Is consensus generalizable? A study of Chinese science teacher educators’ views of nature of science content to be taught

It was found that a total of twenty NOS elements were included by Chinese science teacher educators in their NOS content to be taught. Among them, five were suggested by more than a half of the educators, which consists of (i) empirical basis of scientific investigation, (ii) logics in scientific investigation, (iii) progressive nature of scientific knowledge, (iv) realist views of mind and natural world, and (v) general process of scientific investigation. This paper focuses on elaborating these five NOS elements.

Table 3. NOS elements suggested by Chinese science teacher educators as NOS content to be taught to prospective science teachers

NOS elements	Frequency (N=24)
Scientific investigation
Empirical basis of scientific investigation	20
Logics in scientific investigation	15
General process of scientific investigation	12
Theory-laden nature of observation	8
No single scientific method	6
Replicable nature of empirical evidence	6
Imagination in scientific investigation	6
Science as the pursuit of truth	3
Scientific knowledge
Progressive nature of scientific knowledge	14
Truth-approaching nature of scientific knowledge	8
Inferential nature of scientific knowledge	8
Tentative nature of scientific knowledge	6
Testable nature of scientific knowledge	4
Scientific enterprise
Social and cultural influence on science	10
Understanding of scientific community	9
Bilateral influence of science on the society	6
Relationship between science and technology	3
No existence of the stereotype image of scientists	2
Scientific worldview and ethos
Realist views of mind and natural world	13
Scientific ethos	10

Empirical basis of scientific investigation

The empirical basis of scientific investigation emphasizes the role played by observation and experiment in the process of scientific investigation. It has been explicitly stated as one of the NOS elements in almost all curriculum documents of science education in the Western (e.g. AAAS, 1990b; AEC, 1994; CMEC, 1997; EDE, 1995; NRC, 1996)³ and most academic publications on NOS studies (e.g. Lederman et al., 2002; Rubba & Anderson, 1978). It was included as the NOS elements to be taught by 20 Chinese science teacher educators in the present study. As described by a biology teacher educator, “empirical method is one of major features of scientific investigation since whether the results or arguments in science will be accepted or not will depend on the result of testing through observation or experiment” (STE13 GI p.3)⁴. The origin of the empirical nature of scientific investigation can be traced back to the empiricism in the philosophy of science. In the philosophy of science, there are two types of empiricism in the philosophy of science, i.e., inductive-empiricism and deductive-empiricism. Despite the controversies between these two types of empiricism on the exact role played by the observation and experiments in the process of scientific investigation, all of them share the commonality of emphasizing the crucial role of human senses in the generation of scientific knowledge. Such an argument was clearly reflected in the educators’ descriptions on empirical basis of scientific investigation introduced above.

Logics in scientific investigation

Logics in the scientific investigation are not a very common NOS element found in recent academic publications on NOS studies (e.g. Dawkins & Glatthorn, 1998; Lin & Chen, 2002; Palmquist & Finley, 1997). The logics in scientific investigation were considered by 15 Chinese science educators in the present study as an NOS element. As depicted by a chemistry teacher educator,

Induction and deduction are important logical methods in scientific investigation. Deduction is from the general theory or concepts to the specific conclusion or facts…On the contrary, induction is the reasoning from the specific conclusion or facts to the general theory or concepts…I feel human understanding of the world is an endless process from the specific to the general, and then to higher level of the specific. It is a spiral process. (STE18 GI p.6)

Just relying on the empirical data cannot give a full explanation of the development of the scientific knowledge. In order to establish the validity of the scientific knowledge, it is necessary to provide a method to bridge between empirical data and scientific knowledge. The empiricist philosophers of science suggested that logics would serve such a purpose. Therefore, logics in the scientific investigation are an empiricist NOS element.

General process of scientific investigation

General process of scientific investigation (sometimes called scientific process or method) and NOS are two interwoven concepts. In the very early report by American Central Association of Science and Mathematics (1907), understanding NOS is equivalent to understanding “the Scientific Method” which is termed as the scientific process later. However, in recent decades, these two concepts start to be differentiated. As suggested by Lederman et al. (2002), “we considered scientific processes to be activities related to the collection and interpretation of data, and the derivations of conclusions. NOS, by comparison, is concerned with the values and epistemological assumptions underlying these activities” (Lederman et al., 2002, p.499). Hence, they think that we should only consider the understandings about such process (like the lack of a universal recipe-like method for doing science) as NOS element, rather than the scientific processes themselves. In the present study, 12 educators included general process of scientific investigation into their NOS content to be taught. The following excerpt is an example of the description of this element, which was provided by a physics teacher educator.

