| Week |
Date |
Topic/Reading Event |
Presented by |
| 1 |
Jan. 12
Remote |
Introduction to the seminar |
Michael Dietrich, Norton |
|
|
What is history and philosophy of science?
What is (Integrated) History and
Philosophy of Science?
What is History of Science?
What is Philosophy of Science?
Added February 9: How
to Integrate History of Science and Philosophy of Science
|
Norton
|
|
|
The professionalization of history and philosophy of
science.
|
|
|
|
Departments and programs in history and philosophy of science |
Michael Dietrich |
|
|
&HPS: Committee for Integrated history
and Philosophy of Science
HOPOS: History of Philosophy of Science (society)
&HPS, HOPOS |
Norton |
|
|
Journals
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science
(Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics;
Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical
Sciences)
HOPOS journal
Perspectives on Science
Other journals? |
Michael Dietrich |
|
|
Overview of readings |
Michael Dietrich, Norton |
|
|
HPS and Science in General |
|
2
|
Jan. 19
Remote
|
Ludwig Fleck, Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.(1935, translation 1979) Ch.2:
Section 3 The Tenacity of Systems of
Opinion and the Harmony of Illusions; Viewpoints as Autonomous,
Style-Permeated Structures and Section 4 Introduction
to thought Collective
pp. 27-51.
|
Kyra Hoerr
handout
|
|
|
Herbert Butterfield, Origins of Modern Science: 1300-1800. 1949.
New ed. New York: MacMillan, 1957. Introduction, pp.vi-x. Ch.
V. The Experimental Method of the Seventeenth Century. |
Stephen Perry
handout
|
|
|
Alexandre Koyré, "Preface" to From the Closed World to the
Infinite Universe. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1957. "The
significance of the Newtonian Synthesis," Ch. 1 in Newtonian
Studies. London: Chapman & Hall, 1965. |
Brett Park
handout
|
3
|
Jan. 26
Remote
|
Thomas Kuhn, "What are Scientific Revolutions?" Ch. 6, pp. 71-88
in L. Patton, ed., Philosophy, Science, and History. New
York: Routledge, 2014. (For
background, see also Thomas Kuhn "Revolutions as Changes of World
View" Ch. IX in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
University of Chicago Press, 1962; 3rd. ed. 1996.)
|
Kyra Hoerr
handout
|
|
|
Imre Lakatos, “History of Science and Its Rational
Reconstructions,”
in PSA 1970. Proceedings of the
Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, Vol.
1970 (1970), pp. 91-136. (Boston Studies in the Philosophy of
Science VIII.)
|
Eric Anderson
handout
|
|
|
Larry Laudan, "The Role of Empirical Problems," Ch. 1 in Progress
and its Problems: Towards a Theory of Scientific Growth.
Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977. |
Clara Bueno
slides
|
4
|
Feb. 2
|
Paul K. Feyerabend, "Problems of Empiricism,"
pp. 145-261 in R. G. Colodny, ed., Beyond
the Edge of Certainty: Essays in Contemporary Science and
Philosophy. Lanham, NY: University Press of American, 1965,
1983.
This is a long article. Focus on how Feyerabend arrives at the
failure of "meaning invariance." |
Dejan Makovec
handout
|
|
|
Thomas Kuhn, "The
Invisibility of Revolutions," Ch. XI, oops! Should have
been "The Resolution of Revolutions," Ch XII and Postscript, 5.
Exemplars, Incommensurability and Revolutions, pp.198-217 in The
Structure of Scientific Revolutions. |
Caitlin Mace
handout
|
|
|
John D. Norton "Dense
and Sparse Meaning Spaces: When Referential Stability Fails
and Succeeds" ms. |
Norton
slides |
5
|
Feb. 9
|
Pierre Duhem, The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory, trans.
Philip P. Wiener (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
1954), pp. 180-95, 208-18.
|
Caitlin Mace
slides
|
|
|
Larry Laudan and Jarrett Leplin, , “Empirical Equivalence and
Underdetermination”, Journal of Philosophy, 88 (1991), pp.
