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Rediscovering Einstein's legacy: How Einstein anticipates Kuhn and Feyerabend on the nature of science
Abstract
Thomas Kuhn and Paul Feyerabend promote incommensurability as a central component of their conflicting accounts of the nature of science. This paper argues that in so doing, they both develop Albert Einstein's views, albeit in different directions. Einstein describes scientific revolutions as conceptual replacements, not mere revisions, endorsing ‘Kant-on-wheels’ metaphysics in light of ‘world change’. Einstein emphasizes underdetermination of theory by evidence, rational disagreement in theory choice, and the non-neutrality of empirical evidence. Einstein even uses the term ‘incommensurable’ specifically to apply to challenges posed to comparatively evaluating scientific theories in 1949, more than a decade before Kuhn and Feyerabend. This analysis shows how Einstein anticipates substantial components of Kuhn and Feyerabend's views, and suggests that there are strong reasons to suspect that Kuhn and Feyerabend were directly inspired by Einstein's use of the term ‘incommensurable’, as well as his more general methodological and philosophical reflections.
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... It was, according to Lakatos, precisely because Feyerabend admired Marx so enormously that Lakatos himself wrote in his letter to him: "Just imagine a statue of me to the right of Marx and a statue of you to his left in Highgate Cemetery". 44 However, while praising Marx, Feyerabend criticized the followers of Marx of his own time in the following terms: "His followers of today are uneducated barbarians […] As far as style is concerned, although somewhat unrefined, Papa Marx almost surpasses all of them. Marx's style is substantial, rich in content, interesting, not an insipid sauce…". ...
... 48 Nonetheless, Feyerabend, as "the worst enemy of science," was against modern science. Thus, contemporary Marxists and leftists seemed dissat- 44 ...
This article discusses the relationship between Paul Feyerabend and Marxism. Feyerabend mentioned, referenced, quoted, discussed or commented on the following Marxists, communists or leftists in his writings: Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, MAO, Fidel Castro, Karl Kautsky, Eduard Bernstein, Rosa Luxemburg, Leon Trotsky, Bertolt Brecht, Hanns Eisler, Walter Hollitscher, Georg Lukacs, Ernst Bloch, Herbert Marcuse, Theodor Adorno, Jürgen Habermas, Joseph Needham, Jean-Paul Sartre, Walter Benjamin, Louis Althusser, Daniel Cohn-Benit and Robin Blackburn. On numerous occasions he discussed and commented on Dadaism, Marxism, communism, anarchism, liberalism, dialectical materialism, reductive materialism and, especially, eliminative materialism. He originated a Dadaistic philosophy, and in particular a Dadaistic epistemology. He did not convert to dialectical materialism; nevertheless, Dadaism seems highly relevant to Marxism and communism. As a Dadaist in philosophy he could well have been a Marxist, a non-Marxist, or an anti-Marxist.
... Feyerabend (1963, 191);Feyerabend (1965, 218); on Einstein's influence on Feyerabend, see alsoOberheim (2016).7 On the account of measurement that Feyerabend proposed in this paper, see alsoKuby and Fraser (2022).8 ...
Bohr’s work in quantum mechanics posed a challenge to philosophers of science, who struggled with the question of whether and to what degree his theories and methods could be considered rational. This paper focuses on Popper, Feyerabend, Lakatos and Kuhn, all of whom recognized some irrational, dogmatic, paradoxical or even inconsistent features in Bohr’s work. Popper, Feyerabend and Lakatos expressed strong criticism of Bohr’s approach to quantum physics, while Kuhn argued that such criticism was unlikely to be fruitful: progress in science is generally not made through philosophical reflection. Feyerabend’s criticism of Bohr gradually weakened, as he gained a more detailed understanding of the development of Bohr’s views on quantum mechanics, and this went together with an increasingly critical view of normative philosophy of science and was instrumental to his conversion to ‘anarchism’. This paper aims to show that quantum mechanics played a central role in their debates and disagreements on the rationality of science and the possibility of a normative philosophy of science.
... Duhem stresses this point in his (1954, which Einstein repeated. For detailed references and discussion, see Howard (1990) and Oberheim (2016). 36. ...
