The Concept of Science

The attempt to define science in general terms quickly reaches its limits. In simplified terms, science describes the totality of all knowledge and activities that relate to a specific subject area, are interrelated and are systematically researched using suitable methods.

Science systematically focuses on and investigates a limited subject area using appropriate methods. The research results can be verified using logic and the methods defined for the respective research area. The findings thus obtained are organised and an attempt is made to trace them back to verifiable principles and, in turn, to derive and explain them without contradiction.

Science and Areas of Knowledge

There is therefore no science as such, but rather a "science of". In other words, it is about "something" that needs to be researched in the appropriate context using suitable methods. What exactly science is and how it is practised therefore depends on the defined field.

In common parlance, a distinction is currently made between formal, real and practical sciences. The categorisation is based on the primary scientific subject.

The formal sciences are concerned with abstract issues that are analysed in formal systems. These include: Mathematics, logic, pure linguistics and theoretical computer science, and to some extent also systems theory, including cybernetics. Since the research contents of formal scientific disciplines are not real existing objects, truth values of formal scientific statements can only be verified by means of logic or mathematics
The real sciences (also known as empirical sciences) focus on real, existing facts that are researched empirically. These include the natural sciences with physics, biology, chemistry, astronomy and geosciences as well as the humanities with linguistics, education, history, ethnology, art, theatre, music and cultural studies as well as media studies. In addition to checking for logical consistency, it is necessary to check factual statements through factual research, for which a subject-specific theory of science is formed.
The practical sciences have practical applications as their object of research. These include the engineering sciences, social sciences, economics and law. The differentiation as a separate field of research developed at the beginning of the 1990s and arose from the need to scientifically analyse human action in a wide variety of contexts. According to the current interpretation, action sciences occupy a special position, as they pursue an interdisciplinary approach in their respective contexts.

For historical reasons, since the beginning of the 20th century, the natural sciences and the humanities have often been regarded as separate and sometimes contradictory.

While the natural sciences should focus more on researching universally valid laws, the humanities emphasise the methods of understanding the individual, the unique and the unrepeatable. However, this seemingly divisive contrast is essentially artificial.

From an epistemological point of view, the general is obtained by deduction from individual observations and the individual can only be recognised and described if there is a general understanding with well-founded explanations.

This is particularly evident in anthropology, which must combine approaches from the natural sciences, the humanities and the practical sciences in order to explore and understand a more accurate picture of the human world in its contexts.

In this context, the definition of the human sciences is meaningful, as they deal with human beings as the object of research and explicitly pursue an interdisciplinary approach. The human sciences currently include psychology, education, specialised didactics, human biology, medicine and nursing sciences, cultural studies, history and ethnology as well as archaeology.

In the Anglo-American world, a return to the studia humanitatis (Latin for "study of man") of the Renaissance has become increasingly established through the term "humanities" as a scientific categorisation that encompasses all sciences relating to people (as individuals or collectives). The term has now also found its way into German.

Philosophy

Philosophy occupies a special position. "Philosophy (Greek philosophía - love of wisdom) is the primary doctrine of cognition and knowledge and the associated principles and methods of the individual sciences, as the origin and framework of which it can be regarded.

Philosophical insights are gained with the help of logical, analytical, dialectical, discursive and hermeneutic methods, and more recently also in co-operation with empirical sciences. Its fundamental disciplines include logic, ethics, aesthetics and philosophy of science.

These can be used to recognise their enormous spectrum and their bridging or staircase construction between formally different claims of different (meta) levels and a mathematical-scientific and humanities orientation ..." (Bendel, n.d.; Philosophy)

Philosophy thus not only provides the essential tools of thought with the help of which scientifically systematic work can be defined according to context, but also establishes epistemology (Grk. epistéme - knowledge, cognition and lógos - teaching) as an overarching theory of knowledge itself with the subject (who?), the method (how?) and the object (what?) of knowledge.

Epistemology investigates what knowledge is in itself and how knowledge is produced and how it is founded, what can be known and where the limits of knowledge lie.

Value-free sciences

Since the middle of the 19th century, the ideal of a (value)free "objective" science and the findings of the natural sciences, which came to the fore with mechanisation, had a decisive influence on the modern Western world view. Historically, this gave rise to an unlimited optimism about progress that lasted for much of the late 19th century and the entire 20th century.

