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New perspectives on Pierre Duhem’s The aim and structure of physical theory

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Notes

  1. The expression “historical epistemology” was introduced by Dominique Lecourt in 1969 with reference to Bachelard, but he attributes the paternity to his supervisor Canguilhem; cf. Lecourt (2008, 51).

  2. The French term objet designates here that toward which the theory tends. It is less concrete in its connotations than the term but. One must take into account Duhem’s distinction between the aim of individual theories and the tendency of physical theories.

  3. It is interesting that Duhem calls on Ampère in this context and his recognition that intensity of electrical current is an irreducible property.

  4. The standard English translation misrepresents Duhem in rendering the French positif as positivist or positivistic. Cf. Duhem (1914, 416, 422, 423 and 428) with (1906, 275, 279 and 282).

  5. Duhem misinterpreted Rey, since Rey did not discuss Duhem’s physics in his review. Instead, he thought that Duhem’s philosophy of science was the philosophy of a croyant, in an odd use of the word.

  6. Helge Kragh has suggested in a recent essay (2008) that although Duhem denied that science could be used for apologetic purposes, he apparently thought that the history of science could. Kragh find this “rather surprising, if not inconsistent” (2008, 390). I agree. If the second law of thermodynamics, as applied to the universe as a whole, cannot be used to infer the existence of God, as Duhem thought (1914, 435–440), then neither can the history of statics.

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Correspondence to Anastasios Brenner.

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This specially invited book symposium launches a new series of symposia on old classic books by eminent thinkers whose work has shaped history and philosophy of science.

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Brenner, A., Needham, P., Stump, D.J. et al. New perspectives on Pierre Duhem’s The aim and structure of physical theory . Metascience 20, 1–25 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11016-010-9467-3

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