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The Notion of Paradigm Shift and the Roles of Science and Literature in the Interpretation of Reality

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 June 2014

Susana Onega*
Affiliation:
Dpto. de Filología Inglesa y Alemana, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Universidad de Zaragoza, Calle Pedro Cerbuna 12, E-50009 Zaragoza, Spain. E-mail: sonega@unizar.es

Abstract

Starting from the premise that human knowledge develops in terms of paradigm shifts, the article draws attention to the problems caused by the demise of transcendent knowledge after the Newtonian paradigm shift. By the turn of the twentieth century, the ensuing ideology of endless progress, unfettered by emotional, affective and imaginative knowledge, brought about a split of cognitive cohesion observable in the increase of mental diseases and the birth of psychoanalysis. The trauma paradigm thus initiated an ‘ethical turn’ in the 1990s heralding a wider scientific and academic shift towards the recuperation of holistic knowledge.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Academia Europaea 2014 

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