• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

SafetyRisk.net

Humanising Safety and Embracing Real Risk

  • Home
    • About
      • Privacy Policy
      • Contact
  • FREE
    • Slogans
      • Researchers Reveal the Top 10 Most Effective Safety Slogans Of All Time
      • When Slogans Don’t Work
      • CLASSIC, FAMOUS and INFAMOUS SAFETY QUOTES
      • 500 OF THE BEST AND WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2023
      • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
      • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
      • Safety Acronyms
      • You know Where You Can Stick Your Safety Slogans
      • Sayings, Slogans, Aphorisms and the Discourse of Simple
      • Spanish Safety Slogans – Consignas de seguridad
      • Safety Slogans List
      • Road Safety Slogans 2023
      • How to write your own safety slogans
      • Why Are Safety Slogans Important
      • Safety Slogans Don’t Save Lives
      • 40 Free Safety Slogans For the Workplace
      • Safety Slogans for Work
    • FREE SAFETY eBOOKS
    • Free Hotel and Resort Risk Management Checklist
    • FREE DOWNLOADS
    • TOP 50
    • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS
    • Find a Safety Consultant
    • Free Safety Program Documents
    • Psychology Of Safety
    • Safety Ideas That Work
    • HEALTH and SAFETY MANUALS
    • FREE SAFE WORK METHOD STATEMENT RESOURCES
    • Whats New In Safety
    • FUN SAFETY STUFF
    • Health and Safety Training
    • SAFETY COURSES
    • Safety Training Needs Analysis and Matrix
    • Top 20 Safety Books
    • This Toaster Is Hot
    • Free Covid-19 Toolbox Talks
    • Download Page – Please Be Patient With Larger Files…….
    • SAFETY IMAGES, Photos, Unsafe Pictures and Funny Fails
    • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
    • Download Safety Moments from Human Resources Secretariat
  • Social Psychology Of Risk
    • What is Psychological Health and Safety at Work?
    • Safety Psychology Terminology
    • Some Basics on Social Psychology & Risk
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk – Prof Karl E. Weick
    • The Psychology of Leadership in Risk
    • Conducting a Psychology and Culture Safety Walk
    • The Psychology of Conversion – 20 Tips to get Started
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk And Safety
    • Psychology and safety
    • The Psychology of Safety
    • Hot Toaster
    • TALKING RISK VIDEOS
    • WHAT IS SAFETY
    • THE HOT TOASTER
    • THE ZERO HARM DEBATE
    • SEMIOTICS
    • LEADERSHIP
  • Dr Long Posts
    • ALL POSTS
    • Learning Styles Matter
    • There is no Hierarchy of Controls
    • Scaffolding, Readiness and ZPD in Learning
    • What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?
    • Presentation Tips for Safety People
    • Dialogue Do’s and Don’ts
    • It’s Only a Symbol
    • Ten Cautions About Safety Checklists
    • Zero is Unethical
    • First Report on Zero Survey
    • There is No Objectivity, Deal With it!
  • THEMES
    • Psychosocial Safety
    • Resiliencing
    • Risk Myths
    • Safety Myths
    • Safety Culture Silences
    • Safety Culture
    • Psychological Health and Safety
    • Zero Harm
    • Due Diligence
  • Free Learning
    • Introduction to SPoR – Free
    • FREE RISK and SAFETY EBOOKS
    • FREE ebook – Guidance for the beginning OHS professional
    • Free EBook – Effective Safety Management Systems
    • Free EBook – Lessons I Have Learnt
  • Psychosocial Safety
    • What is Psychosocial Safety
    • Psychological Safety
      • What is Psychological Health and Safety at Work?
      • Managing psychosocial hazards at work
      • Psychological Safety – has it become the next Maslow’s hammer?
      • What is Psychosocial Safety
      • Psychological Safety Slogans and Quotes
      • What is Psychological Safety?
      • Understanding Psychological Terminology
      • Psycho-Social and Socio-Psychological, What’s the Difference?
      • Build a Psychologically Safe Workplace by Taking Risks and Analysing Failures
      • It’s not weird – it’s a psychological safety initiative!
You are here: Home / Robert Long / The Paradox of Positivism for Safety

The Paradox of Positivism for Safety

June 11, 2021 by Dr Rob Long Leave a Comment

The Paradox of Positivism for Safety

imageMost people in safety would be unaware that the common philosophy driving the safety worldview is known as Positivism. You can get some background on positivism here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positivism. Positivism privileges information interpreted through reason and logic and is the most common worldview in the Discipline of General Science. Positivism is based on Empiricism which means it only accepts knowledge from sensory experience. Positivism like many philosophies was constructed in opposition to another philosophy. In this case Positivism was constructed by Auguste Comte (1798–1857) in opposition to metaphysics, non-materialist philosophies and philosophy itself. Positivism anchors to the scientific method and rejects non-material theory.