Like an all-powerful conception of scientifically developed problem-solving strategies, science is not free from beliefs, (pre-)assumptions, and (pre-)judgments of the researchers, which influence the way research is conducted and interpreted, and who ultimately funds what with which expected result.

Science, akin to an omnipotent notion of scientifically developed solutions, is not free from the beliefs, (pre-)assumptions, and (pre-)judgments of researchers, which influence how research is conducted and interpreted, and who ultimately finances what with the expected outcome."

This one-sided optimism about progress, which was characterised by the natural sciences, therefore increasingly fell into a fundamental crisis in the last decades of the 20th century. The reasons for this were the ecological damage caused by a ruthless "scientific-technical civilisation" and the social risks of a view of humanity based on the motto "me first, and then we'll see", which was difficult to assess and which was emerging in purely scientific-technical developments to the detriment of living conditions. Deep doubts about such a "scientific mechanisation of all areas of life" have increasingly come to the forefront of social perception.

In addition, controversial and, in some cases, public discussions often raise questions and demands, such as:

objective and purpose-free research,
demands for orientation towards the real, existing societal need, and
the responsibility of scientists towards society and the environment.

Mindful of this issue, in light of the re-emergence of the following at the beginning of the 21st century:

social and economic problems,
in relation to climate change and ecological-economic challenges, and
developing diseases of civilisation and pandemic events,

there seem to be no alternatives to the scientific approach for addressing these unresolved tasks on a global scale.

The real challenge at the beginning of the 21st century is therefore recognisably to constructively bring together the different scientific approaches to thinking and research.

To this end, it is crucial that the sciences are in a position to gain and process value-free knowledge about social problems and their secondary conditions, and to articulate alternative solutions without, however, getting caught up in the conflict of decisions about what should ultimately be implemented and how.

In this sense, science should and must be value-free and needs a socially supported independence in order to be able to err and correct itself unencumbered. In social terms, this means that value-free science analyses the most diverse areas of life with the most diverse perspectives - economic, ethical, technical, scientific, theological, etc. and their life orientations, without making an assessment

Science is only value-free if it is not instrumentalised for a specific purpose. ("Wertfreiheit", n.d.; Metzler Lexikon Philosophie)

Scientific pluralism

Science is jeopardised when certain scientific methods are seen and enforced as the only or best way to understand the truth about the world

Such a view quickly becomes tantamount to a belief system, as it regards the ideas of a particular science as the highest and only authority. From this world view, everything else is consequently devalued as "wrong" and fought against. Such a style of thinking can be critically analysed as reductionist scientism. (Schöttler, 2012)

On the other hand, there is an open scientific discourse. In a pluralistic and effectively interdisciplinary network, the meaningful accomplishment of evolutionary tasks can be promoted and mastered in a very concrete way.

Instead exhausting themselves by engaging in a battle against each other, whether

for the dominance of one's own worldview or
for the prevailing market-driven profit interests and
with all the possible political and societal consequences

- and thereby hindering or preventing the development of suitable solutions - a return to the epistemological tools of knowledge formation would be helpful. These underlie all scientific approaches and can thus meaningfully connect them with one another.

This leads directly to the central question of how scientific knowledge becomes established and, furthermore, what position and role the different scientific thinking styles and their instruments have in relation to each other.

Paradigms in Science

Since scientific knowledge has at best an intersubjectively comprehensible provisional nature and scientists rarely behave as Popper demanded: "to put forward their own hypotheses in order to then constantly test them through falsification and, if necessary, to destroy them", the term paradigm was coined in science as a kind of development scheme (Thomas S. Kuhn, 1962 - 1969).

Definition of paradigm

The paradigm encompasses the totality of basic views that characterise and determine a scientific discipline in a time-limited epoch, simplified as the current world view of science.

These basic views, which are valid during periods of development, outline and determine which questions are scientifically admissible and what can and cannot be regarded as a scientifically satisfactory solution.

A paradigmatic change is always tantamount to a scientific revolution. It is initiated by contradictions in new findings, accumulates into a crisis and ultimately leads to a change in the basic conception of the understanding of science that has prevailed up to that point. According to Kuhn, this happens in characteristic processes (Kuhn, 2017) :

Pre-paradigmatic phase: lack of a binding research framework and a standardised methodology - several ideas compete for supremacy with disagreement on fundamental questions and orientation.
Normal scientific phase: There is a dominant orientation and idea. Instead of plurality, there is a monopoly claim on the model and type of problem solutions. Over time, scientists encounter problems that cannot be solved with conventional research approaches, as they raise questions that elude the prevailing paradigm. These problems, known as anomalies, accumulate into a crisis within scientific thinking styles.
Paradigm shift: This usually occurs in a revolutionary way when a sufficiently high density of anomalies triggers a profound change in the view and knowledge of the world. However, the decision between two paradigms cannot be justified by argument, as the view of which arguments are considered rational and consistent is an expression of the paradigm itself.

