SCIENCE AND SOCIAL-WORK - ARE THEY COMPATIBLE

This article was originally presented in 1995 as the keynote address o f the National Conference of the Australian Association of Social Work ers. The author analyzes some of the sources of resistance to acceptin g scientific methodology within social work, including political, phil osophical, and quasi-religious ones. The strength of scientific method s, as opposed to other ways of knowing, includes their utility in prov ing that some ''findings'' are indeed false and their skeptical attitu de toward new claims.