A research program (

British English British English is the set of Variety (linguistics), varieties of the English language native to the United Kingdom, especially Great Britain. More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in England, or, more broadly, to ...

: research programme) is a professional network of scientists conducting

basic research Basic research, also called pure research, fundamental research, basic science, or pure science, is a type of scientific research with the aim of improving scientific theories for better understanding and prediction of natural or other phenome ...

. The term was used by

philosopher of science Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

Imre Lakatos to blend and revise the

normative Normativity is the phenomenon in human societies of designating some actions or outcomes as good, desirable, or permissible, and others as bad, undesirable, or impermissible. A Norm (philosophy), norm in this sense means a standard for evaluatin ...

model of science offered by

Karl Popper Sir Karl Raimund Popper (28 July 1902 – 17 September 1994) was an Austrian–British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the ...

's ''

The Logic of Scientific Discovery ''The Logic of Scientific Discovery'' is a 1959 book about the philosophy of science by the philosopher Karl Popper. Popper rewrote his book in English from the 1934 (imprint '1935') German original, titled ''Logik der Forschung. Zur Erkenntnisth ...

'' (with its idea of

falsifiability Falsifiability (or refutability) is a deductive standard of evaluation of scientific theories and hypotheses, introduced by the Philosophy of science, philosopher of science Karl Popper in his book ''The Logic of Scientific Discovery'' (1934). ...

) and the descriptive model of science offered by

Thomas Kuhn Thomas Samuel Kuhn (; July 18, 1922 – June 17, 1996) was an American History and philosophy of science, historian and philosopher of science whose 1962 book ''The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'' was influential in both academic and ...

's ''

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions ''The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'' is a 1962 book about the history of science by the philosopher Thomas S. Kuhn. Its publication was a landmark event in the History of science, history, Philosophy of science, philosophy, and sociology ...

'' (with its ideas of

normal science Normal science, identified and elaborated on by Thomas Samuel Kuhn in ''The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'', is the regular work of scientists theorizing, observing, and experimenting within a settled paradigm or explanatory framework. Re ...

and

paradigm shift A paradigm shift is a fundamental change in the basic concepts and experimental practices of a scientific discipline. It is a concept in the philosophy of science that was introduced and brought into the common lexicon by the American physicist a ...

s).Imre Lakatos, auth, John Worrall & Gregory Currie, eds
''The Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes: Volume 1: Philosophical Papers''
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980) Lakatos found falsificationism impractical and often not practiced, and found normal science—where a paradigm of science, mimicking an exemplar, extinguishes differing perspectives—more monopolistic than actual. Lakatos found that many research programs coexisted. Each had a ''hard core'' of theories immune to revision, surrounded by a ''protective belt'' of malleable theories., ch 4 "Post-positivist philosophy of science", subch "Lakatosian research programmes", pp 60-63 A research programme vies against others to be most ''progressive''. Extending the research program's theories into new domains is ''theoretical progress'', and experimentally corroborating such is ''empirical progress'', always refusing falsification of the research program's hard core. A research program might ''degenerate''—lose progressiveness—but later return to progressiveness.

References

Examples

United States Global Change Research Program

World Climate Research Programme
program Concepts in the philosophy of science {{Science-philo-stub