Realist objections

In relation to realist objections, Feyerabend returns to an argument

elaborated by Carnap and comments that the use of such abstract
concepts leads to an impossible position, as ...theoretical terms receive
their interpretation by being connected with an observational language
and those terms are empty without that connection. (Feyerabend,
pp. 373). As before it follows that they can not be used to confer
significance to the observational language as this observational language
is its only source of significance, with which it is not possible to make a
translation but only a restatement of the term.

Therefore, Feyerabend considers that both the instrumentalist and the

realist interpretations are flawed, as they try to defend the idea that
incommensurability is a legitimately unsolvable idea with which to revoke
the theses of the accumulation of knowledge and panrationalism in
science.

This leads to the following consideration: if each new theory has its own
observational basis, within the meaning of the theoretical framework, how
can we hope that the observations that are produced could eventually
refute it. Further more, how can we actually recognize that the new
position explains what it is supposed to explain or if it is deviating off into
other areas and therefore how can the theories be definitively compared.

Feyerabend's answer to the first consideration lies in noting that the initial
terms of a theory depend on the postulates of the theory and their
associated grammatical rules, in addition, the predictions derived from the
theory also depend on the underlying conditions of the system.
Feyerabend doesn't explore the point further, but it can be assumed that
if the prediction does not agree with the observation and if we have a high
degree of confidence in the description that we have made from the initial
conditions than we can be sure that the error must be present in our
theory and in its underlying terms.

In dealing with the second consideration Feyerabend asks why should it

be necessary to have a terminology that allows us to say that two theories
refer to the same experiment. This supposes a unificationist or possibly a
realist aspiration, whose objective appears to be the truth, however, it is
assumed that the theory can be compared under a criterion of empirical
adequacy. Such an approach would build on the relationship established
between the observational statement that describes the outcome of an
experiment formulated for each theory independently, which is compared
with the predictions that each theory posits. In this way the selection is
made when a theory is an empirically better fit. If the objection to the
possible deviation of the new theory is not answered it is irrelevant as
often history has shown that in fact differing points of view change or
modify their fields of application, for example the physics of Aristotle and
Newton.
Theory selection

See also: Models of scientific inquiry Choice of a theory

The above implies that the process of choosing between theories does not
obey a universal rationality. Feyerabend has the following view regarding
whether the absence of a universal rationality constitutes an irrational
position:

No, because each individual event is rational in the sense that some of its
features can be explained by reasons that are or were accepted at the
time in which they occurred, or that were invented in the course of their
development. Yes, because even these local reasons, which change over
time, are not sufficient to explain all the important features of a particular
event.

Paul Feyerabend
[citation needed]

Feyerabend uses this reasoning to try to shed light on one of Popper's

arguments, which says that we are always able to change any statement,
even those reference systems that guide our critical thinking. However,
the two thinkers reach different conclusions, Popper assumes that it is
always possible to make a criticism once the new criteria have been
accepted, so the selection can be seen as the result of a rationality "a
posteriori" to the selection. While, Feyerabend's position is that this
solution is merely a verbal ornament whenever the standards are
influenced by Popper's first world, the physical world, and they are not just
developed in the third world. That is, the standards are influenced by the
expectations of their originators, the stances they imply and the ways of
interpreting the world they favour, but this is strictly analogous to the
same process of the scientific revolution, that leads us to believe that the
thesis of incommensurability can also be applied to standards, as is shown
by the following asseveration:

Even the most puritanical rationalist will be forced to stop arguing and use
propaganda, for example, not because some of their arguments have
become invalid, but because the psychological conditions have
disappeared that allowed effective argument and therefore influence over
the others

Paul Feyerabend
[citation needed]

Feyerabend states that the Popperian criticism is either related to certain

clearly defined procedures, or is totally abstract and leaves others with
the task of fleshing it out later with specific contents, making Popper's
rationality a mere verbal ornament. This does not imply that
Feyerabend is an irrationalist but that he considers that the process of
scientific change can not be explained in its totality in the light of some
rationality, precisely because of incommensurability.
Kuhn's perspectives

The second coauthor of the thesis of incommensurability is Thomas Kuhn,

who introduced it in his 1962 book, The structure of scientific revolutions,
in which he describes it as a universal property that defines the
relationship between successive paradigms. Under this meaning
incommensurability goes beyond the field of semantics and covers
everything relating to its practical application, from the study of problems
to the associated methods and rules for their resolution. However, the
meaning of the term was continually refined throughout Kuhn's work, he
first placed it within the field of semantics and applied a narrow definition,
but later he redefined it in a taxonomic sense, wherein changes are found
in the relationships between similarities and differences that the subjects
of a defining matrix draw over the world.

In The Structure of Scientific Revolutions Kuhn wrote that "the historian of

science may be tempted to exclaim that when paradigms change, the
world itself changes with them".[5]:111 According to Kuhn, the proponents of
different scientific paradigms cannot fully appreciate or understand the
other's point of view because they are, as a way of speaking, living in
different worlds. Kuhn gave three reasons for this inability:

1. Proponents of competing paradigms have different ideas about the

importance of solving various scientific problems, and about the
standards that a solution should satisfy.
2. The vocabulary and problem-solving methods that the paradigms use
can be different: the proponents of competing paradigms utilize a
different conceptual network.
3. The proponents of different paradigms see the world in a different way
because of their scientific training and prior experience in research.
In a postscript (1969) to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Kuhn
added that he thought that incommensurability was, at least in part, a
consequence of the role of similarity sets in normal science. Competing
paradigms group concepts in different ways, with different similarity
relations. According to Kuhn, this causes fundamental problems in
communication between proponents of different paradigms. It is difficult
to change such categories in one's mind, because the groups have been
learned by means of exemplars instead of definitions. This problem cannot
be resolved by using a neutral language for communication, according to
Kuhn, since the difference occurs prior to the application of language.

Kuhn's thinking on incommensurability was probably in some part

influenced by his reading of Michael Polanyi who held that there can be a
logical gap between belief systems and who also said that scientists from
different schools, "think differently, speak a different language, live in a
different world." (Personal Knowledge,1958, p151)