Ana Teixeira de Melo
The world as we experience it, and particularly the social world, is constructed and portrayed in increasingly complex ways. The terrains of science are changing, in a close relationship with changes in the social world and dominant worldviews. The social world is assumed as complex, dynamical, governed by non-linear reciprocal causal processes and as showing unexpected and emergent properties. In parallel, there are richer and wider sources and varieties of information and more fluid definitions of what constitutes relevant data. New approaches to data exploration emerge and the boundaries between disciplines are progressively more fluid and flexible. The increasing dialogues between disciplines build patterns that bridge them. All these transformations invite scientists in general and social scientists in particular, to revise the internal organization and the predominant modes of operation of ‘this thing we call science’ (Chalmers 1982).
An increasingly complex world can only be understood and rendered manageable by an increasingly complex science. The complex is about particular organizations of relationships sustaining emergent phenomena. The question to be posed is: how can science organize its internal (and external) relationships so it can promote its own development through meaningful discoveries, propelled by doubt, uncertainty, novelty and surprise, as core ingredients of great scientific leaps?
The recursive nature of complex systems must be embraced by a complex science, capable of organizing its internal relationships to maximize its generative and creative potential. This includes understanding and exploring the nature of the interactions between different scientific disciplines and specific fields of inquiry, as well as the relationships between the methods and concepts within and between disciplines. A complex world is a dynamic, synergetic, creative world, supported by the non-linear nature of the interactions of its elements or components. So, should a complex science organize itself so that from its elements rich synergies can be created that surpass the capacities of the individual elements? The nature of the practices of relating concepts and methods within and between disciplines is constrained by modes of thinking, the researcher’s preferred stances towards science itself as well as the practices and methods of enacting research and communicating its outcomes.
In the following sections, we explore abducting, considering it as meta-methodological practice and core integrated competency for twenty-first-century researchers, aiming to promote true scientific advance. We assume a multifaceted view of abducting as a foundational meta-practice for the enactment of an integrative science, which includes:
We will explore ways abducting can be used as an interdisciplinary-focused form of reasoning, when the researcher cultivates an inquisitive open mind-set and engages in rich interdisciplinary practices of relating that promote creativity and an expansion of each field through synergetic interactions.
Abduction was explored by Charles Peirce as a type of ampliative inference, where novel hypotheses are elaborated to explain surprising or unexpected facts. Peirce presented basic abductive inferences and other more extreme varieties of abduction in following the forms (CP 6.522–8, in Buchler 2014):
A surprising fact C is observed, But if A were true, C would be a matter of course Hence, there is reason to suspect that A is true.
CP 5.189
A well-recognized kind of object M1, has for its ordinary predicates P1, P2, P3 etc., indistinctly recognized. The suggesting object, S, has these same predicates P1, P2, P3 Hence, S of the kind M.
CP 5.542, 544–5 and James 1903, in Buchler 2014
M has, for example, the numerous marks P', P'', P''', etc., S has the proportion r of the marks P', P'', P''', etc. Hence, probably, and approximately, S has an r-likeness to M.
CP, 2.694–7, in Buchler 1955
In these forms of abduction, Peirce explores the nature of a given phenomenon by appealing to a novel principle that explains the differences and similarities between objects of attention.
Rozeboom (1997) supported Peirce’s assertions regarding the abductive nature of true science. He talked about explanatory or ontological induction. In these forms of reasoning, in ways similar to abduction, inferences are made ‘from observed patterns of data to the existence of theoretical entities . .. that could explain why the data are patterned’ (Aogáin 2013). Peirce kept abductive reasoning close to data, but also attributed an important role to surprise (CP 7.202, in Fann 1970; Nubiola 2005). We believe abduction can be used more strategically and purposefully, attending also to the insufficiently explained, aiming to refine existing theories. Peirce suggested abduction as much as a process of attaining a hypothesis as the process of evaluating it (CP 5.171, 8.398, in Fann 1970). Abduction initiates a research cycle setting the stage for a sequence of inquiry where deduction and induction also play important roles (CP 15–59, in Fann 1970; CP 6.522–8, in Buchler 2014).
