Thomas Kuhn’s concept of paradigms can be applied not only to science, but also to social sciences, economics, psychology, and many other fields, and paradigm shifts are characterized by short-lived revolutions. We must prepare for the emergence of a new paradigm by waiting for counterexamples to accumulate against the current paradigm.
Thomas Kuhn introduced the concept of paradigms in his book “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions”. The term paradigm, which is now used in many different fields, had a very shocking meaning at the time. With the introduction of the concept of paradigms, the history of science, which people used to think of as a continuous progression of science, was explained as a series of discontinuous paradigm shifts.
In Thomas Kuhn’s theory, there is a concept that is just as important as paradigms. It is steady science. Steady state science refers to scientific activity during periods of paradigm stability. Changes in paradigms do not happen very often, so scientists spend most of their time, even most of their lives, complementing the existing paradigm. This process is called steady-state science. A period of steady state science is when a particular paradigm is recognized among its members. During this period, the paradigm may be modified, but not completely changed, even if counterexamples are observed. Normal scientists focus on further refining the paradigm and increasing its predictive power.
Even if someone argues for a new paradigm, scientists with an existing paradigm will not readily accept it. In order for a new paradigm to be accepted, there must be enough counterexamples to make the old paradigm untenable. Only when this happens can a new paradigm be accepted.
Another idea that Thomas Kuhn changed in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions was the nature of science. Previously, it was thought that science was a process of finding absolute truths that exist in nature. It was believed that over time, science would improve and arrive at the truth. However, Kuhn argued that nature exists independent of scientific laws, and that humans create natural laws in order to recognize and predict it. Therefore, a paradigm shift is not scientific progress, but simply a new way of looking at nature.
Kuhn’s concept of paradigms is not limited to science. For example, the concept of paradigms can also be applied to social sciences, economics, and psychology. In each of these fields, new theories emerge to replace the old ways of thinking when phenomena appear that cannot be explained by existing theories. In economics, Keynesian economics explained the Great Depression and replaced classical economics, and in psychology, Freud’s psychoanalytic theories disrupted traditional thinking about understanding human behavior. These examples show that paradigm shifts can play a transformative role in fields other than science.
The term paradigm can even be applied to Thomas Kuhn’s paradigm itself. In the past, the dominant paradigm was that science could discover truths in nature through gradual and continuous progress. Kuhn turned this on its head. Instead, Kuhn argues that scientific progress is discontinuous and revolutionary, for example, geodynamics replacing pendulum theory, Lavoisier’s oxygen theory replacing phlogiston theory, and Aristotle’s physics being replaced by Newton’s universal gravitation.
Kuhn’s concept of scientific revolutions argued that science develops discontinuously in a process of paradigm shifts. The new paradigms were able to explain counterexamples that the old paradigms could not, but the new paradigms did not necessarily precede the old ones. In other words, even when celestial motion was dominant, someone could argue for geodynamics based on observations. In this sense, Kuhn’s scientific revolutions are deeply connected to paradigm shifts.
If new paradigms emerge in the future, we will likely see a similar process to the one Kuhn described. Counterexamples that the current paradigm cannot explain will accumulate, and new perspectives will emerge to explain them. But because we are in the current paradigm, we cannot predict what paradigm will emerge afterward. Because paradigm shifts are always discontinuous, and new paradigms emerge independently of the old ones, we can only wait for enough counterexamples to be observed to the current paradigm, and thus for a revolution to occur.
Paradigm shifts are not limited to science, but also apply to society as a whole. For example, the information and digital revolution can be seen as a paradigm shift. In the past, manufacturing and physical production were at the center of the economy, but the information revolution has made knowledge and data a key resource. This is not just a technological advancement, but an example of a paradigm shift in society as a whole.
In other words, we are waiting for a paradigm revolution. Kuhn’s concept of paradigm has been, is, and will remain an important perspective for academia and society at large.
