Raymond Williams - Marxist Cultural Theory - Base and Superstructure
doesn't seem to leave much room for the feedback loop does it?
Kuhn's paradigm seems to the base and the period of normal science, the puzzles to solve, the scientific education superstructure. But scientific paradigms aren't the only paradigms. (Well, maybe to Kuhn they are.) But what about metaphysical frameworks, cultural movements, etc? All based on the gestalt switch of a scientist who brainbends a world of scientists? Or scientists can be influenced by these extra-scientific movements? This is where the science<-->culture feedback loops seems to make more sense to me. Base and superstructure turned on its side.
Scientific paradigms not only sources of "base" influence. Technological developments that extend our capabilities in ways not intended by the scientific paradigm can change the fabric of society. For example, the scientific paradigm that contributed to the internal combustion engine may have no mediated connection to the cultural value of mobility or a smaller world, but the implications of the automobile brought it about. However, did the science come before the engineering in the case of the internal combustion engine? What was that in STS101 that claimed that engineering often precedes the science? In which case social values define problems which are solved by engineers which lead to research programmes which normal science seeks to fulfill. Where does the revolution fit in there?
Engines --> cars, trains --> age of industry, modernism, futurism --> colonialism, domination --> clocks --> relativity --> downfall of colonialism?
eeenteresting.
