STEPHEN T O U L M I N

REPLY

My full answer to Mr. Kordig's comment will take a whole book, viz.
the book of which my Synthese paper (as I remarked in a footnote on
p. 91) will form an introductory section. When the MS is further advanced,
I will be happy to have Mr. Kordig's reactions to it: for the moment, I
can indicate briefly only the form of my reply.
Mr. Kordig's comment poses admirably the dilemma facing those phi-
losophers of science who can see no middle way between (say) Coiling-
wood and Hempel. For them, the only choice is one between a plain
historical 'description' of actual scientific methodologies - with the ines-
capable threat of historical relativism - and an abstract, formal 'prescrip-
tion' of ideal standards of scientific judgment - with the consequent risk
of mere irrelevance. Mr. Kordig regards the latter alternative as the lesser
of the two evils, and attempts to impale me on the other horn of his
dilemma, along with Collingwood and Kuhn.
My summary answer is this: I recognize the acuteness of his dilemma,
but I do not accept it. On the contrary, I believe that an exclusive dichot-
omy between the 'prescriptive' and the 'descriptive', such as he relies on
so confidently, can betray us into fallacies through over-simplifying the
questions at issue. I did not (for instance) claim that the standards which
should be used in appraising scientific arguments at any time are 'demon-
stratively entailed by' the standards which were in fact used by working
scientists at that time: such a claim would of course (a) be quite indefen-
sible, and (b) land me in historical relativism. My claim was, rather, that
the proper standards for appraising scientific arguments can be recognized
only in the light of the relations between the standards actually current
at the time in question and the longer-term historical development of
scientific problems and methodologies. This was the reason for my con-
cluding reference (p. 90) to case.law and to precedents; for the distinctive
feature of case-law lies in the close relationship it establishes between
judgments and norms, on the one hand, and the relevant facts and prece-
dents, on the other. (To anyone interested in seeing how inextricably

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Synthese 18 (1968) 462-463. © D. Reidel Publishing Co., Dordrecht- Holland

 REPLY

'description' and 'prescription' are interwoven within the conceptual his-

tory of the Anglo-Saxon legal tradition, I strongly recommend Edward
H. Levi's monograph, An Introduction to Legal Reasoning, Chicago U.P.,
1949.) Supposing one believes - as I do - that the distinction between
'prescription' and 'description' must in practice be applied with great
discretion, and that - if this is done - a middle way can be found between
the prongs of Mr. Kordig's fork, what does it then mean to talk of recog-
nizing norms 'in the light of' an actual historical tradition? That is the
longer story I shall attempt to tell in my current book.
I must leave aside, here, the deeper objections to "logical empiricism"
and to the idea of an a-historical "inductive logic" - e.g. those concerned
with the impossibility of rescuing 'pure observation-statements' from
adulteration by the 'theory-laden concepts' current at any stage of his-
tory. But let me end with one final hint which may indicate why my
"dissatisfaction with logical empiricism" is not (as Mr. Kordig says)
"inordinate". In his classic papers on 'Proofs and Refutations' in the
British Journal for the Philosophy of Science for 1963-64, Imre Lakatos
has shown that - with the historical development of mathematical prob-
lems- the concepts and criteria of 'proof', 'validity', 'rigor' etc., in pure
mathematics itself, turn out to have been historical variables; so that,
even in the philosophy of mathematics, any attempt to analyze our stan-
dards of appraisal in a purely abstract, a-historical manner can readily
generate anachronisms and irrelevances.
This being so, I would ask Mr. Kordig: Why does he suppose that we
can achieve, in the natural sciences, an intellectual position 'above history'
which is in practice unattainable even within pure mathematics? If a com-
parative historical examination of our scientific traditions shows - as it
does - that the corresponding systems of appraisal-concepts once again
have a complex history of their own, what warrant does Mr. Kordig claim
for treating any one system of intellectual standards as "timeless and a-
historical": that is, as being universally relevant to, and having supreme
authority over scientific arguments of all kinds, and at all times?

Department of Philosophy,
Brandeis University

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