Is Science Progressive? - Pedro Salles Leite

 Is Science Progressive?

How do we know things? There is a range of methods for inquiry across the subject matters, the areas of knowledge (AOK). Through the established knowledge framework (using shared knowledge), the components of each area are defined. Among the AOK, natural sciences are fundamental to discover laws of nature and the world (as we classify it) we live in. Through observation and testing, scientists have long explored this AOK and throughout the centuries, left people to question if science did progress. First of all, to answer this question, progress needs to be defined. According to the Oxford dictionary, one of the definitions of ‘progressive’ is “Happening or developing gradually or in stages; proceeding step by step.” However, once we define progression, “developing” also needs to be defined. ‘Develop’, according to the Oxford Dictionary, is “Grow or cause to grow and become more mature, advanced, or elaborate.” Finally, we need to identify towards what progression is being measured. Science gradually matures, advances, and becomes more elaborate in its own knowledge framework, but for everything outside of this framework, this may not always be true.

Ever since scientific theories have been created, they have also changed.  Thomas Kahn is one of the most famous for analyzing these changes. In his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Kuhn argues that science does not progress step-by-step, but instead, in a dynamic process with spurts of changes. A paradigm, which is an accepted theory, is usually the framework scientists use to work in normal science. In normal science, discoveries are made but they are considered smaller progression steps. For example, the periodic tables of elements already anticipated new elements were still to be discovered so when scientists discovered them, it was a progression in science. According to Kuhn, when scientists go out of the established paradigm and create a theory that re-conceptualizes the previous conceived knowledge, it is considered a “scientific revolution”.

Even though it is progress, scientists themselves try to resists new paradigms due to the fact that they require them to rethink their knowledge. Since science is shared knowledge, scientists work together in research and share their findings with the larger scientific community, to check their reasoning and test the validity of their claim. Throughout history, the scientific community established (through the use of shared knowledge) methods to determine if a theory will be accepted. The acceptance of a theory results in progression, according to our established definitions. Therefore, for this to happen, results go into “the zone of exchange”, where personal knowledge with other scientists worldwide. Through established channels communication, such as peer-reviewed journals and pre-publication servers, scientists get feedback on their work. This itself is already progress, even if the work comes to be considered invalid. By knowing that the method/technique used by the scientist is flawed, the knowledge framework of science becomes more mature and therefore is considered to be a progression in science.

Knowledge exchange is the fundamental of progression. There are many methods of testing new ideas that will be incorporated into science’s shared bank of knowledge, either as an idea that doesn’t work or as a new concept that could be a “scientific revolution”.  Falsifiability, as defined by philosopher Karl Popper, is the testability of a scientific hypothesis. According to Popper, if a theory is not falsifiable, it is unscientific and will therefore be considered pseudo-science. Therefore, if a knowledge claim is not falsifiable, can it still be considered a progress in the knowledge framework of science? Many branches of applied science, such as sociology, have no potential for falsification and therefore would not be considered to advance science. Hence, falsifiability can’t be the only factor to determine if a theory will be added to the knowledge framework. The applied sciences add knowledge to the framework so therefore can be considered progression. 

As new paradigms are discovered and science’s knowledge framework is progressed, other areas of knowledge are affected by it. Indigenous knowledge, for example, can clash with science when new paradigms are created. Indigenous communities have a rich, culture-specific, holistic, locally bound, non-formal and orally transmitted bank of shared knowledge. When western science exchanges a theory with traditional native knowledge, there has to be an established “zone of exchange”. Therefore, many of the discoveries made by western society will not be considered a progress when seen by the indigenous culture, because it cannot be transmitted through shared knowledge. For example, theories that are explained by hypothesis falsification, global verification, and quantitative written records is not valid for their culture and through their schema, will not be considered an advancement. Hence, there are many aspects of science that do not progress in the indigenous knowledge framework.

