Main trends of research in the social and human ... - unesdoc - Unesco

The place of the sciences of man in the system of sciences 43
that branch styled the sociology of knowledge. W e cannot therefore dissociate
logic from the sciences of man, since the logic of the logician constitutes a
formalized and highly enriched extension of the logic behind the subject’s
activities. This human aspect of the structural and operational sources of logic
is indeed so deep that it can now we traced back, beyond general and even
sensory-motor co-ordination which provokes action, to nervous co-ordination.
McCulloch and Pitts have pointed to the isomorphism that exists between
operative structures intervening in various forms of neuronic connexions and
the operative factors of propositional logic (Boolean system), and this important
discovery indicates that if logical complexes are the result of progressive struc-
turing, reorganized and reinforced from one level to another up to the stage of
formalization itself, these structures, although not predetermined but gradually
developed, can be traced back to nervous and sensory-motor acts of co-ordina-
tion.
In short, logic belongs to both the exact and natural sciences and to the
sciences of man, and provides links between them all which defy linear classifi-
cation. But if this is accepted, it must be admitted that the same applies to the
scientific forms of epistemology itself. Epistemology has classically been consi-
dered as a branch of philosophy, but two new kinds of facts today indicate
trends towards autonomy similar to those which marked the gradual achieve-
ment of autonomy by psychology, sociology and logic.
The first range of new facts is that the epistemology of each of the advanced
sciences is the fruit of research carried out by its own specialists. The problems
of the bases of mathematics, for instance, are increasingly dealt with by mathe-
maticians themselves, taking account of mainly logical, but also frequently of
historical and strictly psychological considerations (Poincark, Brouwer, Enri-
ques, Gonseth). The epistemological theory of physical experience, particularly
since the revolutionary onset of microphysics, is elaborated by practising physi-
cists. In biology an attempt at epistemological formulation by L. von Berta-
lanffy resulted in a movement known as the ‘general theory of systems’, which
endeavours to single out the epistemic mechanisms common to the various
disciplines involved; including psychology, etc.
The second series of facts is that certain methods of approach in epistem-
ological research are orientated towards the study of development. Theorists
of knowledge have long since realized that the historical analysis of the forma-
tion of ideas and methods, known as the ‘historico-critical method’, throws
light on the mechanisms of scientific knowledge. Studies such as those of A.
Koyrk or T. S. Kuhn, for instance, are extremely instructive from the point of
view of the epistemology of physics and chemistry, and a study of the history of
mathematics led L. Brunschvicg and P. Boutroux to carry out searching epistem-
ological analyses. But history does not give us all the answers, and beneath or
beyond the historical plane there are psycho-genesis and socio-genesis. T. S.
Kuhn himself, for instance, refers explicitly to my research on the child as if it
was what Brunschvicg had already done, thus showing that when the historian
acts as an epistemologist, or vice versa, he could benefit from a knowledge of
psychology.