I feel from a holistic perspective, there are some common points in scientific investigation…There are some general elements, like raising a question, posing some hypotheses, testing such hypotheses or arguments through observation or experiment, drawing some conclusions and communicating such conclusion so as to let people accept the conclusions…All these elements are the general features of scientific investigation. (STE9 GI p.5)

The discussion on general process or method of science can find its origin in the philosophy of science. In the history of philosophy of science, both inductive-empiricists and deductive-empiricists attempt to provide a scientific method. For inductive empiricists like Francis Bacon (1562-1626), the scientific method generally consists of four steps: observation and experimentation; classification; generalization; testing. But deductive-empiricists like Karl Poppers (1902-1994), one of the leading philosophers of science of the 20th century, think that the kind of empiricism advocated by Bacon and Mill is naive. For them, induction plays no part in science. The only logic that science requires is deductive logic. Regardless of their differences in the specific steps included in the process of scientific investigation, the inductive-empiricists and deductive-empiricists are common in believing that there is a general method in science. Clearly, the general process of scientific investigation is another empiricism NOS element.

Progressive nature of scientific knowledge

Tentativeness and progressiveness are related but different. Both imply change. For the tentativeness it is unknown whether such change is positive or accumulative while the progressiveness means so. Although the tentative nature of the scientific knowledge is one of the most commonly found NOS elements in the curriculum documents (e.g. AAAS, 1990b; AEC, 1994; CMEC, 1997; EDE, 1995; NRC, 1996) and academic publications on NOS studies (e.g. Abd-El-Khalick, 2005; Clough, 1998; Lin & Chen, 2002; Palmquist & Finley, 1997), it is not very common to find the progressive nature of scientific knowledge in such. It was found that more than half (14) Chinese educators in this study included this element as one of their NOS content to be taught. As stated by a biology teacher educator, “another feature of science is its accumulation...With accumulation of its empirical evidence, scientific knowledge make its progress” (STE10 SI p.4)⁵. The development of scientific knowledge as an accumulative or a progressive process is a typical points originating in empiricist philosophy of science. The empiricists conceive the development of science as a process that the replaced theories are reduced (and thus absorbed) into the replacing theory. They, for instance, take Newton’s theory as being reduced to Einstein’s theory. Based on such kind of understanding, the development of scientific knowledge is considered as cumulative and continuous. In contrast with the understanding of the development of scientific knowledge as a process of replacement and absorption, it was thought by Kuhn (1970) that scientific revolutions also exist in the development of scientific knowledge, during which a process of replacement and displacement happens, rather than replacement and absorption. In this sense, the development of scientific knowledge cannot be considered just as being accumulative. Clearly, the argument of progressive nature of scientific knowledge belongs to the former views, i.e. the empiricist one.

Realist views of mind and natural world

As explained in Science for All American (AAAS, 1990b), scientific worldviews have to do with the scientists’ beliefs about mind and world. More specifically, it includes the following statements.

The world is understandable…Science presumes that the things and events in the universe occur in consistent patterns that are comprehensible through careful, systematic study. Scientists believe that through the use of the intellect, and with the aid of instruments that extend the sense, people can discover patterns in all of nature. … Scientist also assumes that the universe is, as its name implies, a vast single system in which the basic rules are everywhere the same. Knowledge gained from studying one part of the universe is applicable to the parts (AAAS, 1990b, p.2).

These statements are very elaborate arguments of realist views. In addition, two papers on NOS studies also state it under the name of assumption of science (e.g. Billeh & Hasan, 1975; Welch & Walberg, 1967-68). As indicated in the data, 13 Chinese science educators also included some elaborated realist statements into scientific worldviews, and considered them as NOS element. This elements was delineated by a physics teacher educator,

Science is to understand the world, to investigate what the world really is, how the matter in the world motions and changes ... To conduct such kind of investigation, we must be guided by some basic understandings of the world, like that the world is material, all matter in the world are connected, such connection are universal, matter are motioning, there are rules underlying such motion, and all these connection and rules are knowable to human being. (STE9 GI p.3)

Although there may exist minor difference between the wording in the above excerpts and the Benchmark, they both included several core elaborate realist statements: (a) the existence of an external world that is independent of the observer; (b) the universality and constancy of connection in the world; (c) the possibility of our mind to know the external world and connections within it. These three statements are the prerequisites to arrive at the final and core argument of realism, i.e. the existence of the corresponding relationship between scientific knowledge and natural world. Without the existence of an independent material world, it is meaningless to discuss the relationship between scientific knowledge and natural world. The major form of the scientific knowledge is the universal and constant connection between variables, so if it is believed that there is no such universal and constant connection existing in the real world, the natural conclusion will be that such corresponding relationship cannot possibly exist between scientific knowledge and natural world. Even with the conditions of (a) and (b), if we do not admit that we can, through the use of the intellect and with the aid of instruments that extend the sense, discover such connection in the world, such a corresponding relationship is still problematic. On the basis of above explanation, we can find the crucial role played by these three statements in realist belief system.