This book explores the evolving nature of objectivity in the history of
science and its implications for science education. It is generally
considered that objectivity, certainty, truth, universality, the
scientific method and the accumulation of experimental data characterize
both science and science education. Such universal values associated
with science may be challenged while studying controversies in their
original historical context. The scientific enterprise is not
characterized by objectivity or the scientific method, but rather
controversies, alternative interpretations of data, ambiguity, and
uncertainty. Although objectivity is not synonymous with truth or
certainty, it has eclipsed other epistemic virtues and to be objective
is often used as a synonym for scientific.
Recent scholarship in history and philosophy of science has shown that
it is not the experimental data (Baconian orgy of quantification) but
rather the diversity / plurality in a scientific discipline that
contributes toward understanding objectivity. History of science shows
that objectivity and subjectivity can be considered as the two poles of
a continuum and this dualism leads to a conflict in understanding the
evolving nature of objectivity.
The history of objectivity is nothing less than the history of science
itself and the evolving and varying forms of objectivity does not mean
that one replaced the other in a sequence but rather each form
supplements the others.
This book is remarkable for its insistence that the philosophy of
science, and in particular that discipline's analysis of objectivity as
the supposed hallmark of the scientific method, is of direct value to
teachers of science. Meticulously, yet in a most readable way, Mansoor
Niaz looks at the way objectivity has been dealt with over the years in
influential educational journals and in textbooks; it's fascinating how
certain perspectives fade, while basic questions show no sign of going
away. There are few books that take both philosophy and education
seriously - this one does!
Roald Hoffmann, Cornell University, chemist, writer and Nobel Laureate
in Chemistry