A real life situation that challenges the concept of science being progressive is the atomic bomb. Even though in science’s knowledge framework the discovery of rapid release of nuclear energy by fission of an atom’s nucleus can certainly be considered progress according to our definition but when we look at it from outside of the knowledge framework of science, the word ‘progress’ may be inaccurate. Media often headlines the social issues that this discovery are causing, among the many wars that killed multitudes as well as accidents to power-plants that made entire living zones inhabitable. Therefore, according to our definition of progression, science is not progressive when seen by this framework because it didn’t bring advancement to society.

Science progresses because of the Ways of Knowing (WoK) used by the scientists. They use their sense perception to perceive the world around them, along with their imagination, intuition, reasoning, and emotion to create new theories. Through deductive reasoning, scientists can make generalizations and form a hypothesis. Science progresses in the sense that it is not perfect. When scientists create a hypothesis “all swans all white” with a million white swans as evidence, it is considered progression. If one black swan is found though, and the theory needs to be modified, science also progressed within its knowledge framework. Through observation, meticulously done using sense perception, the basics of science are established.

When analyzing progression, it is clear that science gradually matures, advances, and becomes more elaborate in its own knowledge framework. However, when looking at the atomic bomb and indigenous knowledge, among the many other perceptions outside of the science framework, it also becomes clear that progression is not universal and needs to be measured towards something.  It’s not possible to achieve perfect results in science and this justifies why science is constantly progressing. The “uncertainty” in science indicates there is still more needed to advance its knowledge framework.

Is science progressive ?

Scientific paradigms contain features that makes it progressive. Progress in it’s meaning states there is a cumulative growth of knowledge over time. Thomas Kuhn was a philosopher which obtained Popper’s view on where to set the boundary or limits in science. Kuhn criticized Popper for characterizing “the entire scientific enterprise in terms that apply only to its occasional revolutionary parts” (Kuhn 1974, 802). Popper's focus on falsifications of theories which leads to rare instances when a whole theory is at stake. According to Kuhn, the way in which science works on such occasions cannot be used to characterize the entire scientific enterprise. Instead it is in “normal science”, the science that takes place between the unusual moments of scientific revolutions, that we find the characteristics by which science can be distinguished from other enterprises (Kuhn 1974, 801). Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolution states a paradigm the "normal science" of an age, in which he emphasis the way that science is not a step-by-step progression, but a dynamic progress involving bursts of change that is mainly significant in the overall theory. Kuhn describes paradigm when scientists work within an accepted theory to fill in the details of the overall pattern of connections due to the enlightenments, and use its overview explanation to point the way towards further research. He mentions scientific theory to be successful when there are no novelties of fact or theory. Normal science can be seen when scientists come up with ideas as an conceptual framework of an accepted theory before they invested vast resources. With that being said, normal science may accumulate abnormal results that cannot be explained with minor adjustments to accepted models. The result of its research might even seem to contradict features of the explanation itself. The change from one paradigm to another enables improvement and understanding of its casualties, this can either foreshadow what will occur in the future or reveal it can be proven wrong. Science has contrapositions when arguing whether it is progressive or not, this can be seen through Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution.

Science can be seen as progressive in the view that it has a certain built-in-self-correcting features, which is experimentation, evidence and falsification. However, we have to always question this built-in-self-correcting evidence because we never know if some scientist later on will prove the knowledge claim wrong.  Charles Darwin’s describes the evolutionary theory in which organisms who develop better traits from their parents are the one’s who will have a higher chance of surviving and passing their traits to next generations. For example: The selective breeding of dog for a certain desirable trait will lead its offspring to have that trait. This carries on for generation after generation until a breed of a dog is developed. Many different types of dogs can be developed this way, but they can never develop a cat by selectively breeding dogs. Natural selection can never extend outside of the DNA limit. This creates an limit to which natural selection can be progressive. DNA cannot be changed into a new species by natural selection. When looking at Darwin’s theory of evolution, we can say natural selection is progressive as species with desirable traits are chosen over other species to pass on their desirable traits. However, it is not progressive in the view that it can never extend outside of the DNA limit. So a dog could never change to an extent in which it could become another animal because DNA can’t be changed by selective breeding. Having said that, there is a contra argument whether Charles Darwin’s theory is reliable. Natural selection is not completely reliable as there are some contradictions to it. Scientists claim there is no prove species has evolved, some believe it’s a conclusion formed from incomplete information without scientific proof. The contradictions can be seen as Eskimos do not have enough fur to keep them warm or humans in the tropics would have silver, reflective skin to keep them cool. Instead humans who live in the topics tend to have a darker skin, which contradicts the theory of evolution. Black skin absorbs the heat from the sun's rays more than white skin. Humans show no sign of natural selection based on the environment. The theory of natural selection can be proven wrong because it cannot create something in the DNA that wasn't there in the beginning. We can predict, on the other hand that humans didn’t change in their skin color or Eskimos doesn’t have enough fur to keep them warm nowadays because evolution, in both of these cases, didn’t take place so far, but will eventually in the future. Nevertheless, scientists prove Darwin’s theory as incorrect because there hasn't been an evolutionary change in these species for an extended period of time in relation to the species that has changed with the existence of better and adapted species.

