display all the ideas for this combination of texts
4 ideas
6809 | Kuhn came to accept that all scientists agree on a particular set of values [Kuhn, by Bird] |
Full Idea: Kuhn later came to accept that there are five values to which scientists in all paradigms adhere: accuracy; consistency with accepted theories; broad scope; simplicity; and fruitfulness. | |
From: report of Thomas S. Kuhn (Reflections on my Critics [1970]) by Alexander Bird - Philosophy of Science Ch.8 | |
A reaction: To shake off the relativism for which Kuhn is notorious, we should begin by asking the question WHY scientists favoured these particular values, rather than (say) bizarreness, consistency with Lewis Carroll, or alliteration. (They are epistemic virtues). |
19652 | How can we mathematically describe a world that lacks humans? [Meillassoux] |
Full Idea: How is mathematical discourse able to describe a reality where humanity is absent? | |
From: Quentin Meillassoux (After Finitude; the necessity of contingency [2006], 1) | |
A reaction: He is referring to the prehistoric world. He takes this to be a key question about the laws of nature. We extrapolate mathematically from the experienced world, relying on the stability of the laws. Must they be necessary to be stable? No, it seems. |
12128 | In theory change, words shift their natural reference, so the theories are incommensurable [Kuhn] |
Full Idea: In transitions between theories words change their meanings or applicability. Though most of the signs are used before and after a revolution - force, mass, cell - the ways they attach to nature has changed. Successive theories are thus incommensurable. | |
From: Thomas S. Kuhn (Reflections on my Critics [1970], §6) | |
A reaction: A very nice statement of the view, from the horse's mouth. A great deal of recent philosophy has been implicitly concerned with meeting Kuhn's challenge, by providing an account of reference that doesn't have such problems. |
19668 | Hume's question is whether experimental science will still be valid tomorrow [Meillassoux] |
Full Idea: Hume's question can be formulated as follows: can we demonstrate that the experimental science which is possible today will still be possible tomorrow? | |
From: Quentin Meillassoux (After Finitude; the necessity of contingency [2006], 4) | |
A reaction: Could there be deep universal changes going on in nature which science could never, even in principle, detect? |