Positivism seeks to free itself from value-laden thinking in the quest for objectivism. Of course, this is a contradiction because the quest to divorce oneself from values is a value.

The positivist focus is on objects and the rejection of non-materialist understandings of the world. If something is not ‘observable’ then positivism must reject it, including psychology. There are a range of positivisms that have emerged since Comte but most share this foundation in objectivism, metrics, numerics and observable evidence.

The Frankfurt School which was founded by Fromm and Habermas later rejected the assumptions of positivism and founded the philosophy of Critical Theory (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt_School ). Since the development of Critical Theory a host of post-modern philosophies have emerged that critique the positivist assertion of logical realism and objectivity. Postmodernist and poststructuralist philosophies are two emerging philosophies from Critical Theory. The Social Psychology of Risk has evolved from these traditions.

When one looks at the WHS curriculum and the dominant focus on objects (at least 75% of all WHS curriculum) and Science, one understands some very strange contradictions in the safety-positivist worldview. In many ways this is a worldview that doesn’t have the philosophical equipment to even understand itself.

Strangely, without a focus on non-materialist thinking Safety finds itself with no thinking equipment to critique its own non-materialist discourse. Indeed, the positivist rejection of philosophy itself makes Safety more exposed to metaphysical trade-offs as it seeks numerical absolutes. Safety is now more immersed in metaphysics than one could imagine. In the search for zero that magical number, Safety now drifts into religious language and metaphors of super-heroes and faith/belief (https://safetyrisk.net/safety-for-true-believers/; https://safetyrisk.net/safety-as-faith-healing/; https://safetyrisk.net/no-evidence-for-the-religion-of-zero/). Because Safety is not equipped with philosophical thinking including An Ethic of Safety, it now accidentally falls into a religious worldview in its quest for secular absolutes. This is evident in the recent AASP (https://safety.assp.org/education/general-sessions/) and XXI World Congress on Safety 2017 (https://www.safety2017singapore.com/) conferences.

Philosophically speaking Safety has nowhere to go. Without a philosophical understanding of itself Safety cannot go any further than zero, which is why the new mantra must become ‘beyond zero’ or anything more or less than zero. This of course sets up Safety for delusion about fallibility (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/fallibility-risk-living-uncertainty/ ), vulnerability and suffering (all metaphysical challenges).

By building a fortress around positivism anchored to zero Safety can now only peddle confusion about its own metaphysical contradictions. Dekker experienced this at a conference recently (http://www.safetydifferently.com/oil-and-gas-safety-in-a-post-truth-world/) where he encountered faith-like denial of facts which he attributed to post-truth thinking. What this demonstrated was that in the grand search for positivist ‘facts’ the Safety worldview now rejects the presentation of those facts. Unfortunately, Safety is now anchored to a philosophical worldview that makes compromise and collaboration with other worldviews virtually impossible.

  • Bio
  • Latest Posts
  • More about Rob
Dr Rob Long

Dr Rob Long

Expert in Social Psychology, Principal & Trainer at Human Dymensions
Dr Rob Long

Latest posts by Dr Rob Long (see all)

  • When Safety Delights in ‘I Told You So’! - May 24, 2023
  • Understanding Safety as a Cultural Reproductive Process - May 23, 2023
  • Thinking Outside the Safety Bubble - May 21, 2023
  • Understanding Language Influencing, A Video - May 21, 2023
  • Safetie - May 21, 2023
Dr Rob Long
PhD., MEd., MOH., BEd., BTh., Dip T., Dip Min., Cert IV TAA, MRMIA Rob is the founder of Human Dymensions and has extensive experience, qualifications and expertise across a range of sectors including government, education, corporate, industry and community sectors over 30 years. Rob has worked at all levels of the education and training sector including serving on various post graduate executive, post graduate supervision, post graduate course design and implementation programs.

Please share our posts

  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Robert Long, Social Psychology of Risk Tagged With: objectivity, positivism

Reader Interactions

Do you have any thoughts? Please share them below Cancel reply

Primary Sidebar

Search and Discover More on this Site

Never miss a post - Subscribe via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,521 other subscribers

Recent Comments

  • Rob Long on It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe
  • Chris. on It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe
  • Pierre Joubert on Zero Doesn’t Work, Road Fatalities Increase
  • James on We are all equal
  • Rob Long on We are all equal
  • James Parkinson on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on What Does Safety Achieve?
  • Admin on We are all equal
  • James Parkinson on We are all equal
  • Rob Long on What Does Safety Achieve?
  • Brent Charlton on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on What Does Safety Achieve?
  • Simon Cassin on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Simon Cassin on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time

RECOMMENDED READING

viral post – iso 45003 and what it cannot do

Introduction to SPOR – FREE!!

Psychosocial Safety and Mental Health Series

It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe

The KISS of Death in Safety

Is Your Safety World Too Small?

You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time

When Safety (Zero) is Abusive

Hands Up the Best Safety Fraud!

