Subject:
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help me understand...
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Sun, 18 Jun 2000 23:17:48 GMT
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Viewed:
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121 times
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Hi,
I'm reading a scholarly compilation of articles on human resources development
and I'm hoping to find someone here who can explain what this little section
means...
"Currently, there is no discipline that is firmly structured in terms of theory
or practice. Neither biology, physics, mathematics, chemistry, nor ecology are
the same as they were a mere decade ago. All are embracing completely new ways
of understanding through theoretical breakthroughs. Science has been moving
toward a new paradigm. Chaos theory, the theory of fractals,
self-organizing/autopoietic systems, quantum physics, and Gaia theory (the
earth is a living organism) are driving the move away from Cartesian/Newtonian
models of scientific thought toward systems thinking, from objects to relations
(Capra, 1996), and from philosophies of positivism to theories of
constructivism."
I'll be honest, this gets my hackles up. I am frequently irritated by advocacy
of post-positivist qualitative research, particularly when it's presented
derisively as a the superior of "real" research methods. (And this author has
done so generously in the pages before the quote above appears.) I am
generally willing to accept that for some kinds of research and understanding,
qualitative research is the appropriate tool. But There are chunks of stuff in
the above quote that I just don't get. Do you (anyone?) know what he's talking
about?
Chris
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: help me understand...
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| Hmm. It seems (to me) that the author is [complaining? explaining?] that a lot of present discovories and theories are not based on experiments, but on pure theory without evidence. If I get it correctly. (not that I agree) -Shiri (24 years ago, 18-Jun-00, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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