Hasan Langgulung

Before writing a textbook in a specific scientific discipline one has to remind one that a textbook is but a compilation of data based on research conducted by a group of researchers dealing with different topics in a specific discipline. Research is therefore the most important part of the series of activities that should be done in the field of psychology before the textbook writers in psychology are able to do their work. Before the researchers can function properly, however, they have to bear in mind the diversity of research methodologies under which their approaches will be categorized. The most dominant of these are the realist and the idealist approaches. The following is an attempt to highlight these approaches and to suggest some approaches by which we hope Muslim researchers will be able to create the ummatic paradigm.

Much of the uncertainty surrounding the social sciences can be traced to the question of the purpose of science. J. K. Smith suggests that confusion over the appropriate goals and methodologies for social science can be linked to an epistemological conflict which is currently dividing social scientists.  Smith characterizes this epistemological dispute as a conflict between the realist and idealist positions. He describes the followers of realist epistemology as believing that the purpose of science is to discover universal truth. Scientists who have adopted the realist position believe that “knowledge and truth are questions of correspondence - what is true is what corresponds to reality,” (p. 8) The ultimate goal of the realists in the social sciences is to discover universally true laws that can be communicated through a neutral, culture-free language and that can be applied in any situation to predict, understand, and govern behavior. The realists believe that it is “possible to have a definitive, objective science for all society that would eventually produce the system of laws [and that these] laws are, by definition, universally applicable, regardless of time and place.” (pp. 8, 11)

The followers of the idealist epistemology, on the other hand, are characterized as believing that what humans learn about the world around them is filtered through their senses, and that therefore scientific knowledge does not reflect the true nature of the world. Instead, it represents our best opinions about what is the true nature of the world. For the idealists, the idea that people can possess universal knowledge independent of themselves and that this universal knowledge can be expressed through a neutral or culture-free language is absurd. Idealists believe that human experience is culturally and contextually dependent and that “what is to count as knowledge or to be considered true is a matter of agreement within a socially and historically bounded context.” (p. 8) Smith concludes his analysis of the realist-idealist conflict in social science by observing that “the issue brings to the forefront the epistemological question of what is to count as knowledge. If researchers do not discuss this question, they are forfeiting any participation in determining the basis for the authority of their knowledge .” (pp . 12 - 13) It is my belief that implementing a variation of the idealist epistemology in social science would improve the effectiveness of social sciences or human sciences as they relate to the Islamic paradigm and would help resolve the field‘s feeling of selfdoubt.

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