Communicating Professionally in Risk

How NOT to be Professional in Safety

How NOT to do Anything About Culture in Building and Construction

Celebrating 60 Years of Lifeline

More Posts from this Category

NEW! Free Download

Please take our 2 minute zero survey

FREE eBOOK DOWNLOADS

Footer

VIRAL POST – The Risk Matrix Myth

Top Posts & Pages. Sad that most are so dumb but this is what safety luves

  • Free Safety Moments and Toolbox Talk Examples, Tips and Resources
  • 500 OF THE BEST AND WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2023
  • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
  • When Safety Delights in ‘I Told You So’!
  • Road Safety Slogans 2023
  • 15 Safety Precautions When Working With Electricity
  • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
  • Ratio Delusions and Heinrich’s Hoax
  • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS, CHECKISTS, REGISTERS, TEMPLATES and APPS
  • Safety Acronyms

Recent Posts

  • When Safety Delights in ‘I Told You So’!
  • My Story is Better than Yours
  • Understanding Safety as a Cultural Reproductive Process
  • The Unconscious and the Soap Dispenser
  • Thinking Outside the Safety Bubble
  • Understanding Language Influencing, A Video
  • Safetie
  • You are NOT the Sum of Safety
  • Update on SPoR in India, Brazil and Europe
  • It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe
  • Safety at the Margins
  • Research Basics for Safety
  • We Need Communities and They Need Us
  • Researching Within The Safety Echo Chamber
  • Confirmation Bias, Risk and Being Offensive
  • Lemmings for Lemmings in Leadership and Risk
  • Expertise by Regurgitation and Re-Badging
  • Zero Doesn’t Work, Road Fatalities Increase
  • Can There Be Other Valid Worldviews Than Safety?
  • Evaluating Value by the Value of What You Don’t Know
  • Reality vs Theory, The Binary Divide
  • No Paradigm Shift with BBS
  • The KISS of Death in Safety
  • Is Your Safety World Too Small?
  • What Does Safety Achieve?
  • In Praise of Balance in Risk and the Threat of Extremism
  • We are all equal
  • You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • What in the (Risk & Safety) World is Imagination?
  • iCue Engagement Process
  • SPoR, Metanoia and a Podcast on Change with Nippin Anand
  • For the Monarchists of Safety
  • The Sully Effect
  • All Things Must Pass in Risk
  • Scapegoating and Safety
  • Understanding Habit, Habituation and Change
  • Don’t Mention the War
  • Safety in Design for Who by Who?
  • Beyond ‘What We Do Around Here’
  • Asking the Wrong Questions
  • When Safety (Zero) is Abusive
  • Mandala as a Method for Tackling an Ethic of Risk (a Video)
  • Safety Cosmetics
  • Visualising the EHS Role
  • Towards Dumb
  • Workshops with Dr Long – Vienna, Austria 26-30 June 2023
  • Visual, Verbal and Relational Mapping in Risk Assessment
  • Abduction in Risk and Safety
  • Creating Myths and Rituals in Safety
  • The Safe Christmas Psychosis

VIRAL POST!!! HOW TO QUIT THE SAFETY INDUSTRY

FEATURED POSTS

New Video Available – Semiotics Walk Workshop

Tape Down Those Leads

The Fear of Power and the Power of Fear

First in Best Dressed for Indoctrination

A Great Comparison of Risk and Safety Schools of Thought

Introduction to SPoR – Free

SAFETY IS A MYTH, LONG LIVE SAFETY

The Bias of Method Design in Risk

Human Dymensions Newsletter–October 2014

EGO is not a dirty word

People Skills Are Not Soft Skills

Positives and Negatives in Dialectic in Safety

Implementing SPoR in the Workplace, A Video

Work-Life and Risk, Feminine Perspectives

Social Psychology of Risk Challenge

Blind Faith in Safety

We need to make sure this can never happen again

Target Trade-Offs and Numeric Goals

Making Sense of Safety Management Systems

The Lexicon of Safety Gibberish

Perth Workshops

Investigations and Truth Telling

Transdisciplinary Safety

Safety, Ethics, SPoR and How to Foster the Abuse of Power

Triarchic Thinking and Risk

Sergeant Safety

The Primacy of Play in Learning

Military Metaphors in Safety

Free Online Workshops

Safety as Policing

Why Have Some Freedom in Safety When a Dose of Fear and Guilt Will Do?

What is SPoR?

What or Who Is Safety?

Organising to Manage Uncertainty in an Unpredictable World

Keep Your Head In the Game

Knowing When to Break the Rules

Consciously Safe, Unconsciously Unsafe or Head in the Sand Safety

The Ethics of Safety

Why is Safety an Easy Target?

Wisdom, Discernment and an Ethic of Safety

More Posts from this Category

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,521 other subscribers

How we pay for the high cost of running of this site – try it for free on your site

WHAT IS PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY?

What is Psychological Safety at Work?


WHAT IS PSYCHOSOCIAL SAFETY

x
x