This is shown both by an examination of historical episodes and by an abstract analysis of the relation between idea and action. The only principle that does not inhibit progress is: anything goes.
It is very difficult to find any method that remains firm and unyielding in it's perspectives and applications.
Generally, all rules posited as epistemological truth, run into, or generate contradictions with other rules posited as equally true.
This is a feature, not a bug, and in fact, are core to the progress of science.
Many of the modern developments of modern science have resulted from thinkers deciding to eschew the current truths and axioms, or doing so on accident.
One of the few thinkers to understand this feature of the development of knowledge was Niels Bohr: “…he would never try to outline any finished picture, but would patiently go through all the phases of the development of a problem, starting from some apparent paradox, and gradually leading to its education. In fact, he never regarded achieved results in any other light than as starting points for further exploration. In speculating about the prospects of some line of investigation, he would dismiss the usual consideration of simplicity, elegance or even consistency with the remark that such qualities can only be properly judged after [my italics] the event.…” - L. Rosenfeld
Given any rule, however “fundamental” or “rational”, there are always circumstances when it is advisable not only to ignore the rule, but to adopt its opposite."
Seeing as how the teaching of children is simply taken as a good thing in and of itself, without the aid of any argument, and that this teaching is also partly simply the result of natural processes playing out as they are wont to do, leading to radical new abilities and perspectives, we should not assume that this ability is not present in adults.
There are plenty of forces in what we could label "adult life" that can, and have been known to entirely re-arrange the way adults react to, handle, and interpret reality and stimulim, and go about argumentation: war, illness, natural disaster, ret tet tet.
Hell, sometimes I wonder if we even give children the benefit of the doubt with regards to this ability anymore.
Should there be events, that can act as catalysts to radical change in the minds of adults, including new types of argument, not only would defenders of the status quo be required to posit counter-arguments to the new changes, but they would be required to present new causes, for the supposed change in argumentative processes.
It was a catastrophic familial event that pushed John Wheeler so strongly in the direction of time.
These rapid changes are phase-transitions. They just happen to be taking places in the lives and minds of people.
If the old forms of argumentation are not sufficient, then the proponents of the status quo must either concede their point, or find more aggressive and illicit (irrational) methods of being victorious, chiefly propaganda and coercion.
What's interesting is that you would almost never think something like propaganda would be a tool of scientists, but it certainly is, for instance, Physics, with regard to Naturalness and The Standard Model, has been known to be rather dismissive of theories that posses (or lack) numerical qualities that are not considered in-line with the norms of the day.
Could peer review be considered a form of propaganda?
The role of propaganda is made clear with a closer look at how ideas and actions relate.
We require that ideas and concepts be clearly and neatly defined first, before formulated, or turned into a research programme.
This directly contradicts the exploratory way that children go about learning, as a mode of play, that allows them to eventually discover something (emergent, perhaps) that they can find meaning in.
The damage this does is that it removes the opportunity for bold, radical exploration and experimentation at the fringes of scientific knowledge.
"There is no reason why this mechanism should cease to function in the adult."
I can't believe this man is tying this together.
Creation of a thing, and creation plus full understanding of a correct idea of the thing, are very often parts of one and the same indivisible process and cannot be separated without bringing the process to a stop.
This process can't be guided by research programmes, because it contains the possibility of all research programmes.
A great example, is Galileo's advancement of the Copernican perspective.
The Copernican theory, heliocentrism, was directly opposed to the thought of the day.
This theory found support in unlikely, similar ideas, such as inertia, or the telescope.
Research goes in new directions, new tools are created, and evidence presents itself, until a theory that can defend itself entirely is synthesized from the new evidence.
Now what seemed silly, is taken as scientific fact, and it should be noted that it's elevation to this status could only happen after accepting the seemingly unreasonable or nonsensical aspects of the theory.
"...without a constant misuse of language there cannot be any discovery, any progress".
"To those who are not intent on impoverishing [history] in order to please their lower instincts, their craving for intellectual security in the form of clarity, precision, 'objectivity' and truth, it will be come clear...anything goes."
Thus we see that the only way for science to truly progress, is with a respectful disregard to the contemporary beliefs, and without limitation (being restrained due to the seemingly incorrect or meandering process of exploration), and that this is necessary, because there is no theory or set of beliefs that does not engender contradictions with other accepted theories. It is in fact, these contradictions and conflicts that push the boundaries of our knowledge forward.