The teaching of science and the anarchist epistemological teacher

Abstract

All the philosophies of science contain pedagogical implications of importance for the methods of science teaching. The science teacher who is a follower of the epistemological anarchism proposed by Paul Karl Feyerabend also will adopt their own strategies. Firstly, we turn to the precept that the students decisions should be their own (that each one should develop as they are able and wish to); they will abdicate, then, from a position of imposing the scientific view on the students. They will present science as being formed by a community in which opposing ideas are discussed and in which adherence to one of these ideas results from becoming convinced, after a free examination of the proposals presented. The anarchist science teacher sees it as a priority to convince the students to adhere to scientific thought and not to convert them to science by force. Each scientific question raised by the anarchist teacher should invite the students to reflect and to take a voluntary decision.