenon is an explanation of phenomenon, and
nothing that is not an explanation is worthy of the name of theory (Hechter 2003)”.
“All explanatory theories have irresistible effect on the week mind (Lacatos 1999)”
The Judge irritably shuts the book closed and talks to me again, “Whatever is said in the
book is deliberate lie designed to corrupt the minds of youth”. He paused then added
significantly, “If the suspect has nothing to say we shell proceed to the official part of the court.
Now let’s pledge again to the mission and the history of our organization.
The judges stood up and put their right hands on their chests. They started talking in
unison, “Since the May 29th of 1919 the Truth has been finally found and the true scientific
method was established thanks to Sir Arthur Eddingston and his sacred expedition in the holly
name of the Natural Science. It was then that the Einstein prophecy of eclipse was confirmed,
may his name be always deified. Einstein predicted the gravity of heavy celestial bodies such as
our star to attract and bend the direction of light. During the eclipse it was feasible to observe the
stars even in the presence of the sun. By the comparison of images of the same stars’ cluster that
appears at night and during the eclipse, Sir Arthur Eddington found indisputable evidences in
support to general theory of relativity. Since the shift in the position of stars is not what one can
normally observe on every day basis, Eddington’s observations proved the superiority of natural
science over social ones that would constantly fail to predict anything with any precision. The
social sciences then were excluded from the AAAS and marked as pseudoscience. Later people
decided to make social sciences illegal as they were intoxicating and corrupting youth with their
explanatory power without any reasonable possibility to predict outcomes with high precision.
The mission of our organization is to secretly guide and protect society of false ideologies of
social sciences so that a new Dark Ages never begin (Bailey 2004)”. The judges stopped and sat
down.
4. “Now let’s study your anomaly in greater details”, the first Judge said “Could you identify when
for the first time the interest to study social science was born in your soul?”
“I don’t know”, I said, perhaps when I first fell in love in high school and couldn’t explain why
things did not work the right way.
“And what were you reading?”
“I was reading Freudian theory of psychoanalysis”.
“Did you enjoy reading it?”
“Yes, I …”
“Let me explain you why”, the Judge interrupted me. “When you read Freud you were first
fascinated by his explanatory power. His theory appeared to be able to explain practically
everything that happened in their fields. The theory seemed to have an effect of an intellectual
conversation or revalation opening your eyes to a new truth hidden from those who are not yet
initiated (Bailey 2004) Was not that quite an intoxicating as a love itself?”
“I guess”.
“Once your eyes were thus opened you saw confirming instances everywhere: the world was full
of verifications of the theory. Whatever happened always confirmed it. Thus its truth appeared
manifest and unbelievers were clearly people who did not want to see the manifest of the truth;
5. who refused to see it either because it was against their social class or their repression, which
still was not analyzed and crying aloud for treatment (Bailey 2004)
“I guess so”.
“Have you ever considered that the true confirmation of science must be a result of a
risky predictions like one attained by Sir Arthur Eddingston based on Einstein’s theory of
relativity? Wasn’t it risky for the theory of relativity to look at the event that has not happened
yet and precisely predict its outcome? Every fool can explain any phenomena afterwards but
only genius can predict the unfolding of future event with high accuracy. What is risky in testing
Freudian theory? Any possible outcome will just confirm the theory.
Haven’t you also sought that any good scientific theory is prohibition: It forbids certain
things to happen. The more theory forbids the better it is (Bailey 2004). What are the things that
social theories prohibit? They are only good for allowing things to happen
People like you must be stopped for intellectual influence is, unfortunately, directly
proportional to the vocal energy, the faith and propaganda skills of competing groups (Lacatos
1999) and you are a part of that dark power that aims to establish New Dark Ages”
The true scientific theory has to deal with fallibility, refutability, and testability (Bailey
2004), which I bet you never considered while studying Freud and others like him. What were
you reading after Freud?”
“Well, I became a student of AUCA and I was studying all sorts of theories in
psychology and sociology like Foucault, Darrida, Lacan, Delouse and Guitar.”
“AUCA, is the Sabbath of Pseudo-scientists called Liberal Arts which constantly violates
the laws of the true scientific method. Now tell me while studying different paradigms in
sociology did you or your professors occasionally allow themselves the remarks such that one
6. paradigm can be sustained by the evidence from other paradigm? Like for example, Freudian
theory and the ideas of Karl Marx can go together to substantiate Structuralism”.
“I think so”
“Did not you know then that Sir Thomas Kuhn in his consecrated book The structure of
Scientific Revolution (1970) harshly criticizes and strongly prohibits commensurability”.
“What is commensurability?”
“The concept of incommensurability, first introduced by Kuhn and Feyerabend, was used to
describe a holistic nature of changes that occur in scientific revolutions and irreversible point of
conceptual changes at which the same concepts from different paradigms do not permit the
establishment of common critical discourse. For example what meaning pertains to the concept
of mass in Newton’s mind is different from how Einstein sees it. So there appear to be no
commonly shared empirical meanings between two understandings of the same terminology.
And any attempt to compare Newton and Einstein’s will result in confusion and muddling talks
full of acronyms of misplaced meanings and consequences. If the conduct of Supreme Natural
Science never permits commensurability how social science then talks back forth supporting
evidences from one theory to another? See you did not even bother to doubt the teachings of
your professors. Now do you have any objections against your quilt?”
I keep silent.
“Silence is the agreement. It is time to announce the verdict”.
The two other judges held the rest of the conversation:
“Was it proven the suspect was involved in the practice of pseudo science of sociology,
anthropology, and psychology?”
“Yes, it was”.
“Was it proven the suspect was intoxicated by the explanatory power of social sciences which he
abused by exercising excessively?”
“Yes, it was.”
7. “Was the fact of suspect holding complete ignorance of what truly constitutes real scientific
theory proven?”
“Yes, it was.”
“Was the suspect proven to be engaged in severe form of violence against the true scientific
methodology by occasionally engaging into conversations about commensurability of different
scientific paradigms?”
“Yes, he was.”
“Now the verdict of the court announces that the suspect is guilty and thus must be sentenced
too…”
His voice turns dawn, the last words suspend in the air. I find myself in my bed in my
own room with no judges around. It was all just a frightening dream. My heart still beats crazily.
I sigh. I think. I gaze at the pile of physics books left from yesterday’s reading assignment. I
have never had such logical dreams in my life. Still it was a strange world of positivistic self-
righteousness. The world was correct to the ground but scaring. I cannot help but appreciate
Social Sciences and Liberal Arts for the true art of amalgamating the pious, positivist thinking
that separates us from the darkness of rigorous science by allowing us to meaningfully break the
rules combine uncombinable and preserve humanistic values.
8. References.
Bailey, A. (2004). First philosophy: Fundamental problems and readings in philosophy.
Peterborough, Ont: Broadview Press.
Kuhn, T. S. (1970). The structure of scientific revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lakatos, I., Feyerabend, P., & Motterlini, M. (1999). For and against method: Including
Lakatos's lectures on scientific method and the Lakatos-Feyerabend correspondence. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Hechter, M., & Horne, C. (2003). Theories of social order: A reader. Stanford, Calif: Stanford
Social Sciences.
