Multiple Narratives As Cognitive and Political Bridges to Understanding the Nature of Scientific Knowledge

Abstract

This paper presents the arguments, the theoretical references and characteristics of certain didactic materials designed to promote reflection on the nature of scientific knowledge in the training of researchers and professors of Biological Sciences. These teaching resources have been selected and designed with the intent to activate a critical reflection on the cuisine of scientific research. We are concerned especially with the processes of reflection, reasoning and conceptual arguments that real scientists conduct during their practices in their contexts. Moreover, the analysis of the results of their implementation with groups of university students are provided, highlighting the main learnings achieved. Also, it has interested us to reflect on these contexts from their historical and not neutral nature, regaining their rich connections to other fields, such as politics, economics, religion, art and technology. Finally, with specific activities, we have focused on understanding the processes of construction of explanatory models in Biological Sciences. After the implementation of these scenarios we have verified that students advance in the overcoming of cognitive and epistemic obstacles with respect to the scientific research by recognizing their relationships with society, history and culture. Moreover, they progress in the denaturalization of absolutist conceptions about scientific knowledge, recognize the collaborative and collegiate nature of science and assume a principle of methodological pluralism including creative processes, with ethical implications.