Quality and quantity as indissociable dimensions of research

Abstract

Objective: To theoretically demonstrate the relations between the quality and quantity dimensions and their indissociability in research, arguing that the ways of producing knowledge within a scientific field is conditioned to the researchers' vigilance over the system of objective relations and, thus, is a practice governed by a particular metascience. Method: The argument is built from a philosophical theoretical framework. Results: While it is necessary to identify predicates such as quality and quantity to distinguish and analyze the scientific object, these are constituent aspects of the totality of the perceived object, and it is impossible to study them separately. Conclusion: It is necessary to look carefully at the way scientific research is constructed and communicated, including its explanations and statements based on the predicates’ relational aspects in their double determination, investigation, and exposition, which relates to the process of appropriation and critical-rational explicitness. Descriptors: Scientific method. Research predicates. Complementarity. Meta-science.