This collection of original essays offers a comprehensive examination of scientific progress, which has been a central topic in recent debates in philosophy of science.
Traditionally, debates concerning scientific progress have focused on different methodological approaches, notably the epistemic and semantic approaches. The chapters in Part I of the book defend these two traditional approaches, as well as the newly revived functional and newly developed understanding-based approaches. Part II features in-depth case studies of scientific progress from the history of science. The chapters cover individual sciences including physics, chemistry, evolutionary biology, seismology, psychology, sociology, economics, and medicine. Finally, Part III of the book explores important issues from contemporary philosophy of science. These chapters address the implications of scientific progress for the scientific realism/anti-realism debate, incommensurability, values in science, idealisation, scientific speculation, interdisciplinarity, and scientific perspectivalism.
New Philosophical Perspectives on Scientific Progress will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working on the history and philosophy of science.
... Not only physical images of scientists but also their images of their scientific study characteristics have been evaluated in secondary science books. This is especially associated with the fact that students develop their understanding of the nature of science by this way Acevedo-Diaz & Garcia-Carmona, 2016a;Acevedo-Diaz & Garcia-Carmona, 2016b;Oberheim, 2016;Wolfensberger & Canella, 2015). Canella, 2015). ...
The aim of this study is to examine the profiles of scientists in textbooks prepared to be taught in high school science courses in Turkey. The sample of this study consists of 33 high school science textbooks prepared by the Ministry of National Education Publishing House for both general high schools and science high schools and by private publishing houses for the textbooks of biology, physics and chemistry courses at high schools in 2018-2019 academic year. Document analysis design, which is one of the qualitative research methods is used in this study. The data of the study are analyzed in terms of gender, nationalities, physical characteristics, the types of scientific study and working environments of the scientists in the textbooks according to class level, science field and the type of publishing house. According to the results of the study, there is no balanced distribution of gender and nationality in textbooks. In addition, it has been found that scientists are represented as stereotypes and the working environments and forms are largely ambiguous. The results of this study indicate that the descriptions of scientists made in secondary school science textbooks should be rearranged in Turkey.
... It must be emphasized, however, that recognizing diversity in science is an indispensable act, especially in such critical moments through the course of the development of science that can be qualified as crises and usually lead to the emergence of new scientific paradigms. Therefore, it is quite natural that in the works of Albert Einstein researchers discover statements that allow viewing this great physicist as a predecessor of Kuhn and Feyerabend [Oberheim, 2016]. Einstein insists that the scientist on the eve of a revolutionary discovery must be "an unscrupulous opportunist", ready to use any approach to the interpretation of the world [Einstein, 1998, p. 683]. ...
This article discusses mechanisms of demarcation in science, as a case of establishing identity - one of the topical problems of contemporary cultural studies. Evidently, the quality of cultural interaction depends on the status of the other in relation to one's identity. Contemporary cultural studies distinguish two types of this interaction: exclusion, i.e. suppression of the other as a condition for the formation of one's identity; and inclusion, a retrieval of the excluded, leading to the transformation of one's identity. This article claims that the historical epistemology, as a special approach to the history of science, has elaborated a number of strategies regulating the relationship of science and non-science in the form of an attitude of present science towards its past. The article examines four of these strategies - three of them construct the identity of science through establishing boundaries and by excluding the other; the fourth presupposes acknowledging the other and endowing it with actuality. The last strategy demonstrates the dialogue between science and its other in action and, more importantly, identifies the necessary condition for the successful interaction - the destruction of a homogeneous scientific identity and allowance of self-identification to continue without end. Consequently, studying the types of interaction between scientific and non-scientific views in the field of historical epistemology allows one to conceptualize the general procedure of establishing cultural identification.
