Theme 3 - Post Seminar

For the third theme’s seminar I have read the following articles: Gregor, S. (2006). The Nature of Theory in Information Systems and Sutton, R. I. & Staw, B. M. (1995). What Theory is Not. I have also chosen a paper in the field of Media Technology and evaluated it critically.

The seminar for theme three was about one topic: theory. During the group discussions we agreed on that theory is about explaining why something occurs. It’s about somehow observing something and trying to grasp it, to understand it. We all felt that theory is something related to the previous themes; nominalism, enlightenment and knowledge. Theories describes the world which can lead to knowledge. We started discussing theories in relation to truth and came to the conclusion that it is dangerous to mention truth and theory in the same sentence. A theory doesn’t have to be “true” to be a theory. During the lecture we were taught that when a theory is tested and accepted by a majority of experts, it can be regarded as true. There are multiple theories or models today that we know are not entirely true but we still use them. Newton’s laws of motion is one example. They explain motion in a great way when velocities are within what we can relate to and observe in our world. But when velocities starts to reach the velocity of light, things depart and the theory can’t explain what is happening. So why do we use Newton’s laws if we know they are not entirely true? Because they are a simplification of something very complex. They help us explain the world around us. Even though we know the law is not universal with respect of velocity.

We also discussed that a theory doesn’t have to come from an observation or similar, it can also be based on another theory (which is almost always the case according to our seminar leader). In our group we talked about quantum physics and how there can be theories in that field when there is so little empiric data. Our hypothesis was that there must be theories build on entirely on other theories, which is rather interesting.

During the large discussion in the seminar we discussed what makes a theory good or bad. If you are not an expert in the field then it can be very hard to identify this, especially if the theory is “hidden” within big amounts of data and conclusion. In other words; it’s hard to define a good theory. A good logical argumentation might be one thing that makes a good theory, or that the area where the theory applies is well-defined might also be something to strive for.