449–472. |
Elmo Feiten
handout
|
|
|
Kyle Stanford, "Chapter 2: Chasing Duhem," Exceeding Our
Grasp: Science, History and the Problem of Unconceived
Alternatives (Oxford, 2006). Available
online through the Pitt LIbrary.
|
Robert Marshall
handout
|
6
|
Feb. 16
|
Laudan, Larry. "A Confutation of
Convergent Realism", Philosophy of Science, Vol. 48, No.
1, (Mar. 1981): 19–49.
|
Kamyar Asasi
slides
|
|
|
K. Brad Wray "Pessimistic Inductions: Four Varieties," International
Studies in the Philosophy of Science, 29:1,(2015), pp. 61-73
|
Jordan Olson
slides
|
|
|
Elay Shech. “Historical Inductions Meet the Material Theory.” Philosophy
of Science, 86 (December 2019), pp. 918–929. |
Brett Park
handout
|
7
|
Feb. 23
|
Rachel Laudan, Larry Laudan, and Arthur Donovan, "Testing
Scientific Theories," in Donovan, Arthur, Larry Laudan, and Rachel
Laudan, eds. Scrutinizing science: empirical studies of
scientific change. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1988. pp. 3-43.
|
Stephen Perry
handout 1
handout
2
|
|
|
Henry Frankel, "Plate Tectonics and Inter-Theory Relations," in
Donovan, Arthur, Larry Laudan, and Rachel Laudan, eds. Scrutinizing
science: empirical studies of scientific change. Dordrecht:
Kluwer, 1988, pp. 269-288. |
Eric Anderson
slides
|
|
|
John Nichols, "Plank's Quantum Crisis and the Shifts in Guiding
Assumptions," in Donovan, Arthur, Larry Laudan, and Rachel Laudan
eds. Scrutinizing science: empirical studies of scientific
change. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1988, 317-335. |
Brett Park
slides
|
|
|
HPS and the Individual Sciences
|
|
8
|
Mar. 2
|
Charles Darwin, On the
Origin of Species, First Edition.
Study the table of contents and then the summaries at the ends of
chapters 1-4 on page 43, 58-59, 78-79, 126-130. Please skim
Chapter 4.
|
Clara Bueno
|
|
|
M. J. S. Hodge, 1992. “Darwin's
Argument in the Origin,” Philosophy of Science 59:3,
461-464 |
Eric Anderson
slides
|
|
|
John D. Norton, Selections from Ch.8 and
9, "Inference to the Best Explanation." Material
Theory of Induction.
Skim as needed in Chapters 8 and 9 to
see the problem posed and how a solution is attempted. Read
Sections 9.4 (Darwin and the Origin of Species) and 9.5
(Lyell's Principles of Geology).
|
Norton
slides
|
9.
|
Mar. 9
|
Spring Break
|
|
10.
|
Mar. 16
|
Gerald Holton, "Einstein, Michelson, and the "Crucial" Experiment"
Isis, Vol. 60, No. 2 (Summer, 1969), pp. 132-197.
Did Einstein know of the
Michelson-Morley experiment prior to 1905? New evidence from his
correspondence says he did. John Stachel, "Einstein and Ether
Drift Experiments," Physics Today, May 1987, pp. 45-47.
|
Robert Marshall
slides
|
|
|
Elie Zahar, "Einstein's Heuristics" Section 2 in Part II of
"Why Did Einstein's Programme Supersede Lorentz's?" The British
Journal for the Philosophy of Science, Part I: Vol. 24, No. 2
(Jun., 1973), pp. 95-123; Part II: Vol. 24, No. 3 (Sep., 1973), pp.
223-262. |
Dejan Makovec
|
|
|
John D. Norton, "How
Einstein Did Not Discover," Physics in Perspective, 18 (2016),
pp. 249-282.
