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• Utopia and Social Science – Interpretation of the book Fahrenheit 451

  98-108

  Benedek Dudik

  Views:

  54

  Utopian and dystopian works have traditions hundreds of years, but their golden era did not begin until the 20th century. The genre is very often depicted as a literary genre, but in reality it is much more than simple fiction. These novels are as much social science and social theory writings as they are works of phantasmagoria. In my writing, I strive to explain this line of thought based on Ray Bradbury’s 1953 novel Fahrenheit 451. In the course of my work, following the fictional story of Guy Montag, I intend to present the peculiarities of the genre, its social science relations and its relationship with our contemporary society, in parallel with other dystopian works of the 20th century.

• The relationship between scientific philosophical theories and value research

  131-147

  Benedek Dudik

  Views:

  89

  The purpose of this study is to examine, in what extent the mainstream approaches of scientific
  theories can be applied on the field of the value-research. Therefore, I will examine these models
  through the lense of scientific philosophical approaches of 20th century. Of the three most
  significant philosophical theory (Popper’s falsification theory, Kuhn’s paradigm theory, and Imre
  Lakatos’s theory of scientific research programs), I apply Lakatos’s theory, since it fits the best
  to explain, how parallel research streams emerged on the field of value research. In this study I
  strive for conciliate Lakatos’s program and the three significant value models. In the scientific
  research program theory Lakatos found that many research programs coexist simultaneously.
  Each has a hard core or negative heuristic (as Lakatos calls it) of theories immune to any revision
  surrounded by a protective belt or positive heuristic of malleable theories. Every research
  program vies against others to be most progressive. In my opinion the core of the program is
  the value definition itself, which is used by the different researchers in the field of value studies.
  This value definition barely changed during the past few decades. On the other hand, there are
  numerous value models aimed to assess people’s value system. These models can be considered
  as the protective belt revolving around the hardcore definition. The aim of this paper is not to
  emphasize Lakatos’ theory from the philosophical approaches of science, but to examine value
  research through a philosophical eye. This approach also can ease the communication between
  the value research by exploring the common core of them.