Language is essential to understand the natural science. Language has to be precise and denotative, with as little ambiguity as possible. For language to have a precise meaning it needs to make clear definition of terms. When looking at precise definition, mathematics is a preferable form of communication due to its precision, compactness and usefulness when identifying quantities and abstracting to relationships between phenomena and concepts. There are some difficulties when communicating scientific knowledge to the general public, this is because of the ambiguity of language. Language and its scientific meaning is extremely important because the findings of science normally have serious implications that the people of a society need to consider. For example: the word error for the general public means mistake, wrong or incorrect, therefore its scientific meaning means the difference from the exact true number. With that being said, when scientists inform the general public beyond their professional communities misunderstanding frequently arises. This is because scientists often use the same words as the public does, but with slightly different meaning, which can generate confusion. However, language is what enables us to share our knowledge and experience. Without language scientific claims wouldn’t arise in the zone of exchange from personal to shared knowledge.

Is Science Progressive?

Is Science Progressive?

It was Carl Sagan, an American scientist, who once said: "At the heart of science is an essential balance between two seemingly contradictory attitudes–an openness to new ideas, no matter how bizarre or counterintuitive they may be, and the most ruthless skeptical scrutiny of all ideas, old and new." While this is certainly a charming philosophy, one has to ask how much truth there is to it.  How can one determine the openness of a subject as vast as science to new ideas? Is it progressive? ––It's important to point out that this essay will be using progress in the terms of "happening or developing gradually or in stages; proceeding step by step." and "favoring or promoting change or innovation." All these definitions are supplied by Oxford Dictionary, which it itself offers limitations that will be addressed within this essay later on.

How open science is to new ideas can be seen by is method of determining whether something is valid or not. This is what defines the degree to which a new idea is considered to fit the paradigm of science. In science, a paradigm is a convention that used to test out theories, a boundary of what is a scientific question or observation. This could be limiting to the expansion of knowledge if it wasn't for the fact that it remains subject to change.

The physicist Thomas Kuhn believed there were two cycles in science (with steps in between): normal science and revolutionary science. Normal science is regarded as the period in which theory predicts discoveries, but since the theory already existed, it is not “new” information. These theories do not change any paradigms. However, when an an anomaly rises –a question outside of the paradigm– so commences discovery, which Kuhn writes, "is a symptom of something askew in the image of science." (54) What follows is a crisis where the original paradigm collapses, as whatever new variable emerged has changed fields that had already existed. This way science is not necessarily cumulative as not all hypothesis can co-exist in the same paradigm. The change of a paradigm, while still met with resistance, is the last phase in which new rules are created to accommodate for the new discovery. In this sense, science is progressive. It allows for change and innovation. For if for a fact to be scientific it must within the paradigm of science, the adaptability and flexibility of said paradigm is surely an indication that science is partially progressive.

The next question, then, would be to ask what makes a discovery valid, worthy of including in the paradigm of science, whether it causes change or not. Karl R. Popper wished to solve the problem of distinguishing between science and pseudoscience, or as he said, the difference between astronomy and astrology, between Marxism and Newton's Theory: "It was the problem of drawing a line (as well as this can be done) between the statements, or systems of statements, of the empirical sciences, and all other statements –whether they are of a religious or of a metaphysical character, or simply pseudo-scientific." (Conjectures and Refutations 1963) Popper states that the criterion of a theory is its "falsifiability, or refutability, or testability.", which goes hand in hand with the way we establish scientific laws: scientists make generalizations that are based on extensive evidence with no falsifying instances.

