Title: THOMAS KUHN'S THE STRUCTURE OF SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTIONS

In the preface to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn cites as unifying many of his studies a problem-structure and orientation including "the way in which the experimental bases of a new theory are accumulated and assimilated by men committed to an incompatible older theory" (SSR p.ix). (1) This phenomenon contributed greatly to the movement in Kuhn's career from physics, to historiography, to more philosophical issues concerning the nature of scientific development itself. As the result of his studies, Kuhn emphasized the role of community in scientific "development." He challenged the brick-to-building metaphor endorsed by normal science textbooks, suggesting instead that scientific progress occurs in the form of revolutions and does not follow an uninterrupted linear path, as traditional schoolbooks would lead us to believe. These scientific revolutions erupt not as the direct result of the emergence of new data, but only after a scientific community embraces a new model in place of an old one. Kuhn identified these "universally recognized scientific achievements that for a time provide model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners," as "paradigms" (SSR p.x).