Kuhn and after him other historians of science and sociologists of science, were able to provide many examples from the history of physics, chemistry and biology as evidence for this structural analysis.

Scientificity as rational reconstruction

The main criticism of Kuhn's structural analysis of the paradigmatic-scientific revolution relates primarily to the fuzzy definition of the term "paradigm shift" itself, as he describes both metaphysical, sociological and constructivist perspectives with the bumpy term of incommensurability.

Incommensurability

Incommensurability is defined as the lack or absence of comparability of concepts and definitions of one existing paradigm with another. Kuhn differentiated this caveat as follows:

"Most readers [...] have supposed that when I spoke of theories as incommensurable, I meant that they could not be compared. But 'incommensurability' is a term borrowed from mathematics, and it there has no such implication. The hypotenuse of an isosceles right triangle is incommensurable with its side, but the two can be compared to any required degree of precision." (Kuhn, 2017, p. 179-199; author's translation)

Even if no direct "term-to-term" comparison can be made between different incommensurable theories, incommensurable theories are in principle thoroughly comparable on a meta-level. He repeatedly and decisively contradicted the reception of his work, which sees him as a representative of relativism.

Independent Value Comparison

Instead of a term-by-term comparison, a comparison could therefore be made on the basis of values that are shared independently of the paradigm, such as accuracy, simplicity, internal and external consistency, logical consistency and others. Such an approach presupposes that there does not have to be one valid paradigm, but that several paradigms with different perspectives exist in the scientific competition for knowledge. This is also supported by other approaches in the theory of science:

From a sociological perspective, the attempt at a paradigmatic explication of scientificity has failed. According to this, scientificity is what scientists in an epoch regard and define as science. (Balog & Schühlein, 2008)

From the point of view of falsification theory, scientificity is a debate and competition between different research programmes, which are measured by whether they succeed in independently producing new results that are not a mere reproduction of what has already been said.

A more far-reaching approach is therefore to relate the criterion of scientificity not to individual research programmes, but rather to the way in which the debate takes place within and between these research programmes.

Methodological transparency

From this perspective, the emphasis is placed on methodological transparency. A statement becomes unscientific if it is not generally comprehensible how concepts, theories and results come about or if contact with the reality of experience is lost.

In order to achieve validity, all available experience and research results in the respective subject area should be appropriately taken into account. Contradictions remain open until new research approaches are able to resolve them and thus further develop knowledge.

A scientific discipline should therefore always be able to "derive" the terms it uses, especially the fundamental central concepts, in a generally comprehensible manner and without internal contradiction.

This includes explaining how these terms are defined, how they come about and how their application is regulated in a comprehensible and valid manner.

This presentation of concepts and theories is referred to as rational reconstruction and forms the central criterion of scientificity as the basis of scientific work.

Scientificity as a methodology

What exactly constitutes the scientific nature of science has been the subject of intense debate in 20th century epistemology, with a significant diversity developing. The most important aspects for medicine are presented and their significance explained.

Empiricism

Empiricism means knowledge from experience. A scientific system of empiricism, as it has been practised in the natural sciences (physics, chemistry, etc.) since the Age of Enlightenment, proceeds in a simplified manner as follows:

The subject of investigation is clearly defined and established.
A suitable experiment with observation follows.
Precise data is collected and methodically (mostly statistically) analysed.
This is used to form hypotheses based on conclusions from the analysis.
This primarily inductive approach analyses individual observations from the experiment and formulates conclusions for generally valid statements as a hypothesis.
In the next step, the hypothesis is re-examined, corrected and modified using the same or similar experiments.
If the results are conclusively reproducible, rules and laws are formulated from the hypotheses.

The most important thinking tools of this approach are logic and reason, practically realised with the help of mathematics. Ideally, the result would be to establish natural laws in this way and describe them mathematically.

Logical empiricism, which developed in the first decades of the 20th century[1], always attempted to prove the meaningfulness of the terms and statements used with the help of experimental criteria.

