SECTION:
The Unifying Method of the Humanities, Social Sciences and Natural Sciences: The Method of Transdisciplinarity
Friedrich Wallner (University of Vienna, Austria)
Culture and ScienceFor a long time philosophers of science (e.g. members of the Vienna Circle and their followers) have been convinced that there is only ONE structure of science possible and valid in every culture and under all conditions.
As in the last five decades researched in the history and sociology of science has shown that this is not true they started a fight against it which was lost. This seemed at first glance as a very unhappy situation for science with relativisation science lost its cultural influence in the western world and became functionalistic and instrumentalistic; i.e. it lost its claim of knowledge.
Intensive research in the structure of western science and in the structure of sciences of other cultures for instance Tradional Chinese Medicine have led us to a total restructerisation of the concept and understanding of science. According these results culture is a condition of science without which science cannot be understood as knowledge.
After these explanations in the talk we will show how we can handle the knew conceptual situation methodologically. There will be shown new methods of revealing presuppositions of science and how locality and commitment of trues come together.
This knew understanding of science reveals new ways of the communication between cultures and suggests an alternative manner of globalisation.
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