This then leads us to ask the question: how does one "falsify" a theory? What's made science differ from areas of knowledge is the change of subject matter, which leaves behind all the complexities and challenges of the human mind and behaviour and relies on methods of observation. It's one of science's pillar ways of knowing: observation is the basis of science. It disregards intangible things such as intuition, the gut feeling we feel in a situation.

So far, we understand that science exists within its own paradigm which without it, it would not be science but something else. The paradigm is adaptable, able to change when new ideas emerge that do not fit the schema but hold undeniable truth. Sidenote: within science, truth becomes provisional truth,  based on results that are coherent with other findings alongside the acknowledgement there is never enough evidence to be 100% sure. Determining the scientific validity of a statement stems from the ability to falsify to, to test it.  It all seems rather straightforward. Except, we are trying to determine how progressive is science and there is one way of knowing, one key idea, missing to get closer to finishing this puzzle. Earlier, it was claimed that observation is the basis of science. At the risk of sounding flippant, it is not that observation is not a vital part of the subject area but the true basis of science is the missing piece of this puzzle: shared knowledge.

The scientific paradigm, that will change when an idea arises that revolutionizes it, is based on shared knowledge. The language which we use to communicate ideas and concepts within science is based on shared knowledge. The equation for enthalpy will always be q=mc∆T (heat = mass x constant x change in temperature) whether it be in english or in mandarin. The proper methods of testing theories are based on shared knowledge. A scientist would not propose that God exists based on his intuition because as a community, both God and intuition have been ruled as unfounded theories with no scientific way of proving either. So the natural question would be: what does the role of shared knowledge play in the level of progressiveness of science? Inevitably, what ultimately defines something as science is the consent of a community that has set certain parameters and standards for what defines the subject area. While some might call this limiting, without this, what would science be but random individuals making individual claims.

So far, we've yet to discuss the question, "is science progressive?" through an ethical lense. The bioethicist, David B. Resnik, defines ethics as the "norms for conduct that distinguish between acceptable and unacceptable behavior." Broader than law, it's a way to behave as a scientists that will ensure honesty and trust within such a subject. There are countless of violations of ethics, even from powerful authorities such as the government. For example: Porton Down, a series of experiments ran in the 1940s-60s by the UK government and military. Participants were led to believe they were being tested to procure a cure for the common cold where in reality, they were exposed to hazardous chemicals such as LSD, mustard gas, sarin and so on. This is considered a violation of ethics, as it was based on exploitation and non-consent. Yet, what does this have to do with progressiveness? Well, with the surge of technology, especially internet, the scientific community has become much greater and beyond that, now reaches a wider audience in terms of scientific conclusions and predictions. Along with it, the issue of ethics in science have increased exponentially for now the scientific community is being held accountable by more than scientists; they are held accountable by the public. This means that the concept of animal rights and human rights when it comes to testing and such are now a much more discussed topic than before.

However, animal testing is still prevalent. According to the non-profit Do Something website, over 100 million animals are burned, crippled, poisoned and abused in US labs every year –and what's worse is that 92% of the experimental drugs that are safe and effective in animals fail in human clinical trials because they are too dangerous. There are plenty of reasons why animal testing is not necessarily needed: humans and animals don't always react the same and animal testing cannot show all the potential uses of a drug. Planet Science tells us that research using animal testing was recently investigated in the United States and it was found that most trials had high scientific value but low medical benefit. In this sense, science, for the most part, fails to be progressive as despite animal testing not proving to be that beneficial, it continues to torture and kill animals every year.

On the subject of new ideas, it must be noted that until now, this essay has solely dealt with Western science. What happens if we cross over into a different culture, to indigenous tribes? It seems at first that these two cultures are the opposite. Natural sciences are based on decontextualizing and depersonalizing knowledge, while indigenous knowledge is holistic, seeing themselves as part of the processes of this world rather than observers.  Yet, at a closer look, there is far more shared between the two than initially assumed.

