Positivism Theory

Positivism Theory

Introduction

Positivism refers to the philosophical theory that maintains that certain or positive knowledge tends to be founded on the natural phenomena along with their relations and attributes. That is, the knowledge gained from the sensory experiences, and after that interpreted using logic and reason, always forms every certain knowledge’s exclusive source.  Positivism, therefore, maintains that legitimate knowledge, which is either truth or certitude, can only be found in the posterior knowledge (Green, 2017). Given that positive facts or verified data obtained from such senses are referred to as the empirical evidence, and this leads to the observation that positives theory is mainly founded on empiricism.

Further, positivism theory also maintains that the society, in a manner comparable to the physical world, operates as per the general laws. The intuitive and introspective knowledge cast off, similar to theology and metaphysics given that the theological and metaphysical claims are unverifiable through experience. In spite of the positivist approach being amongst the recurrent themes in relation to the western thought history, the approach’s contemporary sense was initially formulated in early 19^th century by Auguste Comte. In his formulation, Comte presented the argument that even as the world ( physical) was operating as per gravity along with other supreme laws, so was the society, in addition to going further by developing positivism into a human religion (Green, 2017). This paper has, therefore, been written with the objective of analyzing the theory of positivism.

Discussion

According to Morgenthau (2017), a number of researchers have acknowledged that it is very challenging to explain the positivism research philosophy and theory in a succinct and precise manner. This is as a result of the observation that immense differences exist in the settings under which positivism is employed by different researchers. Moreover, the amount of variations with regards to the clarification of positivism is prone to be equivalent to the number of researchers tackling the research philosophy area (Campbell, 2016). However, in its fundamental nature, positivism is mainly founded on the conception that science remain to be the only means of learning about truth. An in-depth review of the theory of positivism is, therefore, presented as follows.

As one of the notable philosophies, positivism tends to conform to the observation that only the authentic knowledge that has been acquired through observation (senses), and that includes measurement, is considered as trustworthy. As such, in positivism researches, the researchers’ roles are restricted to data gathering and interpretation in a manner that is objective. Thus, in such kinds of researches, the findings are normally quantifiable and observable. Positivism is reliant on the observations that are quantifiable and are capable of leading to statistical analyses. According to Campbell (2016), it has been acknowledged that “being a philosophy, positivism has always been consistent with the empiricist perspective that knowledge mainly arises from the human experience. In this regard, it can be observed as having an atomistic and ontological perspective of the globe as being made up of discrete, events and observable elements that interrelate within a manner that is observable, regular and determined.

Furthermore, in the positivism based researches, the researcher is always independent from the research and the provisions for the various human interests in the research are not offered. Bix (2017) asserts that, being a rule of the thumb, the positivist researches normally take on deductive approaches, even as the increasingly inductive research approach has often been linked to the phenomenology philosophy. Furthermore, positivism is linked to the observation that the researchers need to focus on the facts even as phenomenology focuses on the implications while also having the provision for human interests. Nevertheless, the researchers have warned that in casa an individual takes on a positivist approach to his or her research, then it is his or her belief that he/she is independent of the study and that the study may be purely objective. In such instances, independent implies that the researcher maintains minimal or reduced levels of interactions with the study participants in the course of carrying out the study. That is to say, the researches that take on the positivist paradigm are mainly founded on facts and also regard the world to be objective and external (Morgenthau, 2017).

In order to effectively review the theory of positivism, one is required to look into the aspects of positivists and antecedents. Thus, regarding the antecedents, it can be noted that positivism forms an integral part of the increasingly general primeval quarrel that existed between poetry and philosophy, and which Plato had been remarkably laid out and after that reformulated as an extant quarrel between humanities and sciences. Plato elaborated a poetry critique from the philosophy perspective in his dialogues. On the other hand, Wilhelm Dilthey is known to have popularized the difference between the natural sciences and humanities. Further, the observation that the various physics’ laws might be relative as opposed to absolute might be increasingly true with regards to the social sciences was made in 17256 and in divergent terms Vico. In contradiction to the positivist movement, Vico noted that the human mind (humanity) science superiority came as a result of the view that the natural sciences did not tell anything with regards to the inner aspects of things.

Consequently, concerning the positivists, it can be observed that positivism maintains that all genuine knowledge enables the authentication, as well as that all valid knowledge presumes that it is only scientific knowledge that is valid. Thinkers that include Pierre-Simon Laplace, Auguste Comte and Henri de Saint-Simon held the conviction that scientific method, in addition to the circular reliance of observation and theory has to substitute metaphysics in thought history.  The sociological positivism was also reformulated by Émile Durkheim as the social research foundation. On the contrary, Wilhelm Dilthey is known to have fought doggedly against the supposition that only the clarifications that had been derived from science were authentic. Dilthey also reprised Vico’s argument that the scientific clarifications could not reach the phenomena’s inner nature and that it is only the humanistic knowledge that could offer humans the required insight into feelings, desires and thoughts. Dilthey’s views were partially influenced by Leopold von Ranke’s historicism.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, varied reasons have been offered by researchers for supporting positivism theory including the observation that its features including prediction, generalizability, parsimony, reliability and validity aid the researcher in conducting studies that are general and not particular, thereby enabling universal application. Moreover, the research paradigm is widely used on the basis that by being epistemologically empirical, positivism proffers the opportunity for forecasting. Moreover, dissimilar to the interpretivists, the positivism research paradigm is regarded as being objective and transparent from the individual prejudice. As such, an individual may be a realist ontologically and still count on positivism for long for being reliable and valid.

Nevertheless, as an epistemology, positivism has been linked to a number of disadvantages. These include the observation that positivism is increasingly reliant on experience as knowledge’s valid source. Nonetheless, a broader array of important and fundamental concepts including space, time and cause are not experience founded. Moreover, positivism tends to assume that every kind of procedure may be viewed as a specific variation of an action of either relations between persons or individuals. The other disadvantage is that the taking on of positivism in research may be criticised for increased dependence on the status quo. Thus, in positivism researches, the research findings tend to be descriptive and id devoid of insight into in-depth matters.

References

Bix, B. (2017). On the dividing line between natural law theory and legal positivism. In Law and             Morality (pp. 49-60). Routledge.

Campbell, T. D. (2016). The legal theory of ethical positivism. Routledge.

Green, T. L. (2017). From positivism to critical theory: school-community relations toward            community equity literacy. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education,    30(4), 370-387.

Morgenthau, H. J. (2017). Positivism, functionalism, and international law. In The Nature of         International Law (pp. 159-184). Routledge.