Quello dell'incommensurabilità delle relazioni che l'uomo istituisce, pratica, conosce e discute, è un tema antico. Emerge dal profondo della storia e del simbolismo stesso con cui si forma la cultura Occidentale e ne influenza ciclicamente l'assetto delle credenze di base, ivi incluse quelle relative ai fondamenti della conoscenza e della giustizia. La sua razionalizzazione nella classicità conduce, con sorprendente lucidità, al cuore del problema giuridico: quello della necessità di una decisione-riconoscibile pubblicamente come razionale-su un conflitto in periclitante rischio di degenerare nella violenza. Keywords: incommensurabilità, retorica, diritto, metafora SOMMARIO: Introduzione-1. Una vicenda esemplare-2. Incommensurabilità epistemica-3. Incommensurabilità pratica-4. Diritto e incommensurabilità: il ruolo delle comunità giuridiche. Introduzione 'Incommensurabile' è, propriamente, qualcosa che non si può rapportare ad altro nella modalità della misura. Quest'ultima presuppone la possibilità di istituire una comparazione tra due elementi in ragione di un'unità prestabilita, detta per l'appunto unità di misura, in funzione della quale essi sono accomunati ed ordinati. Così, per fare degli esempi, due pugili che intendano affrontarsi sul ring devono essere accomunati dall'appartenere alla medesima categoria: sono commisurati in riferimento ad uno standard dato dalla misurazione del peso corporeo nel momento in cui combattono. Analogamente, i corsi di laurea possono essere accomunati dalla misura delle rispettive durate: parlando ad esempio di "lauree
Interpreting Kuhn provides a comprehensive, up-to-date study of Thomas Kuhn's philosophy and legacy. With twelve essays newly written by an international group of scholars, it covers a wide range of topics where Kuhn had an influence. Part I deals with foundational issues such as Kuhn's metaphysical assumptions, his relationship to Kant and Kantian philosophy, as well as contextual influences on his writing, including Cold War psychology and art. Part II tackles three Kuhnian concepts: normal science, incommensurability, and scientific revolutions. Part III deals with the Copernican Revolution in astronomy, the theory-ladenness of observation, scientific discovery, Kuhn's evolutionary analogies, and his theoretical monism. The volume is an ideal resource for advanced students seeking an overview of Kuhn's philosophy, and for specialists following the development of Kuhn scholarship.
Interpreting Kuhn provides a comprehensive, up-to-date study of Thomas Kuhn's philosophy and legacy. With twelve essays newly written by an international group of scholars, it covers a wide range of topics where Kuhn had an influence. Part I deals with foundational issues such as Kuhn's metaphysical assumptions, his relationship to Kant and Kantian philosophy, as well as contextual influences on his writing, including Cold War psychology and art. Part II tackles three Kuhnian concepts: normal science, incommensurability, and scientific revolutions. Part III deals with the Copernican Revolution in astronomy, the theory-ladenness of observation, scientific discovery, Kuhn's evolutionary analogies, and his theoretical monism. The volume is an ideal resource for advanced students seeking an overview of Kuhn's philosophy, and for specialists following the development of Kuhn scholarship.
It is well known that most of Feyerabend’s ideas on epistemological anarchism developed as a constant dialogue with Imre Lakatos (cf. Motterlini, 1999). Furthermore, in developing his ideas, Feyerabend was constantly critiquing both Karl Popper and Lakatos. In order to facilitate a better understanding of the debate between Feyerabend and Lakatos, here I present a brief description of the Lakatosian Methodology of Scientific Research Programs (MSRP). (I am grateful to David Geelan for this suggestion). According to Lakatos (1970) the basic unit of appraisal must not be an isolated theory or conjunction of theories but rather a “research program,” with a conventionally accepted “hard core” and with a “positive heuristic” which defines problems, outlines the construction of a “belt of auxiliary hypotheses,” foresees anomalies and turns them victoriously into examples, all according to a preconceived plan. The “negative heuristic” represents the “hard core” of the program, consisting of basic assumptions considered “irrefutable” by the methodological decision of its protagonists, and does not allow modus tollens to de directed at this hard core. The positive heuristic represents the construction of a “protective belt” consisting of a partially articulated set of suggestions or hints on how to change, develop the “refutable variants” of the program. The positive heuristic saves the scientist from becoming confused in the “ocean of anomalies” by directing the modus tollens at the “auxiliary hypotheses”. The scientist lists anomalies, but as long as his research program sustains its momentum, he may freely put them aside, and it is primarily the positive heuristic of the program, and not the anomalies, which dictate the choice of problems.