Background: John D. Norton, "Einstein's
Special Theory of Relativity and the Problems in the
Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies that Led him to it." pp.
72-102 in Cambridge Companion to Einstein, M. Janssen and
C. Lehner, eds., Cambridge University Press. |
Norton
slides
|
11.
|
Mar. 23
|
Harry M. Collins, "Detecting Gravitational
Radiation: The Experimenters' Regress," Ch. 4 in Changing
Order: Replication and Induction in Scientific Practice.
London: Sage, 1985.
|
Elmo Feiten
slides-pptx
slides-pdf
|
|
|
Allan Franklin, "How to Avoid the Experimenters’ Regress," Studies
in History and Philosophy of Science, Vol. 25, No. 3, (1994),
pp. 463-491.
Background: Collins' reply: "A Strong
Confirmation of the Experimenters’ Regress," Studies in
History and Philosophy of Science, Vol. 25, No. 3, (1994),
pp. 493-503. |
Brett Park
slides
|
|
|
Ben Almassi, "Conflicting Expert Testimony and the Search for
Gravitational Waves," Philosophy of Science, 76 (December
2009) pp. 570–584. |
Jordan Olson
slides
|
12.
|
Mar. 30
|
Miriam Solomon, “Social Empiricism,” Nous 28 (1994), pp.
325-343.
|
Kyra Hoerr
handout
|
|
|
Naomi Oreskes, “The Devil is in the (Historical) Details:
Continental Drift as a Case of Normatively Appropriate Consensus?” Perspectives
on Science 16(2008), pp. 253-264.
|
Sloane Wesloh
slides
|
|
|
Helen Longino, "Cognitive and Non-Cognitive Values in Science:
Rethinking the Dichotomy," in L. H. Nelson and J. Nelson,
Feminism, Science, and Philosophy of Science. Kluwer Academic
Publishers, 1996, pp. 39-58. |
Clara Bueno
|
13.
|
Apr. 6
|
Basalla, George. 1967. “The Spread of Western Science”, Science
156: 611-622.
|
Jordan Olson
slides
|
|
|
Raj, K. 2013. "Beyond postcolonialism ... and postpositivism:
circulation and the global history of science," Isis. 104 (2):
337-47. |
Stephen Perry
handout
|
|
|
Jouni-Matti Kuukkanen, “I am knowledge. Get me out of here! On
Localism and the Universality of Science,” Studies in the History
and Philosophy of Science 42 (2011) 590-601.
|
Sloane Wesloh
slides
|
14.
|
Apr. 13
|
Jan Golinski, "Thomas Kuhn and Interdisciplinary Conversation: Why
Historians and Philosophers of Science Stopped Talking to One
Another,"
Ch. 2 in Seymour Mauskopf and Tad Schmalz, eds., Integrating
History and Philosophy of Science. Springer, 2012.
|
Sloane Wesloh
slides |
|
|
Peter Dear, "Philosophy of Science and its Historical
Reconstructions,"
Ch. 6 in Mauskopf and Schmalz.
|
Kamyar Asasi
slides |
|
|
Hasok Chang, "Beyond Case-Studies: History as Philosophy"
Ch. 8 in Mauskopf and Schmalz. |
Caitlin Mace
slides
|
15.
|
Apr. 20
|
Thomas S. Kuhn, "Revisiting Planck," Historical Studies in
the Physical Sciences , Vol. 14, No. 2 (1984), pp. 231-252.
Kuhn reflects on the apparently
completely traditional historiography in his Black-body
theory and the quantum discontinuity, 1894-1912.
|
Kamyar Asasi
slides |
|
|
Open discussion on history and philosophy of science.
Everyone: please bring an issue
pertaining to HPS to discuss. |
All.
|
|
Apr. 27
|
Comprehensive Exam (HPS PhD Program only)
Details of the exam format are here. |
|
Undated
photo of Allan Franklin and Harry Collins at a History of
Science Society symposium.