THE PRINCIPLE OF PROLIFERATION AND ITS PLACE IN POSTMODERN EPISTEMOLOGY

Annotation

The paper breaks down certain methodological aspects of the philosophy of Paul Feyerabend as well as focusing upon the problem of how the status of scientific knowledge has changed within the concept of epistemological anarchism in relation to changes in the scientific paradigm. Is has been postulated that in the framework of the postmodern paradigm the problem of scientific knowledge is inevitably linked to the problem of language as a means of the objectification of knowledge. The missing metanarrative as a legal foundation for scientific knowledge and the transition from the concept of �broad narratives' to a paralogical scope of complex semantic games are an immediate cause of changes in scientific methodology. Therefore, numerous theories, which are conceived by the principle of proliferation, stimulate the development of brand new concepts. Besides, the constellation of many a rivaling theory enables to scrutinize the feasibility and justifiability of particular theoretical constructs. As a consequence, the principle of proliferation espoused by the philosophy of Feyerabend is both a way to bypass binary oppositions associated with classical philosophy and an unavoidable challenge as far as the criteria of the scientific value of postmodern epistemology are concerned.

Keywords

• paradigm
• scientific revolution
• epistemology
• scientism
• postpositivism
• conventionalism
• postmodernism
• proliferation
• transgression
• ‘language games’
• verification
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