Roy Bhaskars Theory of Critical Realism

Roy Bhaskars Theory of Critical Realism How to Change Reality: Story vs. Structure Debate between Rom Harre and Roy Bhaskar Roy Bhaskar (15 May 1944 19 November 2014) was a British philosopher, renowned as the initiator of the philosophical movement of Critical Realism. He was a World Scholar at the Institute of Education, University College London. Critical Realism (CR) is an integrative metatheory founded in the 1970s by Roy Bhaskar with the publication of seminal works in the philosophy of science and social science, such as A Realist Theory of Science, The Plausibility of Naturalism, and Scientific Realism and Human Emancipation. Bhaskars consideration of the philosophies of science and social science resulted in the development of Critical Realism. The term Critical Realism was not initially used by Bhaskar. The philosophy began life as what Bhaskar called Transcendental Realism in A Realist Theory of Science (1975), which he extended into the social sciences as Critical Naturalism in The Possibility of Naturalism (1978). The term Critical Realism is an elision of Transcendental Realism and Critical Naturalism, that has been subsequently accepted by Bhaskar after being proposed by others, partly because of its appropriate connotations; Critical Realism shares certain dimensions with German Critical Theory. In this essay Roy Bhaskar distinguish post modernism, social constructionism, Critical Realism and Dialectical Critical Realism. He has discussed Rom and Charlies point of view on Social Constructionism and Critical Realism in a dialectical context. The first thing Bhaskar discussed, is how Rom and Charlie defended post modernization and social constructionism. Further, Bhaskar gave a dialectical context on Roms work, stating that his all works ends in some kind of reductionism, but before giving dialect on Roms point. Bhaskar gives a prolonged explanation to postmodernists saying that reality is a social construct. Bhaskar started elucidating postmodernism. According to Bhaskar, Reality is a construct of discourse, the text, the conversation, or if you like, people or even power relations. Bhaskar further criticized Roms dual aspect philosophy of social reality. In which he stated how Rom gives two different statements in different modes. According to Bhaskar, when Rom is in Vygotskian mode he says that social reality is a construct of conversation. That is because Roms ideas are closest as to Lev Vygotsky. Bhaskar further added that when Rom is in humanist mode, he says it is a construct of people. Both postmodernist and Rom a greed that social reality is conceptual, to which Bhaskar also agreed and proclaimed further that is it not exhaustive of anything, whether its people, powerful particulars, discourse or text. According to Bhaskar, interesting thing about dialectical critical realism is that it takes the dialectic a stage further. Bhaskars dialectical critical realism rejects any sort of reductionism. He asserted that there is no equation between social and the conceptual or social and the humans. He then gave prolonged description about conceptual moment in human life. He then discussed the connection to human freedom and they have a dialectical universalisabilty of forming a judgement. According to Bhaskar, humans have a vision of good society in which the free development of one is the condition for free development of all, by this statement free development (- -), he is asserting that human wants a classless society, the free development of each, the individual liberty and freedom to work of each individual allows for the building of a better society. He further asserted that being humans, we are more concerned about the factors that affects our freedom and we should get rid of those factors such as Nazism (The ideology and practice of the Nazis, especially the policy of racist nationalism, national expansion, and state control of the economy), bureaucracy and capitalism. He said that we should rescue our situation by considering our being and existence in a more serious manner and it is because we want to save the situation and have to take ontological (nature of being, becoming, existence, or reality, as well as the basic categories of being and their relations) question significantly of whether structures, whether unconscious or social, are real. Bhaskar describes from a critical realist standpoint that how postmodernist deny existence of direct object to being. Bhaskar asserted that postmodernist normally says that they are not denying that things exist but they merely assert and says that they cant say anything about these things. But Critical Realism has shown philosophical position, or scientific position, or social