[ Summary ] ˇ Chapter 4.0 : Epistemology
Epistemological and
methodological preliminaries
[ NB : Provisional texts. Level of writing : 2/5 ]
only available in French and partly in English.
Presentation & Content
Epistemological and methodological preliminaries ; definition of the empirico-synthesical sciences, new scientific field specific to the hypercomplex subjects.
Summary
The Universe, restricted to the terrestrial biosphere, would be of Materialist Realist nature. The study of the hypercomplex phenomena would seem to require the creation of a new scientific field which could be called "empirico-synthesical", having its own methodological, critical analysis and scientific validation framework. Psychobiology would be the empirico-synthesical science of interdisciplinary, global and systemic study of the somato-psychic continuum of human being.
Plan of the chapter
A - Critical analysis of the scientific method
Current epistemological research has underlined a whole set of problems relating to the validity of the scientific methods and knowledge (Bachelard 1993, Kuhn 1983, Feyerabend 1979, Popper 1990, Brannigan 1996).
For these reasons, a critical preliminary study tried to characterise and take into account the whole of the factors of dyslogy intervening in the cognitive construction of the scientific representations of the world.
Figure 4.0-1 : Factors of dyslogy reduced
B - Epistemological framework
It would seem that the study and the modeling of the hypercomplex phenomena, starting from the synthesis of the data of empirical-analytical sciences (physics, chemistry, biology, physiology, neurosciences...), would require the creation of a new scientific field, that one could call "empirical-synthetical", having its own methodological and scientific validation framework.
Figure 4.0-2 : Empirical-Synthesical sciences reduced
This new field of research would be in epistemological continuity with empirical-analytical sciences and would gradually tend to replace some of the historical-hermeneutical sciences.
The empirical-synthetical science of human behavior, founded on the systemic synthesis of the empirical-analytical data, would be the biological psychology, or psychobiology.
Figure 4.0-3 : Relations between psychobiology and other scientific fields reduced
C - Methodological framework
The extent of the various disciplinary fields approached, preventing exhaustiveness, makes it necessary to define a heuristics of data selection :
In experimental sciences, only synthesis data concerning the neurobiological bases of behaviors (explanatory aspects) are used. The objective being, either, if the state of knowledge allows it, to clarify in detail the dynamics and the interaction of the neurobiological processes underlying the emergence of the behaviors, or, failing that, to characterise only some of the structural-functional constraints of these processes.
Some disciplinary fields, more particularly that of neurosciences, are privileged : neurophysiology, to characterise functional sets of structures ; biology of the development, to understand the development of the neural structures underlying the expression of some behaviors ; neuropsychology and cognitive neuropsychology, to characterise anatomo-functional relations and processes.
In social sciences, only data coming from observation or data which highlights certain behaviors (descriptive aspects) are used.
Certain disciplinary fields are privileged : history, to understand the evolution of the representation of certain behaviors ; the psychology of development, to characterise the development of a behavior during the ontogenesis ; general psychology, to characterise the behavioral regularities ; ethology, especially primatology, to know the possible influence of culture on the expression of a behavior ; and anthropology, especially ethnology, to observe the evolution of certain behaviors in various cultural contexts.
The objective is, by closely connecting the whole of the behaviors observed with the whole of the neurobiologic structural-functional constraints of the processes, to produce behavioral modelings taking the whole of the interdisciplinary data into account and in conformity with them.
Figure 4.0-4 : Psychobiological methodology - Method of research reduced
All the data obtained by methods having skews or known and justified insufficiencies are not used. Such is the case, for example, of the data originating from the psychoanalysis, whose clinical method, founded on anamnesis, is prone to lapses of memory, distorted recollections and suggestibility of the patient to the therapeutist (Grünbaum 1996).
D - Scientific validation framework
Related to the characteristics of this theoretical and interdisciplinary, empirical-synthetical research task, a scientific validation model in two stages is proposed :
- A priori validation. This first stage would be specific to the empirical-synthetical methodology. It would be founded on the principles of coherence and testability (according to Ladričre 1995, Gil 1995, Hempel 1972, Watanabe S.). These principles are briefly described below.
- A posteriori validation. This second stage would be founded on the empirical-analytical sciences principles of validation, which are mainly experimental controls.
a - A priori validation : Principle of coherence
An hypothesis concerning a behavior or a psychobiological process would have a sufficient degree of probability of a priori validity if it satisfies the three conditions of coherence : internal, factual and external.
Internal coherence
The internal condition of coherence comprises two under-conditions :
- Condition of trans-levels integration : existence of a logically coherent system of explanatory hypotheses describing the emergence of the process studied starting from the interaction of processes existing at other levels of organisation.
- Condition of indirect validation : the various processes of the other levels of organisation have already been characterised and validated by experimental methods specific to the considered levels.
Factual coherence
The theoretical system of the studied process is explanatory and in conformity with a majority of facts already characterised and observed.
External coherence
The theoretical system of the studied process is consistent with other already tested theories.
b - A priori validation : Principle of testability
The theoretical system allows an experimental control : it is possible, later on, to corroborate it or to refute it.
Figure 4.0-4 : Psychobiological methodology - Method of validation reduced
www.psychobiology.org