Raphael Scholl
University of Bern, Switzerland
Academic Year 2014-15
From a Causal Point of View: Rethinking Confirmation, Discovery, Realism and Theory Change in the Biomedical Sciences

Raphael Scholl obtained degrees in medicine (1999-2005) and history and philosophy of science (2003-2007) from the University of Bern in Switzerland. His dissertation research at Bern's Institute of Cell Biology concerned the regulation of RNA splicing (Dr. med., 2007). From 2008 to 2014, he was at the department of philosophy of the University of Bern. He is currently financed by a Swiss National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellowship.

Believing that a tightly integrated history and philosophy of science remains the most promising metascientific project, Raphael is co-editing a volume on the methodological challenges of the HPS approach. "The philosophy of historical case studies" is under contract with the Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science.

In the remainder of his time in Pittsburgh, Raphael will work on a project to extend the new mechanistic approach in the philosophy of the life sciences to important traditional issues such as scientific realism and long-term theory change.