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The application of critical theory—the Frankfurt School tradition of analyzing power, ideology, and domination—to the study of scientific orthodoxy. The critical theory of scientific orthodoxy examines how consensus can function as a form of power: how orthodox views can serve dominant interests, how dissent is marginalized through institutional mechanisms, how scientific authority can be mobilized to legitimize social arrangements, how the very category of "orthodoxy" can exclude marginalized perspectives and alternative ways of knowing. It also examines possibilities for emancipation: how to create scientific institutions that are more democratic, more inclusive, more open to heterodoxy; how to challenge orthodoxies that serve power rather than truth; how to build science that serves human flourishing rather than domination. The critical theory of scientific orthodoxy reveals that consensus is never neutral—it always exists in a field of power, and understanding orthodoxy requires understanding whose interests it serves and whose voices it excludes.
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