That said, abduction should be used strategically, as a goal-directed activity underlying the logic of discovery (Paavola 2004). As a set of strategies, and the practice of an attitude, abducting may be about activating or enhancing a creative potential (Gonzalez 2005), the ‘flash of new suggestion’ (CP 5.181, in Nubiola 2005), through available methods of data creation, collection, sense making and interpretation (Reichertz 2004; Timmermans and Tavory 2012). The nature of the relations between disciplines and fields can set more or less adequate stages for interdisciplinary abducting and creative enterprises.
Abducting is considered, in this essay, as a meta-practice, a meta-method composed of different dimensions. It is essentially about the enactment of a set of practices of relating that we consider essential for the practice of a complex science such as:
There is an underexplored potential for innovation and discovery lying between disciplines, that relies on the nature of their interactions (mediated, of course, by the interaction between the individual person of the researcher and collectivities of researchers), namely between their concepts and methods.
Interdisciplinary relationships may become strategies of abduction when:
Some forms of reasoning become strategies guiding a given type of relationship while eliciting and supporting an emergent hypothesis. Below, we present proposals for supporting interdisciplinary abductive reasoning, where A and B are different disciplines or fields of research.
A and B are similar but different.
If P were true,
Then both their differences and similarities would be a matter of fact,
Since they would share Pc(common principle),
while differing in PA(specific principle for A) and PB (specific principle for B)
The well-recognized phenomenon A shows the complex features/underlying processes C1' C2, C3, Ci.
The phenomenon B shows these features/processes appearing in similar form C1' C2, C3, Ci, with the differences in the form of C'1' C'2, C'3, C'i.
B seems of the kind of A in regard to X,
And of a different kind of A in regard to Y.
But ifW(underlying processes/patterns that connect) were true
The differences and similarities would be a matter of course
A and B are similar and different
Aconcepts (Ac) describe/explain A, and Amethods (Am) have been used
Bconcepts (Bc) describe/explain B, and Bmethods (Bm) have been used.
Given the differences between A and B,
For Bconcepts AND/OR Bmethods to provide meaningful insights regarding A,
Would not be surprising if
Bconcepts → (map/translate into) Aconcepts AND/OR Bmethods → (map/translate in X way into) Amethods'
OR Bconcepts → (translate into/inform) Amethods AND/OR Bmethods (translate into/inform) → Aconcepts'
On the account of X(underlying processes or patterns that connect)
Different disciplines might cooperate on constructing and cultivating these and other new ways of interdisciplinary relational forms of abducting.
An integrative interdisciplinary relational practice of abducting might assist social sciences in increasing their own complexity and, with that, the possibilities of making more meaningful and pragmatically useful contributions for the construction, understanding and management of a world, where possibilities for positive action abound.
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Buchler, J. (Ed.) (2014). The Philosophical Writings of Peirce [originally published 1940]. New York: Dover Publications, Inc.
Chalmers, A. F. (1982). What Is This Thing Called Science? (2nd ed.). Buckingham: Open University Press.
Fann, K. T. (1970). Peirce’s Theory of Abduction. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.
Gonzalez, M. E. Q. (2005). Creativity: surprise and abductive reasoning. Semiotica, 153(1/4): 325–341.
Nubiola, J. (2005). Abduction or the logic of surprise. Semiotica, 153(1/4): 117–130.
Paavola, S. (2004). Abduction as a logic of discovery: the importance of strategies. Foundations of Science, 9(3): 267–283.
Reichertz, J. (2004). Abduction, deduction and induction in qualitative research. In U. Flick et al. (Eds.) A Companion to Qualitative Research (pp. 159–165). London: Sage.
Rozeboom, W. T. (1997). Good science is abductive, not hypothetico-deductive. First published in L. Harlow, S. A. Mulaik and J. H. Steiger (Eds.) What If There Were No Significance Tests? (pp. 366–391). New Jersey: Erlbaum.
Timmermans, S. and Tavory, I. (2012). Theory construction in qualitative research: from grounded theory to abductive analysis. Sociological Theory, 30: 167–186.