One of the challenging questions posed to me as a Research Leader at IWMI was, ’What’s new’?
This line of query did not mean that everything that was
researched was some or other new – we continued research in topics like rainwater
harvesting, organic manuring, and development of business plans. I have studied them and developed business
plans for my BS degree in Agriculture, some 40 years ago.
Being privileged to work in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa,
soon I learnt that everything is new for sub Saharan Africa, and the donors
were happy to put money in, as long as there’s an element of capacity building
and women empowerment. Donors are/were
not interested in research, but on development of human capital through which
socio-economic development may occur. I
do not have anything against this, it is the right thing to do, and I welcome
this. Asian countries on the other hand
have well developed human capital; China, India and South East of Asia do not
need external help. As a matter of fact,
they do not even need money for research these days. So, donors keep away, or being asked to keep
away.
The above does not answer the question, ’What’s new?’, and
the answer lies in text books for ‘Philosophy of Science’. In most cases, and most researchers, we do
induction/deduction research. The
probabilistic definition of inductive research goes as,’ If a large number of
As have been observed under a wide variety of conditions, and if all these
observed As without an exception possessed property B, then all As probably
possess the property B. \Greater
the number of observations, then greater the probability that resulting
generalizations are true.
So, scientific knowledge arrived through induction and
deduction is not true, but probably true.
As inductivists, we repeat what we already know, fine
tune them by applying a new methodology or a tool or pose the question
differently, and when we have to publish, we often bring supporting testaments
from researchers who had reported similar findings. Through this type of research, we improve
pretty much what we know.
This is a good thing, and why should not we do such things?
A recent example could be smart-mobile phones. Mobile phone was invented in 1971, the
battery weighed 2 kgs and lasted 10 minutes of conversation! Now mobile phones are smarter and snugly fits
in our pockets, battery last for 48 hours, they have a camera, radio, and voice
recorder and the works, which all existed before mobile phone was
invented. Can anyone say, that research
in mobile phones should stop because there can’t be anything new?
In early days of IIMI, we showed through inductive research,
and by gathering large body of data, that there’s inequity in water
distribution in canal commands, which influenced many irrigation infrastructure
modernization programs.
This does not mean that we should not search for something
new. There was Martin Cooper at Motorola
who wanted mobile phones instead of land lines, so, when the phone rang, we did
not have to ‘run’ to the phone tethered to a wall. It is already with us. This was a ‘paradigm shift’, a phrase loosely
used by many of us. We need such
paradigm shifts to make quantum leaps in the way we live.
When I look back, this took place when IWMI, amongst others
wanted to manage water as a basin resource.
Yes, we knew the hydrologic cycle, we knew water is recycled again and
again, but within the context of water for agriculture, and perceived
efficiencies in irrigation applications, there was a paradigm shift. Investors in irrigation infrastructure
maintenance were guided by this new paradigm.
Lining of canals in fresh groundwater areas were discouraged.
I argue, we need these paradigm shifts, and I argue,that we keep encouraging inductivism as well.