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http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a909857880
Peter Hayes "The Ideology of Relativity: The Case of the Clock
Paradox" : Social Epistemology, Volume 23, Issue 1 January 2009, pages
57-78
"If relativity theory is an ideology, then its illusory explanatory
power enhances the real power and authority of theoretical physicists.
Precisely because Einstein’s theory is inconsistent, its exponents can
draw on contradictory principles in a way that greatly extends the
apparent explanatory scope of the theory. Inconsistency may be a
disadvantage in a scientific theory but it can be a decisive advantage
in an ideology. The inconsistency of relativity theory - to borrow the
language of the early Marx - gives relativity its apparent universal
content. This seeming power of explanation functions to enhance the
status of the group, giving them power over others through the
enhanced control over resources, and a greater power to direct
research and to exclude and marginalise dissent. (...) The argument
that Einstein fomented an ideological rather than a scientific
revolution helps to explain of one of the features of this revolution
that puzzled Kuhn: despite the apparent scope of the general theory,
very little has come out of it. Viewing relativity theory as an
ideology also helps to account for Poppers doubts over whether special
theory can be retained, given experimental results in quantum
mechanics and Einsteins questionable approach to defining
simultaneity. Both Kuhn and Popper have looked to the other branch of
the theory - Popper to the general and Kuhn to the special - to try
and retain their view of Einstein as a revolutionary scientist.
According to the view proposed here, this only indicates how special
and general theories function together as an ideology, as when one
side of the theory is called into question, the other can be called
upon to rescue it. The triumph of relativity theory represents the
triumph of ideology not only in the profession of physics bur also in
the philosophy of science. These conclusions are of considerable
interest to both theoretical physics and to social epistemology. It
would, however, be naïve to think that theoretical physicists will
take the slightest notice of them."

Pentcho Valev
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