陈悦

个人信息Personal Information

教授

博士生导师

硕士生导师

任职 : 中国工程科技创新战略研究院客座教授

性别:女

毕业院校:大连理工大学

学位:博士

所在单位:公共管理学院

学科:科学学与科技管理. 区域经济学

办公地点:大连理工大学人文楼301房间

联系方式:0411-84706082

电子邮箱:chenyue@dlut.edu.cn

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Towards an explanatory and computational theory of scientific discovery

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论文类型:期刊论文

发表时间:2021-01-19

发表刊物:JOURNAL OF INFORMETRICS

卷号:3

期号:3

页面范围:191-209

ISSN号:1751-1577

关键字:Theory of scientific discovery; Transformative scientific discoveries; Theory of structural holes; Intellectual brokerage; Knowledge diffusion; Information foraging

摘要:We propose an explanatory and computational theory of transformative discoveries in science. The theory is derived from a recurring theme found in a diverse range of scientific change, scientific discovery, and knowledge diffusion theories in philosophy of science, sociology of science, social network analysis, and information science. The theory extends the concept of structural holes from social networks to a broader range of associative networks found in science studies, especially including networks that reflect underlying intellectual structures such as co-citation networks and collaboration networks. The central premise is that connecting otherwise disparate patches of knowledge is a valuable mechanism of creative thinking in general and transformative scientific discovery in particular. In addition, the premise consistently explains the value of connecting people from different disciplinary specialties. The theory not only explains the nature of transformative discoveries in terms of the brokerage mechanism but also characterizes the subsequent diffusion process as optimal information foraging in a problem space. Complementary to epidemiological models of diffusion, foraging-based conceptualizations offer a unified framework for arriving at insightful discoveries and optimizing subsequent pathways of search in a problem space. Structural and temporal properties of potentially high-impact scientific discoveries are derived from the theory to characterize the emergence and evolution of intellectual networks of a field. Two Nobel Prize winning discoveries, the discovery of Helicobacter pylori and gene targeting techniques, and a discovery in string theory demonstrated such properties. Connections to and differences from existing approaches are discussed. The primary value of the theory is that it provides not only a computational model of intellectual growth, but also concrete and constructive explanations of where one may find insightful inspirations for transformative scientific discoveries. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.