The growing awareness of ecological systems and complexities of living systems within Western science matches the traditional respect for all things mentality of indigenous tribes. Both base their science on empirical observation in natural settings, on pattern recognition and verification through repetition. They both share similar organizing principles, where their body of knowledge is stable but flexible. It's argued that the reason we perceive a difference between the sciences of the two cultures is because of the scale. A Western scientist might isolate a specific medicinal compound from plants grown in a laboratory, using her knowledge of biology and chemistry. Certain indigenous people might know which plant is the best for medicinal purpose by the specific location or harvested in a certain way. 'Both construct knowledge using fundamentally the same ways of knowing, but at different scales.' Western science however, refuses to acknowledge indigenous knowledge as valid science, despite having similar methods and similar conclusions. This is where science limits itself and demonstrates a lack of progressiveness.

We've seen that in Western science, the paradigm of science, the boundary of what is and what isn't science, is open to change as evident by Kuhn's cycles theory. Yet, the way something is proved to be science or not remains a conflicting answer for our question. On one hand, science is based on observation and on shared knowledge. A way of combining those two is through Popper's method of determining whether something is a scientific theory or not. Yet, who's to say indigenous knowledge does not hold as much truth, despite being untestable? Having mentioned ethics, or the lack thereof, indigenous knowledge could help reinforce proper morals within science as it's based on respect for all things. It also focuses on communicating proper behaviour and values through metaphors and stories. This could mean a huge step forward for science in terms of sustainability and taking care of our earth. Science's inability to incorporate these values and this way of thinking shows that while it remains open to new 'scientific ideas', it has failed to keep up with the more morally complex times.

Is Science Progressive? - Pedro Hannud

     Science is an incredibly rich area to question and debate many distinct topics. This extremely fascinating study, is mankind's best-organized attempt to discover how our galaxy, our world and how our species evolved and came to exist. After all, science is always trying to move forward solve new problems or uncertainties we humans have about everything. This brings us to the extremely complex question of whether or not science is progressive. Progress is defined as being a forward or onward movement towards a destination, which in scientific purposes can mean the attempt to unveil any possible doubts and questions regarding the functioning of everything around us and inside us as well. When addressing this question it is extremely important to stress that like almost all questions, there is no certain answer, but there is a big possible discrepancy that can be drawn, which is of whether progress should be only considered in a specific framework or if it should be considered in all frameworks. This discrepancy is very critical because the answer to the question may totally change according to whether you consider all frameworks or only one.

 As Thomas Kuhn has already stated, all scientific discoveries are the final product of a complete revolution, where after a long period of time spent on studying and exploring one question or scientific issue, a new theory is created where all agree upon and understand as the most accurate idea. When this "climax" is reached, and a new agreed-upon theory is established, we have the creation of what Kuhn calls a “paradigm”. This idea hence becomes shared knowledge until a better theory is drawn or this one is proven to be wrong. When this happens, and another theory better suits and answers a question there is a paradigm shift, which will occur continuously until the best answer is found again.

Many important paradigms we have nowadays were created in times of war and political instability, and even though the collateral damages of such studies may have been massive, important discoveries were drawn out of them, making science progress many years into the future and changing scientific history. Although there was progress in the scientific framework, the social framework was incredibly affected, bringing up debates on whether or not science is really progressive until this day. As we see in recent history, many discoveries that have totally changed the course of mankind have had negative side effects on the social framework, and one of the best examples is when Einstein discovered that if he split an atom of uranium with a neutron beam, there would be an incredibly large amount of energy released and therefore a chain reaction would occur. This revolutionary discovery willingly or unwillingly created the atomic bomb, which ended thousands of lives in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and forced the Japanese army to surrender to the allies in World War II. Even though this discovery was a progress in science, it had dreadful social impacts and continued to harm those lands after decades due to the level of radiation exposed, hence illustrating how progress in a specific framework may devastate a different one. Another example also in World War II, was how the Nazi doctors experimented and discovered valuable information about hypothermia, and how the human body reacts to cold temperatures and until what point it can still be alive. The method of discovering the secrets of hypothermia though, was testing on living Jews who were forced to undergo these inhuman circumstances, where in many times wouldn’t resist and therefore perish. Both of these examples created new extremely important paradigms, making progress in the scientific framework but negatively impacted the social framework, which really makes us question if there is any progress in these examples. The human testing coordinated by Nazi doctors has been an important argument used to create the testing regulations used nowadays to protect humans, which shows how immoral they were. The Atomic bomb was also used after as an example to set and create war rules between nations, which brings up the question of whether or not some lives should be sacrificed in order to save others? And if so, how do we choose who will be sacrificed? After all, at what cost should progress come?

