出版社：Department of Linguistics, University of Toronto
摘要：Originally published in Glot International 2,1/2, page 8, January/February 1996. Why do some scientific theories gain adherents while others do not? And why do new theories arise when they do, and not at another time? The simple answer—that the successful theories are true, and they arise when the truth is recognized—cannot be sufficient, for two reasons. First, nobody knows at the outset whether a theory is true or not; and second, no theory has yet turned out to be true. Therefore, there must be other factors which account for the rise of a new theory or paradigm. Thomas Kuhn has observed that the “logical history” of a field—the way it is presented in textbooks—represents an idealized version, formulated after the fact, of the actual history. At the very early stages of a new theory, it is quite likely that even many of its adherents cannot articulate exactly what it is that appeals to them about the theory, or why they think that it is the right way to go. “It’s kind of neat” is often enough of a reason at first.
