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Asia-Pacific
Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 6, Issue 2, Article
1
(Dec., 2005) Shu-Chiu LIU From geocentric to heliocentric model of the universe, and the alternative perspectives
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Asia-Pacific
Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 6, Issue 2, Article
1
(Dec., 2005) Shu-Chiu LIU From geocentric to heliocentric model of the universe, and the alternative perspectives
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Conveying the Structural View of Nature
Liu's study revealed that the students who did not take for granted the necessity to physically reason the astronomical phenomena consequently presented more primitive (or more descriptive) models than the others. This is to some extent similar to the fundamental difference between the perspectives of early Chinese and European scientists and the sciences they accordingly demonstrated: the former devalued reasoning in their scientific enquiry while the latter gave much importance to it. It is argued that this is closely associated with a "structural view of nature" (logically coherent theories) that determines scientific progress.
A structural view of nature was claimed to be the driving force, by which European astronomy was moving towards a more coherent view, and in contrast, in absence of this view the early Chinese astronomers failed to progress their models. Without a structural view of nature, natural phenomena cannot be regulated into a whole and all bits in scientific theories cannot be summed up into certain rules or fundamental hypotheses, from which one can make logically consistent deductions by means of formal logic. To point it out again, what is essential to establishing such a structural view of nature is the why-question - If one only seeks to describe, not to explain causally, the physical world, the accordingly constructed theories or models would not exhibit logical, causal interrelations.
Thus, the contrasting views on "reasoning" from the early Europeans and Chinese can be helpful in assisting students in forming a structural view of nature. The ancient Chinese astronomers, unlike their Greek counterpart, did not give emphasis to efforts on regulating celestial phenomena, despite a different perspective they provide, and consequently on testing the derived regularities. As a consequence, their models of the heavens and earth were prevailing without significant improvement for about two millenniums until the Western scientific concepts became known in the seventeenth century. This aspect indicates how significant it is to establish a structural view of nature and an understanding of the function of experiment in scientific theory (for reasoning) that should have much implication to students' conceptual development.
Apart from the Chinese historical models, the Copernican Revolution can serve as another example to teach about this, as Copernicus was the first in written history to single out the form of a theory, and to argue for a systematic, harmonic, and logically coherent astronomy. He criticized Ptolemaic astronomy as being "fundamentally hypothetical" within which everything is isolated and independent and thus can be freely changed whenever a need emerges. This historical chapter can not only tell students something about the nature of science but also help them reflect upon their own views in terms of structure.
Copyright (C) 2005 HKIEd APFSLT. Volume 6, Issue 2, Article 1 (Dec., 2005). All Rights Reserved.
