Abstract

In order to explain the success of scientific achievements, traditional approaches in philosophy of science employ epistemological criteria; social constructivist approaches, a) also use epistemological criteria, but they do so without the well-known accuracy of traditional approaches, b) when they employ their own social constructivist concepts, lack them the exactness which we find at epistemological criteria, and c) spend a lot more in stories than in conceptual reconstructions. Therefore, we have a methodological difference between traditional approaches and social constructivism. This difference will be the key subject matter of this paper. The core concept that runs through the paper is that, although social constructivist stories sound ways of explaining the success of science, they have some thresholds.