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 Distortion is another way of looking at things May 23, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I am soooo against relativism normally, but, and perhaps this should be a big but, there are exceptions. Lateral thinking is described in a far deeper textual way by Feyerabend than say, de Bono. I think that epistemology can go beyond 'Against Method', but the stuff of creativity is made up of the stuff that Feyerabend describes so well. An interesting read.
An essential polemic on science/society February 14, 2007
7 out of 9 found this review helpful
It is unfair and inaccurate to criticise Against Method on the grounds that it propounds a relativist approach to science. It is essentially an extremely interesting, and entertaining, polemic in which Feyerabend attempts to shake up our complacency about science, method and the interaction of science and society. His analysis of Galileo is fascinating (as is his later ironic defence of the anti-Galileo authorities in "Farewell to Reason"), but he would be the first, I believe, to say that the reader should think and research the issue for themself, not sit back and take his word for it.
This is a book to make you think, and to provoke you to keep going. In fact Amazon is right - read it alongside Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. (And, though he clearly hated the man, you might even have to read some Karl Popper, just to get the other side of the argument.)
 Absurdity in action December 4, 2006
7 out of 15 found this review helpful
Before reading this book, ask yourself the following question: do you think voodoo is as good science as quantum mechanics? If the answer is no, then prepare for extreme frustration with absurd arguments, dishonest scolarship and numerous inconsistencies. If the answer is yes, you'll be thrilled with this laissez-faire approach to science and epistemology.
The main thesis of the book could not be simpler: all science and all observations are completely theoretical. What one physical theory says is hence completely incommensurable with what another says. In fact, physical theories aren't in any way better than other theories in explaining the world. Astrology is just as valid as astronomy, voodoo is just as valid as our medical science...everything is just as valid as everything else, because there cannot be any rules for validity.
Why is this the case? Because Galileo's physics was not perfectly rational. A (faulty) analysis of Galileo makes up for more than half of the book. Little does it matter to Feyerabend that his physics in the 17th century was presented in dialogues without any mathematical tools. Has anybody ever claimed that Galileo was a model scientist, or moreover, that Galileo can be though of as an example of MODERN science? Of course not, but Feyerabend picks a spectacular and easy target. In doing this he is consistent, though, because any argument is as good as any other. Although one has to wonder how he can claim that Galileo was not rational after arguing forcefully that there cannot be any criteria for rationality...
Of course Feyerabend provokes on purpose. He does not believe all this, as he stated many times later. The book was an effort to wake philosophers of science from their dream that philosophy can give norms for science. In doing this Feyerabend was absolutely right, and his place in the history of philosophy of science is well founded. But just considering this book as an independent work, one can't help the idea that it's parody. It is that bad.
 Blow your mind January 16, 2000
15 out of 22 found this review helpful
This book changed the way I looked at science. Although I am a hardline rationalist, I can't help but notice how often the intellectuals are wrong and ignorant, normal people are right when scientific issues of public concern are discussed. This book thinks about why, and what should be done about it.This book is not, however, a populist work. Intellectually it pulls no punches.
A wonderful polemical critique of scientific reductionism May 15, 1999
21 out of 23 found this review helpful
Anyone who expects an academic, theory building and hence myopic interpretation of history, especially in the context of scientific discovery and the nature of scientific fact and laws, would be well-advised to look elsewhere.This book is a humorous, multi-sided and relentless attack on accepted notions and interpretations of consistency and progress, achieved through a single method (such as rationality or logic), in the area of human knowledge. Feyerabend denies method supremacy over contextual and meaning rich subjective thinking, and marshals the facts of history to establish the lack of any single method or well-defined body (such as science) in the growth of human knowledge. What Howard Zinn did to conventional history with "A People's History of the United States", Feyerabend here accomplishes with regards to the history of science and rationalism. In doing so, he opens the door not for sloppy thinking, but for colorful and context rich thought and expression.
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