Culture <=> ether may be a useful analogy. 20 or so years before Einstein published his special theory of relativity, Michelson published his null result -- the experiment he conducted with Morley, using an interferometer, indicated the speed of light was the same in any direction, regardless of the direction of motion of the apparatus, contrary to the prediction inferred by the existence of an ether. Consequently, extant theories died quickly. The universe was mostly vacuum. But today, after conceptual work developing vacuum fluctuations, in which particles and antiparticles could exist within timeframes of the uncertainty principle, and after Dan Kleppner from MIT pulled photons out of a vacuum, people don't think the universe is mostly nothing anymore. Even now there is the search for dark matter. Our notions of the ether have not disappeared, they have instead been transformed by diligent theorists and experimentalists.
Regarding cultural psychology, observers and experimentalists such as Luria, Lave, Saxe, Cole, and so on, have produced results that require explanation of something more than simple social interaction in the study of human cognition -- patterns of differences across interactions, that depend upon who and when and where and what is involved in the interactions. The psychological equivalent of Michelson's work has produced no null result. Experiment and Observation, being far from abstract in their results, demand that these patterns be given explanatory weight.
-- Bill Barowy, Associate Professor Lesley University 29 Everett Street, Cambridge, MA 02138-2790 Phone: 617-349-8168 / Fax: 617-349-8169 http://www.lesley.edu/faculty/wbarowy/Barowy.html _______________________ "One of life's quiet excitements is to stand somewhat apart from yourself and watch yourself softly become the author of something beautiful." [Norman Maclean in "A river runs through it."]
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