Kuhn-1962-structure-of-scientific-revolutions defines normal science (a scientific field) as an area of scientific investigation unified by a single paradigm, where most of the success of the enterprise derives from the community’s willingness to defend that paradigm.
” ‘normal science’ means research firmly based upon one or more past scientific achievements, achievements that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its further practice.” (Kuhn, p. 10)
Normal science is characterized by consensus and acceptance of the paradigm where fundamental questions about the concepts, methods, and standards are largely settled, allowing researchers to focus on the extending and refining the paradigm rather than question it. Kuhn provides an interesting take on what-keeps-scientists-engaged-in-normal-science.
This feature contrasts sharply with popper-1934-logic-of-scientific-discovery, according to which scientists should remain permanently open to the falsification of any theory. For Kuhn, normal science depends on “closing off” debate about fundamentals, as he believes that constantly questioning the fundamentals will lead to no true scientific progress.
Kuhn explains normal-science-as-puzzle-solving: the problems chosen by the paradigm are assumed to have solutions, and success depends on technical skill rather than conceptual innovation. By this way, normal science actually discourages novelty and original thinking and instead follows a restricted vision given by the paradigm.
“[Normal science] seems an attempt to force nature into the preformed and relatively inflexible box that the paradigm supplies.” (Kuhn, p. 24)
Three kinds of knowledge normal science focuses on
(p. 25-27 )
- a class of facts that “the paradigm has shown to be particularly revealing of the nature of things”
- e.g. star positions in astronomy, or wavelength in physics
- will create new tools and apparatus to increase the accuracy and scope of these facts
- facts that can be compared directly with the predictions from the paradigm theory
- empirical work undertaken to articulate the paradigm theory
- determination of physical constants (e.g. Avogadro’s constant)
- determination of quantitative laws (e.g. Boyle’s law)
- resolutions of ambiguities in applying the theory to new phenomena
Theoretical problems normal science works on
(p. 30-34)
- using existing theory to predict factual information of interest
- e.g. cataloguing calculated positions, velocities, and trajectories of celestial bodies using Newtonian mechanics
- manipulations of theory undertaken to compare the paradigm’s predictions against facts
- Newton’s Principia was optimized for celestial bodies so the theory needed to be adapted for terrestrial bodies
- clarification of the paradigm through reformulation