The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (f)

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps using the AWL words in the list, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!
   accessible      adjusted      area      awareness      be achieved      chapter      communities      concepts      Consequently      construction      core      detecting      Emergence      encounters      equipment      Fundamental      guarantees      induced      inducing      initial      nonetheless      Nonetheless      normal      Normal      Paradigm      paradigm      paradigms      phenomena      practitioners      precise      precision      professionalisation      pursuit      radical      refined      refinement      research      Research      researchers      restriction      rigid      theories      theory      violated      vision   
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
by Thomas S. Kuhn

VI - Anomaly and the of Scientific Discoveries.

If science is so and if scientific are so close-knit, how can a change take place? changes can result from discovery brought about by with anomaly.

science does not aim at novelties of fact or and, when successful, finds none. , new and unsuspected are repeatedly uncovered by scientific , and new have again and again been invented by scientists. novelties of fact and bring about change. So how does change come about? There are two ways: through discovery - novelty of fact - or by invention – novelty of . Discovery begins with the of anomaly - the recognition that nature has the - expectations that govern science. The of the anomaly is then explored. The change is complete when the has been so that the anomalous become the expected. The result is that the scientist is able "to see nature in a different way".. How change as a result of invention is discussed in greater detail in the following .

Although science is a not directed to novelties and tending at first to suppress them, it is very effective in causing them to arise. Why? An accounts quite successfully for most of the observations and experiments readily to that science's . results in the of elaborate , development of an esoteric and shared vocabulary, of that increasingly lessens their resemblance to their usual common-sense prototypes. This leads to immense of the scientist's , science, resistance to change, and a detail of information and of the observation-theory match that can in no other way. New and methods and instruments result in greater and understanding of the . Only when know with what to expect from an experiment can they recognise that something has gone wrong.

, anomaly appears only against the background provided by the . The more and far-reaching the , the more sensitive it is to an anomaly and change. By resisting change, a that anomalies that lead to change will penetrate existing knowledge to the .

(A Synopsis from the orginal by Professor Frank Pajares, Emory University)