Lakatos’s Theory and the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Programme; The Conceptual Adequacy of Lakatos’s Theory

Abstract

In this chapter and the next one the central question will be how good Lakatos’s theory, or model, of scientific development complies with the actual development of nuclear magnetic resonance. In view of chapter I, where a number of other such theories were discussed as well, one might wonder why the present emphasis is so much on Lakatos’s theory. There are two reasons for this. Firstly, comparing theory with experiment — that is, case study — in my conception is an ongoing, “dialectical” process where the results obtained on the experimental side (i.e., in the description of the case) are immediately assimilated on the theoretical side, leading to corrections, clarifications, refinements, etc. of the theory, and these results in turn are being used in the further description of the case. From this it seems advisable to concentrate on one theory while leaving the comparison with other theories more implicit in the analysis. For otherwise the structure of the analysis would threaten to become too complicated, c.q. the task to be performed unmanageable. (Usually it will not be too difficult to obtain, from the explicit comparison of the case study with one theory, conclusions concerning other theories.) Secondly, having decided to concentrate on one theory, the obvious choice is Lakatos’s theory rather than, e.g., Kuhn’s or Laudan’s.