position, all require a certain general shape of the world. He added that if we are restricted human knowledge to that which can be perceived by the senses, we will believe that social forms and social structures are immutable but if we are like Habermas (German sociologist and philosopher in the tradition of critical theory and pragmatism.) in his account of nature that we will set up false resistance between nature and society. Bhaskar asserted nature is a very special thing, which is not governed by laws, mechanism or structures and he agreed with Roms words on nature that we are free to reinvent it very mo rning.Bhaskar added that Rom and Charles are not postmodernist; they do not believe reality, as such, is a social construct. But in their Social Constructivism , their views on social existence reduces to conversation or people. They have given example that one thing can be dependent on multiple factors i.e. Does the food depend just on cook? No. It depends on various factors like utensils, ingredients, resources that he/she is given by the authorities, to which Bhaskar added that the cook must have made more tastier food if there would have been more budget. Here, Bhaskar wanted to prove a point that we are constrained by various factor and we can do better without constraints. Bhaskar then dialect Rom and Charles idea of reinventing society. He criticized that why Rom and Charles do not reinvent a better kind of society if its so easy? He then further explained with an example of Oxford College, that how fellows can decide how much wine they can drink and how much to store for the next year. By this he means how fellows can change rules time to time. But then an Oxford college is subject to government finance, if privately endowed, to stock market fluctuations. By this example Bhaskar describes how things can be controlled using constraints and how things would act as a very powerful constraint. Bhaskar further explains social structure and causal powers. He explains how agent, factor or vehicle, anything that influences the course of events in some way, is the criteria for causality. He added the people are very special but what people can do in a particular social context must be examined scientifically. He says we should accept the constraining structures if we want human freedom and we should not deny it. To this, Bhaskar dialect Roms statement that social structures cannot be reproduced except by human activity. He further asserted what Rom has said is a fundamental principal and is common to both his(Bhaskars) transformational model of social activity and Giddens theory of structuration. But there is an important difference between the two models in morality of which cannot be equated, which Maggie Archer in particular has pointed out. Bhaskar, regarding his transformational model asserts how we, humans are shackled of doing anything new and are beset by the preexistin g structures, that restrain us. He asserted that fundamental Aristotelian model of society is correct. Efficient causality presupposes material causality; it presupposes a pre-existing material cause. And how we are heavily burdened by cruel presence of the past in this social world. He then talks about the one which validates Rom and Charless model, is, the birth of a baby, coming out of the womb, but that too, pre-existing life in the womb and out of the womb as well, pre-exiting thing are ready, fixed, pre-given. Bhaskars statement that at any moment of time we are heavily constrained by preexisting structures is a right theory From Bhaskars point of view, Charles account of relationship between people and organism lacks the concept of emergence. He stated, people are organism, but there is one thing that differentiate people from being an organism only, emergent powers. In Bhaskars word People are organism, but they are organism with emergent powers. He added that our society too, have emergent powers of human behavior to understand the society better but then everything eventually ends up with his former notion, everything is pre-existing human behavior. In this para, Bhaskar explains how humans are emergent from the animal world and human power are the ingredients in the animal world, thats what make us human, thats why we are humans. Bhaskar describes that there is a plausibility of good society, we have to strive and fight for making one. Bhaskar concluded that they might come to agree upon in terms of substantive proposals. But Rom and Charlie thinks that we have already achieved social construct but they do not know how we did it. Whereas Bhaskar thinks that there is a lot more hard work to do. And it is something humanity may or may not obtain contingently. But it is there as a task and moral imperative.

