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One of the aims of science is to find models that will account for as many observations as possible within a coherent framework. Together, Galileo's rethinking of the nature of motion and Keplerian cosmology represented a coherent framework that was capable of rivaling the Aristotelian/Ptolemaic framework.

In any community of scientists, Kuhn states, there are some individuals who are bolder than most. These scientists, judging that a crisis exists, embark on what Thomas Kuhn calls revolutionary science, exploring alternatives to long-held, obvious-seeming assumptions. Occasionally this generates a rival to the established framework of thought. The new candidate paradigm will appear to be accompanied by numerous anomalies, partly because it is still so new and incomplete. The majority of the scientific community will oppose any conceptual change, and, Kuhn emphasizes, so they should. To fulfill its potential, a scientific community needs to contain both individuals who are bold and individuals who are conservative.

Those scientists who possess an exceptional ability to recognize a theory's potential will be the first whose preference is likely to shift in favour of the challenging paradigm. There typically follows a period in which there are adherents of both paradigms. In time, if the challenging paradigm is solidified and unified, it will replace the old paradigm, and a paradigm shift will have occurred.

Chronologically, Kuhn distinguishes between three phases. The first phase, which exists only once, is the pre-paradigm phase, in which there is no consensus on any particular theory, though the research being carried out can be considered scientific in nature. This phase is characterized by several incompatible and incomplete theories.

If the actors in the pre-paradigm community eventually gravitate to one of these conceptual frameworks and ultimately to a widespread consensus on the appropriate choice of methods, terminology and on the kinds of experiment that are likely to contribute to increased insights, then the second phase, normal science, begins, in which puzzles are solved within the context of the dominant paradigm. As long as there is consensus within the discipline, normal science continues.

Over time, progress in normal science may reveal anomalies, facts that are difficult to explain within the context of the existing paradigm. While usually these anomalies are resolved, in some cases they may accumulate to the point where normal science becomes difficult and where weaknesses in the old paradigm are revealed. Kuhn refers to this as a crisis. Crises are often resolved within the context of normal science. However, after significant efforts of normal science within a paradigm fail, science may enter the third phase, that of revolutionary science, in which the underlying assumptions of the field are reexamined and a new paradigm is established. After the new paradigm's dominance is established, scientists return to normal science, solving puzzles within the new paradigm.

SSR is viewed by postmodern and post-structuralist thinkers as having called into question the enterprise of science by demonstrating that scientific knowledge is dependent on the culture and historical circumstances of groups of scientists rather than on their adherence to a specific, definable method.

SSR has also been embraced by creationists who see creationism as an incommensurate worldview in contrast to naturalism while holding science as a valuable tool.[7]

The idea that thought is the same as language is an example of what can be called a conventional absurdity[

The idea that language shapes thinking seemed plausible when scientists were in the dark about how thinking works, or even how to study it. Now that scientists know how to think about thinking, there is less of a temptation to equate[thinking]with language. (pp. 58–59, italics added)

Experimental work since Whorf's time has suffered several additional problems. Pinker noted that some apparent behavioral differences between language groups have turned out to be artifacts of clumsy translation.

Why should we continue to do Whorfian research? One possible reason is that cataloging crosslinguistic cognitive differences could be a step toward charting the boundaries of human biological and cultural diversity

The Orwellian idea that people think (mostly or entirely) in the medium of natural language, and therefore that language can be equated with thought, is unsupported empirically and is also problematic in principle, given what is known about language and about thought

Languages differ in the extent to which they describe duration in terms of distance as opposed to amount of substance.

Is this conflation of distance and duration universal to humans, or does it depend in part on the conflation of distance and duration in language?

Chinese speakers are less capable of reasoning counterfactually than English speakers because Chinese lacks subjunctives, which serve as counterfactual markers in English

crosslinguistic cognitive differences could be tools for investigating how thinking works and, in particular, for investigating the role of experience in the acquisition and representation of knowledge: If people who talk differently form correspondingly different mental representations as a consequence, then mental representations must depend, in part, on these aspects of linguistic experience. If discovering the origin and structure of our mental representations is the goal, then crosslinguistic cognitive differences can be informative even if they are subtle and even if their effects are largely unconscious. Whether or not they correspond to radical differences in speakers' conscious experiences of the world, Whorfian effects can have profound implications for the study of mental representation.