Is growth of science knowledge static / dynamic?

Question

static - through a process of addition
dynamic- through a process driven by conflict

Answer 1

I think it is a bit of both. Many of the dicoveries made during the world wars were found because one or the other side needed something to defeat their "enemy".

Once peace of a sort was made, the discoveries found by the new found allies were then shared, thus adding to the knowledge discovered already... although not all the information may have been shared.

Sadly though, I think that most of our discoveries have been more Dynamic than Static. Humans just can't stop bickering with each other.

Answer 2

Actually, I am of the opinion that dynamic knowledge growth is the best way for growth of a knowledge base to occur. Basic scientific process:
Observe something in nature which you would like to explain
Develop a hypothesis giving an explanation
Develop experiments to test your hypothesis
Perform experiments and collect data
Examine data with respect to the original hypothesis
If the data does not agree with your hypothesis, change your hypothesis and develop new experiments etc.
If the data does agree with your hypothesis, publish your findings so that others can criticique your efforts, and suggest other experiments to do to strengthen your hypothesis or to refute it.

The main point is, even if you can do experiments that seem to support a hypothesis, later developments in technique might allow you to look at a hypothesis differently or more accurately. This can allow you to more firmly support a hypothesis or to refute it altogether.

The point is that no scientist thinks that his hypothesis is fact. He would say, rather, that data gathered to date tend to support the hypothesis. This type of thinking allows for changes. It is this type of change that dynamic knowledge growth embraces, and it is considered a good thing, as it allows old theories, based on old techniques to be re-examined using more modern techniques to get more accurate data.

Answer 3

It's EXPONENTIAL!