Positivism & Post-Positivism
Our best hope for achieving objectivity is to triangulate across multiple
fallible perspectives! Thus, objectivity is ... what multiple individuals
are trying to achieve when they criticize each other's work. We never achieve
objectivity perfectly, but we can approach it. The best way for us to improve
the objectivity of what we do is to do it within the context of a broader
contentious community of truth-seekers (including other scientists) who criticize
each other's work. The theories that survive such intense scrutiny are a
bit like the species that survive in the evolutionary struggle. (This is
sometimes called the natural selection theory of knowledge and holds that
ideas have 'survival value' and that knowledge evolves through a process
of variation, selection and retention). They have adaptive value and are
probably as close as our species can come to being objective and understanding
reality.
trochim.human.cornell.edu/kb/positvsm.htm