Natural laws discovered in this way, even if they function in a mathematically verifiable manner, are by no means laws of absolute truth and permanent validity carved in stone - they are not "Moses' stone tablets" containing eternal laws.

As described in the next chapter with Popper's falsification theory, empirical analyses are statistical probabilities based on derived models of the prevailing current understanding of science and its theories. Since there are no theory-free observations, there is also no theory-free empiricism, which is why all statements obtained in this way always have a provisional character.

It is essential to always attempt to falsify the models and their established theorems in order to achieve true knowledge. This is done through the methodology of falsification, which demonstrates inconsistencies and contradictions between different assumptions of a theory.

Empirical research

No matter how rigorous the approach, empirical research, no matter how precisely it is conducted, has natural limits that lie in the concept itself, which can be described with a few questions:

Is there a theory-free observation?

Pure impartiality does not exist, as there are always basic assumptions that determine the initial question, the experimental setup, the observation and evaluation of an experiment. At the same time, the observer is always a part of the experiment itself. Their bias influences the experiment in many different ways.

The same information can be analysed differently depending on the perspective of the researcher , which can lead to different results and conclusions from the same data.

Are there empirical statements that are absolutely true?

Can the concept be applied to everything and is it therefore valid as proof of empirical reality? For example: Even if gravity as a real effect is empirically valid everywhere in our world and has a mathematically provable basis, the empirically reproducible result is not yet proof that the same conditions for gravity also prevail outside the earth.

Frequent events therefore have exceptions (to the rule). A single exception shows that it is not always true as assumed and previously experienced. A counterexample is therefore sufficient, as the example attributed to Popper "a black swan shows that there are not only white swans" says.

Verification and falsification

Empirical methodology can produce results that are valid under certain conditions at a certain point in time. They are dependent on the view and the thought structures with which they are obtained.

Inductive statements can become more certain through verification and falsification, but never achieve the status of an absolute statement. The knowledge gained in this way therefore always remains provisional.
Verification uses defined criteria to check whether the result corresponds to its specifications[2] . Falsification attempts to prove the invalidity of a statement, method, thesis, hypothesis or theory by refuting it (see above).

Summary

From an epistemological perspective, there is therefore neither a final verification nor a final falsification. Both instruments help to gradually approach the truth. The resulting conclusions lead to provisional models of reality.

Empirical scientific statements are therefore relative approximations; ideally, they are asymptotically related to a truth value.

A pragmatic theory of truth could therefore read: "A statement is true as long as its application works." If the model of reality changes and with it the conditions of application, the hypothesis must be tested again. If a test result proves negative, these theories must not be saved by ad hoc hypotheses, but should be discarded.

Popper developed this strict methodology of falsification in his debate with logical empiricism. The central statement is that a separation of scientific from unscientific statements is not possible through the logical structure of a concept and its explication alone, but is shown by the rules of dealing with the respective valid theories. (Popper, 1971)

Intersubjectivity

The term intersubjectivity originally comes from sociological research, but has an overriding importance.

Intersubjectivity (from Latin inter: between and from subject: person, actor) expresses the fact that a (more complex) issue is equally recognisable and comprehensible for several observers: for example, there is agreement on how something is perceived, how it is classified or what it means .

The importance of empirical-sociological research on intersubjectivity lies above all in obtaining a coherent reality of experience, communicating it and making it describable.

In particular, intersubjectivity takes on a practical significance when it is emphasised that certain problems can only be dealt with appropriately if relationships between people with their respective perceptions and perspectives form the basis, or (must) be established.

However, the term intersubjectivity is used and specified somewhat differently in different theories, as it is used as an important term in a wide variety of disciplines. Concepts of intersubjectivity can be found in the fields of philosophy of science, psychology and the social sciences. It is also found in political theory, ethics or discourse theory (consensus theory of truth) and, more generally, in concepts of philosophy (e.g. positivism).

Intersubjectivity is also a determining factor in the practice of medicine, as every encounter between patient and practitioner, whether diagnostic, counselling or therapeutic, always takes place in an intersubjective space.

Subjectivity and objectivity

Intersubjectivity can be distinguished from subjectivity as follows: "Subjective" defines what is only accessible to the individual and for which no universality is claimed.

Typical examples are facts that are only accessible through introspection or judgements of taste ("I don't like the spinach").

