"I have been writing this book for 15 years. I've done other things along the way, but most of those - almost every professional presentation or publication - have been connected in some way to the ideas presented in this book. I have felt an urgency to make some sense of science in psychology, at first just for myself, then later for my students and other friends, and this has patterned all of my work. That urgency came upon me almost from the first psychology course that I took as an undergraduate. Then, and since, I have felt a vague unease about the discipline; one that I have been trying, variously, to name, exorcise, diagnose, or remedy. At first, I took that unease to be primarily epistemological. There seemed to be too many contradictions, inconsistencies, and, half-formed notions in writing about science, research, and method in psychology. Over time, however, I have learned that this is not so unusual; that, actually, we all have a hard time writing sensibly about science. Science is composed of a vast history, made up of radically distinct epistemic, disciplinary, cultural, and geographic regionalities. It is hardly surprising if any one of us can only lay an imperfect hold on some small part of that geography"-- Provided by publisher.
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