Discrimination and Stereotyping

Prejudice, stereotype and discrimination are merely against for anyone for any reasons as they were defined(Rand, Sowell, & Epstein, 2007). Prejudice, a feeling based not a belief based, is referred to as unconstructive judgment or opinion figured out lacking familiarity and knowledge on facts. It is only a feeling based on assumptions without considering any prior facts about the group being prejudge. Prejudice is often based on stereotype. One great cause of prejudice is the differences on skills, talents, beliefs and experience even though sometimes these differences benefit us.For an instance, on social classes, we feel wealthy classes are said to be superior to any other classes in society. Stereotype is referred to conventional opinion as any mental image of social group regardless of individual differences. At some point, stereotype can also be seen in positive outlook, for an instance the stereotype for Asian Americans being good in the field of Mathematics. Stereotype is som etimes the foundation of prejudice. Discrimination being known to as prejudice in action, it referred to as the unlikely treatment for other people in terms of race, culture or religion.An example is the discrimination on African Americans due to their color, treating them unequally from the White Americans(Educators, 2006). Prejudice, stereotype and discriminations have some negative impacts on the society as they may are said to be harmful behaviors. It may lead to limitations of opportunities for people who said to be of lesser standard than others (Phone, 2007). The limitations may be of many cases like in popularity, achieving no equal rights to gain popularity. In employment and promotion, only those think and believe to be capable of the job were brought in to employment and get promoted.In having rights and power, like the black who does not have equal privileges as white ones. The Scenerio Prejudice, stereotype and discrimination on the scenario or case of Elizabeth who is a second-grade school teacher is exemplified. There exists discrimination when he only praises Walt than Ricky, just because Ricky comes from a lower class society and on the other hand Walt from middle class, Elizabeth provides not equal treatment as should praise both of them when answers correctly and should giving a helping hand for both of the students whenever they commit mistake which was merely opposite to the scenario.The action done by Elizabeth is the harmful behavior of discrimination. She shows no favorable response for Ricky being in the lower class. Stereotypically speaking, the scenario shows stereotype behavior because Elizabeth believes that Walt has greater knowledge the Ricky. Elizabeth may be in doubt of Ricky’s intelligence that is why she does have not significant time praising him and helping him and not giving equal chances for both students to show what they have got..And also the prejudice behavior relates with stereotype, while Elizabeth believes n ot for Ricky’s capabilities, she does a pre judgment that maybe Ricky will took hard time to cope up even though it is only his opinion. And that opinion may lead to hasty generalization or wrong generalization. The scenario or case being tackled is only one of those situations that involve prejudice, stereotype and discrimination. The case may affect both students, Walt and Ricky, but in opposite and much different manner. For Walt, it may be a positive effect on him for instance that he may live a world with praises which can help him develop self esteem.On the other hand, Ricky might suffer fear of interacting with other people of different class with him. He may become a victim of limitations from opportunities as one of the main result of prejudice, stereotype and discrimination. He might also lose his privilege and freedom to learn and also his right as a child to new more about his world and surroundings. Implicit Association Test In connection with prejudice, stereoty pe and discrimination, I took the Implicit Association Test. This test shows whether I had hidden biases towards different people. In the IAT, I took the Weapons (‘Weapons – Harmless Objects' IAT) .An IAT which require the ability to recognize White and Black faces and associate them with images of weapons or harmless objects. The result of my test was your data suggest a slight association of Black Americans with Weapons compared to White Americans (corp. , 2007). The result dictates that I slightly relate harmful objects with Black Americans which I think not necessary true to myself. Maybe the pressure of doing the test with time limit also affects the result because of my eagerness to finish the test. I don’t consider Black Americans as harmful people and so I assume that the research tool was not accurate.The Implicit Association test is I can say a not reliable or accurate tool to be used. Many things could affect the result, it can be affected by being rig ht handed or left handed either. The key we are able to press most likely just conform to our most used hand or finger. Another one was the pressure on time, where it is also stated there that we just need to press the right key in a short time. Even though as I have said not accurate tool to used, It is only matters for the reason the it is an interesting and enjoying tool for us to know about our hidden biases on different races, culture or religion. Reference: corp., I. (2007). You have completed the Race – Weapons IAT. [Electronic Version]. Retrieved June 29, 2007 from https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/Study?tid=-1. Educators. (2006). Dealing with Stereotyping, Prejudice, Discrimination, and Scapegoating [Electronic Version]. Retrieved June 29, 2007 from http://www.esrnational.org/antidiscriminationlesson.htm. Phone, K. H. (2007). Violence/Abuse [Electronic Version]. Retrieved June 29, 2007 from http://kidshelp.sympatico.ca/en/informed/sub_prejudices.asp?sec=3&sb=2. Rand, A., Sowell, T., & Epstein, R. (2007). Ethnic Prejudice, Stereotypes, Discrimination, and the Free Market [Electronic Version]. Retrieved June 29, 2007 from http://www.friesian.com/discrim.htm. Â  

Ionic Reactions

The purpose of this lab is to study the nature of ionic reactions through the experiment and be able to write balanced equations along with net ionic equations for precipitation reactions using formulas Procedure First, make sure that the items needed for the lab are ready along with the safety precautions. What we do is mix and observe the reaction of 5 main substances while they are being mixed with 7 different substances in a 96 well plate.Observations The first column which as the sodium phosphate had a reaction with the five substances inside of the 96 well plate and also the Sodium Hydroxide had a reaction with all the five substances inside the 96 well plate. The other thing that I observed with learning from this experiment was the color that was given off when the substances mixed for example; whenever the barium nitrate had a reaction it changed to a cloudy color white.Reactions of the chemical (equations) A1) Co(N03)2 + 6 H20 + Na3P04 + 12 H20 ? Na3 + P02Co(N03)2 + 18 H20 A6) Co(N03)2 †¢ 6 H20 †¢ Na2C03 ? NaCo(N03)2 + C03 + 6 H20 A7) Co(N03)2 †¢ 6 H20 †¢ NaOH ? B1) Cu(N03)2 †¢ 3 H20 †¢ Na3P04 †¢ 12 H20 ? B2) Cu(N03)2 †¢ 3 H20 †¢ NaI ? B5) Cu(N03)2 †¢ 3 H20 †¢ NaHC03 ? B6) Cu(N03)2 †¢ 3 H20 †¢ Na2C03 ? B7) Cu(N03)2 †¢ 3 H20 †¢ NaOH ? C1) Fe(N03)3 †¢ 9 H20 †¢ Na3P04 †¢ 12 H20 ? C2) Fe(N03)3 †¢ 9 H20 †¢ Nal ?C6) Fe(N03)3 †¢ 9 H20 †¢ Na2C03 ? D1) Ba(N03)2 †¢ Na3P04 †¢ 12 H20 ? D3) Ba(N03)2 †¢ Na2S04 ? D5) Ba(N03)2 †¢ NaHC03 ? D6) Ba(N03)2 †¢ Na2C03 ? Conclusions I have learned that some of the substances don’t have a reaction with another substance, but on this particle experiment about half and half had a reaction and didn’t have a reaction. The ones that were easy to decide if they were having a reaction changed colors and became very cloudy.

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