---
title: "Against Method"
chunk: 4/5
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Method"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:36:11.863288+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

=== Discovery/justification distinction ===
Herbert Feigl criticizes Feyerabend's earlier work, including the paper edition of Against Method, for conflating the distinction between the context of discovery and the context of justification. According to this distinction, formulated by Hans Reichenbach and Karl Popper, there is no logic about how scientists develop scientific theories but there should be a logic of confirming or disconfirming scientific theories. Once this distinction is accepted, then Feyerabend's claim that 'anything goes' would be a truism and would not run against logical empiricism. Feyerabend's response in Against Method is to reject the validity of the discovery/justification distinction. He argues that while the distinction can be maintained abstractly, it does not find a "point of attack" in scientific practice. This is because the two contexts are not separated in different phases of scientific research but are always comingled. Discounting evidence, for example is often necessary for scientific discovery but is rejected when seeking justification. Justifying scientific theories has implications for what research is conducted and, therefore, questions about what is justified also affects the paths open to discovery.

=== Criticism of Lakatos ===
The first edition of Against Method contains a chapter devoted to critically discussing Lakatos' methodology of research programs, although this chapter was removed in subsequent editions. Feyerabend offers several criticisms. Lakatos claims that research programs should be permitted 'breathing space' where research programs are allowed to be pursued regardless of their lack of empirical content, internal inconsistency, or conflicts with experimental results. Feyerabend agrees with this claim but argues that applying it consistently entails that we cannot cease the pursuit of research programs after they have been degenerating (i.e., becoming increasingly ad hoc) (regardless of how long they've been degenerating for). Feyerabend uses the example of Boltzmann's atomism as a theory that was degenerating in the 19th century as a result of the Zermelo-Poincaré recurrence objection and Loschmidt’s reversibility objection but was then vindicated in the early 20th century with Einstein's development of statistical mechanics to illustrate this point. Because of this, Feyerabend claims that although Lakatos insists that he has provided rational rules for the elimination of research programs, these rules are empty because they do not forbid any kind of behavior. Therefore, Lakatos is an 'anarchist in disguise' since it provides methodological rules that do not need to be followed.
Feyerabend provides a second criticism that ends with the same conclusion. According to Lakatos, his theory of scientific rationality only contains heuristics for its implementation rather than direct advice. Because of this, Lakatos' theory on its own provides no advice and the specific advice follows from considerations of concrete research practices. His third criticism concerns Lakatos' argument that theories of rationality should be tested against the value judgments of the 'scientific elite' in specific historical episodes. First, Feyerabend claims that the value judgments of the scientific elite are rarely uniform and so they will not uniquely choose a particular theory of scientific rationality. Second, the value judgments of scientific elites are often made on the basis of ignorance. Therefore, there seem to be strong reasons to not accept those value judgments. Third, Lakatos assumes that the standards of the scientific elite are superior to other value judgments (e.g., of witches) and therefore does not provide an argument against relativism. Finally, Feyerabend provides a 'cosmological' criticism of Lakatos' theory of rationality. Lakatos claims that theories of scientific rationality reconstruct the 'internal' growth of knowledge and ignore the 'external' (e.g., sociological, psychological, political) features of scientific practice. However, without knowledge of the external features of scientific practice, Feyerabend claims that we cannot know whether a theory of scientific rationality will actually succeed in practice.

=== Scientific education ===
Feyerabend provides numerous criticisms of scientific education in his time. He claims that the primary role of education was to stunt individual creativity by forcing them to accept and research on topics that students did not choose for themselves. He also claims that education is responsible for what he calls "intellectual pollution" where "illiterate and incompetent books flood the market, empty verbiage full of strange and esoteric terms claims to express profound insights, 'experts' without brains, without character, and without even a modicum of intellectual, stylistic, emotional temperament tell us about our 'condition' and the means of improving it." He distinguishes between a general education, which is focused on the development of free individuals, and professionalization where one learns the ideology of a specific trade. In a general education, pupils are introduced to many intellectual and cultural traditions which they then engage with critically to make free choices about how they want to live their lives. Professionalization, by contrast, introduces pupils to a single tradition and often involves teaching this tradition as epistemically superior to its rivals. Feyerabend claims that increasing pushes for professionalization were coming at the expense of a general education. Feyerabend criticizes this on ethical grounds, as it reduces students to intellectual slaves, and on the grounds that a general education is more conductive to the development of knowledge.

== Scholarly reception ==
The immediate reaction to Against Method was largely negative amongst philosophers of science, with a few notable exceptions. Most of the commentary focused on Feyerabend's philosophical arguments rather than the Galileo case study. The primary criticisms were that epistemological anarchism is nothing but a repetition of Pyrrhonian skepticism or relativism, that Feyerabend is inconsistent with himself by arguing against method while arguing for methods (like counterinduction), and that he criticizes a strawman. One positive review came from Arne Naess, who had sympathies for epistemological anarchism.
Despite this, Against Method has remained one of the classic texts of 20th century philosophy of science and has been influential on subsequent philosophers of science (especially the Stanford School).