All of these questions can be answered using areas of knowledge such as indigenous knowledge and also looking at different ways of knowing such as perception.

            When looking at indigenous knowledge, we can drastically see how a different way of seeing something may impact how one sees the answer to the question of whether or not science is progressive. Indigenous knowledge is very different from western civilization when looking at sciences and social understanding due to the fact that western civilization understands these things to be separate from each other and indigenous knowledge doesn’t. If we use these two distinct views, we can understand clearly how the question being addressed in this paper can be seen in various different ways. Due to the fact that indigenous tribes don’t see science and social aspects as separate frameworks, they might perceive the answer to this question differently in the fact that they might not think it is possible to have progress in science and negative impacts in social aspects due to the fact that they are not separate from each other for them, thus they might not understand how it is possible to have negative impacts in the social framework when having progress in the scientific framework. The western civilization on the other hand might bee able to see how science may have progress and therefore negatively impact society because they are separate frameworks in their perception of things, making their answer the total opposite from the answer indigenous people would give to the question of whether or not science is progressive.

            Throughout this paper, the question of whether or not science is progressive has been addressed and it is clear that there are many answers to this question, only depending on what perspective you are looking at and how you perceive things. According to different schemas and perspectives, the answer to this question may drastically change as we have seen throughout this paper, where if you are a member of an indigenous tribe, you might see science as not progressive due to the fact that it is tied up to the social aspect, thus not progressive when using the examples of WWII.  If you are a member of the western civilization you might see science as progressive due to the fact that it can be separated from the social framework, so you might see it as progressive in the scientific framework but not in the social framework, or even though there are negative impacts in society, you might think that the progress made in science is bigger than the problems created as a result of it. So, in other words, science can be progressive, not progressive or even both at the same time, it just depends on where you are standing and through what schema and perception you analyze and try to answer this question.

Science is progressive, isn't it?

Science is progressive, isn't it?

What makes something progressive. Progress is defined as the forward or onward movement toward a destination. But science isn't a destination, and neither is scientific knowledge; Scientific knowledge is a pool of shared understanding about science. In science, progress isn't an onward movement to a set destination but onward movement to a larger pool of scientific knowledge. Progressive on the other hand is," happening or developing gradually or in stages; in most cases proceeding step by step". The word progressive is often a synonym to liberal, radical, even ahead of its time and innovative; most of the time an adjective that implies it is going to something better.  In science theories, ideas and paradigms change constantly giving it a dynamic nature. Paradigms are universally recognized scientific achievements that for a time provide and model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners; Paradigms can also be accepted theories and rules for which all of science is based upon. More often than not science’s dynamic nature tends towards a better understanding, and deeper comprehension of the already existing paradigms.

But before we can discuss if science is progressive, we must discuss what science is. Science is the study of naturally occurring phenomenon. Science must be falsifiable; falsifiability is a concept created by philosopher Karl Popper that says for a hypothesis to be credible it must be disprovable before it can be accepted as a scientific theory or as scientific knowledge. This concept allows humans to accept theories as true even though they are not completely correct. Because of the current technology it is impossible to prove something as completely accurate or correct but we can make premises and theories, which are true they just can’t be fully and completely true. Falsifiability applies to science as a whole, as science is the pool of shared and credible theories and knowledge that has accumulated over centuries to form what we see as science now, all the theories and understanding must be falsifiable in nature. Something to be part of the body of scientific knowledge it must follow the scientific method, the scientific method is the generator of scientific knowledge and hence a foundation for all of science. The scientific method uses reason as a way of knowing; making hypotheses, then testing the hypothesis empirically, then reasoning the relationship observed in the results to previous knowledge and the original question and procedure. The scientific method is used in different ways in natural sciences and in social sciences. The scientific method also greatly relies on induction, meaning using evidence obtained through the scientific method to come up with a theory or law that can be applied on a larger scale. The use of the scientific method can be easily observed in the natural, material and even in the humane sciences.

