Metadecisions: Rehabilitating EpistemologySpringer Science & Business Media, 6. pro 2012. - Broj stranica: 341 Metadecisions: Rehabilitating Epistemology constitutes an epistemological inquiry about the foundations of knowledge of a scientific discipline. This text warns contemporary scientific disciplines that neglecting epistemological issues threatens the viability of their pronouncements and designs. It shows that the processes by which complex artefacts are created require a pluralistic approach to artefact design. It argues that viable solutions to fundamental problems in each discipline require cooperation, creativity and respect for contributions from all walks of life, all levels of logic and all standards of rigor - be they in the natural sciences, the social sciences, engineering sciences, management, the law or political sciences. Ten cases spanning subjects like Doctor Assisted Suicides (DASs), Advising Women on The Risks of Mammograms, a Deregulation Crusade, The Crash of TWA Flight 800, The Control of The World Wide Web, The Creation of the US Department of Homeland Security, among others, are used to illustrate the application of the metasystem framework to increase knowledge and meaning of fundamental problems. The design of any human activity requires the intervention of several inquiring systems where the manager, the engineer, the scientist, the lawyer, the epistemologist, the ethicist and even the artist contribute to shape how problems in the real-world are formulated, how decisions/metadecisions to solve problems are taken, and finally, how actions are implemented. |
Sadržaj
1 | |
ABSTRACTION REPRESENTATION AND METAMODELING | 19 |
LEVELS OF LOGIC IN A PROBLEM | 39 |
artefacts are designed within inquiring systems which can be differentiated | 74 |
cognitive functions which are instrumental in the acquisition of knowledge | 87 |
Chapter 5 The Use of Cognitive Functions to Define and Formulate | 117 |
THE PARADIGM OF THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES | 145 |
THE PARADIGM OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES | 165 |
in the domain of Aesthetics where artefacts need to be beautiful as well | 193 |
THE NEGLECT OF EPISTEMOLOGY | 217 |
THE PARADIGM OF INFORMATION SCIENCES | 239 |
ETHICS | 263 |
AESTHETICS | 287 |
EPILOGUE | 307 |
GLOSSARY | 309 |
337 | |
THE PROCESS OF QUANTIFICATION | 183 |
Explicit and Implicit Quantification We take seriously the challenge that | 184 |