Intersubjectivity can also be distinguished from objectivity insofar as objective facts are provable independently of conditions related to individual observers:

Typical examples are mathematical and logical truths ("1 + 1 = 2", "An object cannot simultaneously have a property and not have it") as well as facts that exist in the outside world, such as the natural properties of material objects, which are in principle recognisable to everyone beyond doubt ("The lawn is wet from the rain").

Intersubjectivity as an Epistemological and Philosophy of Science Feature

Epistemologically, facts can be classified according to the extent to which they are generally accessible. This allows the following classes to be distinguished:

Facts that are, in principle, only recognisable or valid from the perspective of the first person. This includes, for example, aesthetic or culinary preferences, but also personal ethical judgements. This also includes facts that can only be accessed introspectively, such as toothache or thoughts.
Facts that can only be accessible to people in certain contexts and with certain characteristics, so that only these groups of people can examine the corresponding statements and judgements and consider them to be true. These include, in particular, religious-cultural or ethical truth claims.
Facts that are in principle accessible to everyone. Mathematical truths and scientific facts can be categorised here.

The transitions between these categories can be fluid, which also makes clear categorisations and examples debatable.

At the very least, the rough classification clarifies how "intersubjectivity" can serve as a quality criterion for scientific knowledge within the framework of philosophy of science discourse.

Put simply: Sciences seem to grasp truths that are "intersubjectively accessible."

Intersubjectivity in sociology

In sociology, intersubjectivity means that certain experiences are comparable for several individuals. This comparability makes it possible for symbols or signs - such as the words of a language - to have the same (or similar) meaning for different individuals. Intersubjectivity therefore makes successful communication possible.

Intersubjectivity is context-dependent and can also reveal problems and potential for conflict under different concrete conditions. If, for example, the participants in an event belong to different social groups, then different meanings are assigned to the same signs or symbols due to different backgrounds of experience, which creates conflicts of misunderstanding between them.
In qualitative research, the concept of intersubjectivity forms the basis for understanding foreign (sub)cultures. Events or facts that take place are usually assigned different meanings than in the culture of the researcher. It is therefore crucial to have a certain access to this other culture, to share its horizon of experience and interpretation in order to understand events from the perspective of this culture.

Only when possible differences in the meanings of symbols or signs are described do the insights gained become meaningful and comprehensible and can thus become more objective.

For phenomenological sociology, the intersubjective character of the shared lifeworld is of central importance. From this perspective, intersubjectivity means the appropriation and dissemination of commonly accessible perceptions and knowledge and the associated practices.

Intersubjectivity in psychoanalysis

In psychoanalysis, intersubjectivity is a conceptualisation of the psychoanalytic relationship situation as a "dynamic field" that has been constantly evolving over the past 30 years.

In current psychoanalysis, this is also referred to as the "intersubjective turn" and describes an analytical attitude across schools in which the relationship between analyst and patient is defined as asymmetrical (the responsibility for the therapeutic process lies more with the analyst) but as reciprocal in the process.

Thus, the analytical process is less determined by interpretations by a subject, the "knowing analyst" in relation to an object, the "unknowing patient". Rather, it creates an intersubjective field in the encounter between two subjects, which is perceived, experienced and ultimately analysed together (Potthoff & Wollnik, 2014).

[1] Vienna Circle 1924-1936 under the direction of Moritz Schlick

[2] Verification (lat. veritas - truth and facere - to make) describes a verification procedure. An example of a verification concept is the checking of predefined specifications of products and services using ISO 9000 standardised procedures, as "confirmation through objectively tested evidence that the set requirements are met"

Sources and references

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Kuhn, T. S. (2017). Die Struktur wissenschaftlicher Revolutionen (H. Vetter, transl.; 1st German edition 1973, 2nd revised German edition 1976). Suhrkamp.
Popper, K. R. (1971). Logik der Forschung (4. Aufl.). Mohr Siebeck. Ch. 1 p. 3-21.
Potthoff, P., & Wollnik, S. (2014). Die Begegnung der Subjekte: Die intersubjektiv-relationale Perspektive in Psychoanalyse und Psychotherapie. Psychosozial-Verlag.
Schöttler, P. (2012). Szientismus: Zur Geschichte eines schwierigen Begriffs. NTM Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Wissenschaften, Technik und Medizin, 20(4), 245–269. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00048-012-0078-5
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Authors: glt | Rev.: gbh | Ed.: pz | last modified May 21, 2025