What could the unity and diversity of the sciences consist in? In the heyday of logical empiricism, the answer to the title question was easy. The sciences stand in hierarchical order, and the diversity of the sciences is domesticated by reduction relations among them, leading to their unity. However, in the 1960s Feyerabend and Kuhn claimed that these reduction relations cannot be that simple because usually, the concepts of the involved sciences do not fit neatly together. Instead, there are conceptual incongruities between them, which where baptized “incommensurability”. This holds both diachronically, that is for precursor and successor theories, and synchronically, that is for sciences whose subject matter is some whole and sciences whose subject matter is their parts, respectively. If one does not accept the resulting, seemingly unbridgeable diversity of the sciences, one needs a different viewpoint. This viewpoint may be delivered by “Systematicity Theory” that is a new general philosophy of science. Systematicity theory claims that all sciences exhibit, in several dimensions, a higher degree of systematicity, when compared with everyday knowledge. However, as the concept of systematicity varies with the different disciplines and sub-disciplines, the unity among the sciences generated by systematicity is of the Wittgensteinian family resemblance kind which, at the same time, respects their diversity.
This paper aims to show that the development of Feyerabend’s philosophical ideas in the 1950s and 1960s largely took place in the context of debates on quantum mechanics.
In particular, he developed his influential arguments for pluralism in science in discussions with the quantum physicist David Bohm, who had developed an alternative approach to quantum physics which (in Feyerabend’s perception) was met with a dogmatic dismissal by some of the leading quantum physicists. I argue that Feyerabend’s arguments for theoretical pluralism and for challenging established theories were connected to his objections to the dogmatism and conservatism he observed in quantum physics.
However, as Feyerabend gained insight into the physical details and historical complexities which led to the development of quantum mechanics, he gradually became more modest in his criticisms. His writings on quantum mechanics especially engaged with Niels Bohr; initially, he was critical of Bohr’s work in quantum mechanics, but in the late 1960s, he completely withdrew his criticism and even praised Bohr as a model scientist. He became convinced that however puzzling quantum mechanics seemed, it was methodologically unobjectionable – and this was crucial for his move towards ‘anarchism’ in philosophy of science.
The goal of this paper is to provide an interpretation of Feyerabend's metaphysics of science as found in late works like Conquest of Abundance and Tyranny of Science. Feyerabend's late metaphysics consists of an attempt to criticize and provide a systematic alternative to traditional scientific realism, a package of views he sometimes referred to as “scientific materialism.” Scientific materialism is objectionable not only on metaphysical grounds, nor because it provides a poor ground for understanding science, but because it implies problematic claims about the epistemic and cultural authority of science, claims incompatible with situating science properly in democratic societies. I show how Feyerabend's metaphysical view, which I call “the abundant world” or “abundant realism,” constitute a sophisticated and challenging form of ontological pluralism that makes interesting connections with contemporary philosophy of science and issues of the political and policy role of science in a democratic society.
Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions became the most widely read book about science in the twentieth century. His terms ‘paradigm’ and ‘scientific revolution’ entered everyday speech, but they remain controversial. In the second half of the twentieth century, the new field of cognitive science combined empirical psychology, computer science, and neuroscience. In this book, the theories of concepts developed by cognitive scientists are used to evaluate and extend Kuhn’s most influential ideas. Based on case studies of the Copernican revolution, the discovery of nuclear fission, and an elaboration of Kuhn’s famous ‘ducks and geese’ example of concept learning, this volume, first published in 2006, offers accounts of the nature of normal and revolutionary science, the function of anomalies, and the nature of incommensurability.
Contemporary Philosophy in Focus offers a series of introductory volumes to many of the dominant philosophical thinkers of the current age. Thomas Kuhn (1922–1996), the author of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, is probably the best-known and most influential historian and philosopher of science of the last 25 years, and has become something of a cultural icon. His concepts of paradigm, paradigm change and incommensurability have changed the way we think about science. This volume offers an introduction to Kuhn's life and work and then considers the implications of Kuhn's work for philosophy, cognitive psychology, social studies of science and feminism. The volume is more than a retrospective on Kuhn, exploring future developments of cognitive and information services along Kuhnian lines. Outside of philosophy the volume will be of particular interest to professionals and students in cognitive science, history of science, science studies and cultural studies.
