Summary
Contents
Subject index
This unique addition to reference literature provides an introduction to the major concepts and contemporary issues that are essential for students of environmental science and environmental studies to know. With over 200 entries authored by world-class names like Anthony Brazel, John Day and Edward Keller, this text is divided into six sections: Environmental Science, Environments, Paradigms & Concepts, Processes & Dynamics, Scales & Techniques, and Environmental Issues.
Paradigms
Paradigms
A paradigm is a philosophical and theoretical framework of a scientific school or discipline in which theories, laws, and generalizations and the experiments performed in support of them are formulated. Thomas Kuhn (1922–1996), a philosopher of science, presented the word ‘Paradigms’ in the sense of its modern meaning when he referred to the set of practices that define a scientific discipline during a particular period of time. However, in his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions Kuhn defines a scientific paradigm as that which is observed and scrutinized and the sort of questions that are supposed to be asked and answered in relation to a subject, how these questions are to be structured, and how the results of scientific investigations should be interpreted. An additional ...
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