In biology the scientific method is used for testing of products and seeing the effects of independent variables on dependent variables. But the scientific method is not only applicable in physical research, a large part of the current scientific knowledge has used the scientific method in written research and observations, much like a psychologist would in the humane sciences. This is different from the science that is used in chemistry and physics were most if not all of the current knowledge was built on experimental data that followed the scientific method. Like previously explained the scientific method is a mix of deduction, induction and observations; it follows a cycle like the one depicted in picture below (1).

(1)

(1)

In many cases science is progressive, it proceeds in steps, take for example the periodic table. Fist created in by Dmitri Mendeleev in the late 1960s, the periodic table was mostly blank. At that point in time scientists had yet to uncover elements which we know of today. But as technology progressed and elements were discovered they were added to the periodic table. You can imagine the periodic table like a house, the foundation was laid first, this being the template created in the 1960s and then things were added in progression to achieve the final product, a fully constructed house with all the decorations. The periodic table was built in steps with each one based of what was previously there just like a paradigm is. Paradigms are also progressive but they do not move forward in a single path but in a cycle. The cycle in which they function is described in Kuhn's works. For Kuhn science progresses from normal science, the current problems is being solved; to model drift, when there is little to be solved; to model crisis, when your going no where; to revolution the discovery of new possible paradigms; to the final step of paradigm change, the community has reached an agreement on the new paradigm.

Paradigms change as new technologies become available, this is why a scientific fact has to be true at the given time with the tools available at that time. But this means as human develop new technologies that are more accurate, meaning they can perform measurements with more accuracy and precision, with less random error and hopefully less human error paradigms must be changed.  Currently the paradigm that the speed of light is constant in a vacuum stands true but if there was a new technology available tomorrow tat was able to disprove this accepted ‘fact’ then we would have to change the paradigm and anything that was built on it, just like the argument made about math in THE PROOF where wiles explained that if the theory was disproven all math that was based on it would crumble like a house of cards.

Science is founded on the principle that knowledge must be exchanged, if somebody discovers that the speed of light is not constant in a vacuum but did not share that claim then this claim can never be part of the body of scientific knowledge. This exchange is important because others must know of this knowledge and others must test it before it can be part of the shared knowledge, be included in the current paradigm and can become a base for other theories and facts.

One way which we can explore the concept of progress in science is by looking at progression on the smaller scale of evolution.  Before evolution even became a theory, creationism was the accepted fact on how humans and all living beings came to be on earth. As time passed and people started uncovering facts there was a paradigm shift to the theory of evolution, this theory became wide spread after Darwin published On the Origin of Species in 1859. This was published during a time where creationism was still the widely accepted fact and contradicting the churches beliefs could lead to accusations of hearsay. the idea behind evolution, which now is a fact, is that all living organisms evolved form the simplest life form to what we see of today and that evolution can occur gradually (follows gradualism), or it can happen suddenly and quickly at a period of time (follows the idea of punctuated equilibrium).  In the aspect of evolution there is little doubt that it is something progressive as evolution in itself is a form of progress.

One way, which we can see how science is progressive, is looking at religion. Religious knowledge doesn't progress. If we use Christianity as an example, the knowledge in christianity has supposedly been around since the 12th century. Religion is an area of knowledge which is resistant to change or to progress, they would never accept a new theory on god even if there was ample proof why in the scientific community it would be being considered by many.

I think that when we are considering the question is science progressive it is important t o consider how we are evaluating  the terms science and progress. To me science nust have two of the three fundamental ideas  described in the second paragraph and progress must be something ha move forward with a more positive result with every step.  when you consider the foundations of science and how they all point toward science as being progressive.