This paper strengthens and defends the pluralistic implications of Einstein's successful, quantitative predictions of Brownian motion for a philosophical dispute about the nature of scientific advance that began between two prominent philosophers of science in the second half of the twentieth century (Thomas Kuhn and Paul Feyerabend). Kuhn promoted a monistic phase-model of scientific advance, according to which a paradigm driven `normal science' gives rise to its own anomalies, which then lead to a crisis and eventually a scientific revolution. Feyerabend stressed the importance of pluralism for scientific progress. He rejected Kuhn's model arguing that it fails to recognize the role that alternative theories can play in identifying exactly which phenomena are anomalous in the first place. On Feyerabend's account, Einstein's predictions allow for a crucial experiment between two incommensurable theories, and are an example of an anomaly that could refute the reigning paradigm only after the development of a competitor. Using Kuhn's specification of a disciplinary matrix to illustrate the incommensurability between the two paradigms, we examine the different research strategies available in this peculiar case. On the basis of our reconstruction, we conclude by rebutting some critics of Feyerabend's argument.
Paul Feyerabend’s work ranged over many of the most exciting questions in twentieth-century philosophy: the nature of meaning and of observation; the relationship between scientific theory and experience; the difference between science and myth; the anatomy of conceptual change; the materialist picture of human beings; the status of common sense; the rationality of science; and the social and political standing of science. His conclusion that there is no such thing as the scientific method earned him a reputation as a relativist and an ‘irrationalist’. This book is the first comprehensive critical study of the major themes in Feyerabend’s philosophy.
Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions can be seen, without exaggeration, as a landmark text in intellectual history. In his analysis of shifts in scientific thinking, Kuhn questioned the prevailing view that science was an unbroken progression towards the truth. Progress was actually made, he argued, via "paradigm shifts", meaning that evidence that existing scientific models are flawed slowly accumulates - in the face, at first, of opposition and doubt - until it finally results in a crisis that forces the development of a new model. This development, in turn, produces a period of rapid change - "extraordinary science," Kuhn terms it - before an eventual return to "normal science" begins the process whereby the whole cycle eventually repeats itself. This portrayal of science as the product of successive revolutions was the product of rigorous but imaginative critical thinking. It was at odds with science's self-image as a set of disciplines that constantly evolve and progress via the process of building on existing knowledge. Kuhn's highly creative re-imagining of that image has proved enduringly influential - and is the direct product of the author's ability to produce a novel explanation for existing evidence and to redefine issues so as to see them in new ways.
The incredible achievements of modern scientific theories lead most of us to embrace scientific realism: the view that our best theories offer us at least roughly accurate descriptions of otherwise inaccessible parts of the world like genes, atoms, and the big bang. This book argues that careful attention to the history of scientific investigation invites a challenge to this view that is not well represented in contemporary debates about the nature of the scientific enterprise. The historical record of scientific inquiry, the book suggests, is characterized by the problem of unconceived alternatives. Past scientists have routinely failed even to conceive of alternatives to their own theories and lines of theoretical investigation, alternatives that were both well-confirmed by the evidence available at the time and sufficiently serious as to be ultimately accepted by later scientific communities. The book supports this claim with a detailed investigation of the mid-to-late 19th-century theories of inheritance and generation proposed in turn by Charles Darwin, Francis Galton, and August Weismann. It goes on to argue that this historical pattern strongly suggests that there are equally well-confirmed and scientifically serious alternatives to our own best theories that remain currently unconceived. Moreover, this challenge is more serious than those rooted in either the so-called pessimistic induction or the underdetermination of theories by evidence, in part because existing realist responses to these latter challenges offer no relief from the problem of unconceived alternatives itself.
Medical science, whose range is as vast as its history is old, has led to the formation of a specific style in the grasping of its problems and of a specific way of treating medical phenomena, i.e. to a specific type of thinking. In substance such separateness of the way of thinking is nothing extraordinary. One has only to realize the difference between the way of thinking of a scientist and that of a humanist, even if the subject in question is the same: for example, how great is the difference, and how great is the impossibility of a direct juxtaposition, between psychology as science and as a branch of philosophy. Even the very subject of medical cognition differs in principle from that of scientific cognition. A scientist looks for typical, normal phenomena, while a medical man studies precisely the atypical, abnormal, morbid phenomena. And it is evident that he finds on this road a great wealth and range of individuality of these phenomena which form a great number, without distinctly delimited units, and abounding in transitional, boundary states. There exists no strict boundary between what is healthy and what is diseased, and one never finds exactly the same clinical picture again. But this extremely rich wealth of forever different variants is to be surmounted mentally, for such is the cognitive task of medicine. How does one find a law for irregular phenomena? - this is the fundamental problem of medical thinking. In what way should they be grasped and what relations should be adopted between them in order to obtain a rational understanding?
(1) Linguistic arguments play a very important role in contemporary philosophical discussion. It is believed that they are capable of refuting age old philosophical theses and to provide a short-cut to the solution of philosophical problems. If this belief should turn out to be correct, then we would possess here a very powerful eliminative instrument which could be applied even before a theory has been developed to such an extent that empirical examination becomes possible. However, such an instrument is a two-sided sword. Curtailing philosophical speculation it may curtail scientific investigation also. It may even arrest scientific progress. It is this conjecture which has prompted me to examine the matter in some detail.
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On this occasion, and in this place, I feel that I ought, and am probably expected, to look back at the things which have happened to the philosophy of science since I first began to take an interest in it over half a century ago. But I am both too much an outsider and too much a protagonist to undertake that assignment. Rather than attempt to situate the present state of philosophy of science with respect to its past — a subject on which I’ve little authority — I shall try to situate my present state in philosophy of science with respect to its own past — a subject on which, however imperfect, I’m probably the best authority there is.
As a number of you know, I’m at work on a book, and what I mean to attempt here is an exceedingly brief and dogmatic sketch of its main themes. I think of my project as a return, now underway for a decade, to the philosophical problems left over from the Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
If you wish to learn from the theoretical physicist anything about the methods which he uses, I would give you the following piece of advice: Don't listen to his words, examine his achievements. For to the discoverer in that field, the constructions of his imagination appear so necessary and so natural that he is apt to treat them not as the creations of his thoughts but as given realities.
This paper reconsiders the challenge presented to scientific realism by the semantic incommensurability thesis. A twofold distinction is drawn between methodological and semantic incommensurability, and between semantic incommensurability due to variation of sense and due to discontinuity of reference. Only the latter presents a challenge to scientific realism. The realist may dispose of this challenge on the basis of a modified causal theory of reference, as argued in the author’s 1994 book, The incommensurability thesis. This referential response has been the subject of a charge of meta-incommensurability by Hoyningen-Huene et al. (1996), who argue that the realist’s referential response begs the question against anti-realist advocates of incommensurability. In reply, it is noted that a tu quoque rejoinder is available to the realist. It is also argued that the dialectical situation favours the scientific realist, since the anti-realist defence of incommensurability depends on an incoherent distinction between phenomenal world and world-in-itself. In light of such incoherence, and a strong commonsense presumption in favour of realism, the referential response to semantic incommensurability may be justifiably based on realism.
Part I. The Semantic Tradition: 1. Kant, analysis, and pure intuition 2. Bolzano and the birth of semantics 3. Geometry, pure intuition and the a priori 4. Frege's semantics and the a priori in arithmetic 5. Meaning and ontology 6. On denoting 7. Logic in transition 8. A logico-philosophical treatise Part II Vienna, 1925-1935: 9. Schlick before Vienna 10. Philosophers on relativity 1. Carnap before Vienna 12. Scientific idealism and semantic idealism 13. Return of Ludwig Wittgenstein 14. A priori knowledge and the constitution of meaning 15. The road to syntax 16. Syntax and truth 17. Semantic conventionalism and the factuality of meaning 18. The problem of induction: theories 19. The problems of experience: protocols Notes References Index.