History of Science from Newton to the present Spring Semester 2008

Transcription

1 HSCI 3023 Honors History of Science from Newton to the present Spring Semester 2008 Instructor: Peter Barker tel.: Office: PHSC 617 Office hours: TuTh 10:30-11:15, or by appointment. What: HSCI Where: Adams 112 When: TuTh 9:00-10:15 Course Goals: To acquaint students with the main theories of the universe in the Western scientific tradition, how they changed, and why they changed, from the time of Newton to the present; to develop skills in the critical evaluation of texts and the reasoned defense of conclusions reached by the individual. Reading Readings form background to class material for the week they are listed and should be read before class (if possible!). Texts: Peter J. Bowler and Iwan Rhys Morus Making Modern Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). Study guide for Bowler & Morus. Robert Jungk Brighter Than a Thousand Suns: A Personal History of the Atomic Scientists (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1958). Thomas S. Kuhn The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2nd ed., 1970, or 3rd ed., 1996). Study guide for Kuhn. Andersen, Hanne On Kuhn (New York: Wadsworth, 2001)

2 Recommended texts: Michael Frayn Copenhagen (New York: Anchor Books, 1998) Study guides Study guide for Bowler & Morus. Study guide for Kuhn. Return to top Course outline (last modified 28.iv.08) Week 1 begins Jan 16: General introduction. Kuhn Preface and chap. I; Bowler and Morus chap. 1; Andersen chap.'s 1-3 Week 2 begins Jan 21: Newtonian astronomy as normal science. Kuhn chap. II-V; Bowler and Morus chap. 2; Jan 22 O&P test Week 3 begins Jan 28: Lavoisier's chemistry as revolutionary science. Kuhn chap. VI - IX; Bowler and Morus chap. 3; Andersen chap.'s 4, 6.2, 6.3 Week 4 begins Feb 4: Background to Darwin. Bowler and Morus chap. 5 Week 5 begins Feb 11: The Darwinian revolution? Bowler and Morus chap. 6 Week 6 begins Feb 18: The surprising reception of Darwinism. Bowler and Morus chap. 15, 7 Week 7 begins Feb 25: Life since Darwin. Bowler and Morus chap.' s 8,9 Feb 28EXAM #1 Week 8 begins Mar 3: Early quantum theory and atomic physics. Bowler and Morus ch. 11; Junck ch. 1-4 Friday Mar 7: Research paper outline due. Week 9 begins Mar 10: The decision to build the bomb. Junck ch. 5-6: Frayn Copenhagen; Bohr's reply to Heisenberg S P R I N G B R E A K Mar Week 10 begins Mar 24: The Manhattan project and the decision to use the bomb - I; Junck ch. 7-10

3 Week 11 begins Mar 31: The Manhattan project and the decision to use the bomb - II. Junck ch ; Bowler and Morus ch. 20 Week 12 begins Apr 07: The Hydrogen Bomb and the Cold War. April 10 EXAM #2 Week 13 begins Apr 14: Current controversies I: Nuclear power and fossil fuels.thursday Apr. 17: Last day to submit research paper 1st draft (optional). Week 14 begins Apr 21: Current controversies II: Climate change. Thursday Apr. 24: Last day to submit research paper final draft. Week 15 begins April 28: The Past and Future of Science. Kuhn XII-XIII; Bowler and Morus ch. 21, 22. Monday May 5 Exam #3 (Final): 8:00-10:00am Return to top Grades There will be a graded test covering course organization and policies on Tuesday January 22. There will also be three essay exams during regular class hours, #1 on Thursday Feb 28, #2 on Thursday April 10, #3 (the final exam) on Monday May 5. Essay questions will be posted on this site, one week before each exam. Students may consult books and notes during these exams, but transcription of complete answers is prohibited. Each student will also complete a research paper, based on an approved and graded outline. Grades will be computed as follows: O&P Test = 5%; Exam 1, 2 = 15% each, exam 3 = 20% ; research paper outline = 5%; research paper = 20%, class participation = 20%. There is no curve. Make up examinations and late delivery of essays will not be permitted except under circumstances of emergency or illness, verifiable to the satisfaction of the Instructor. Return to top Extra Credit is available for all exams except the Final Academic honesty We assume you understand and adhere to the norms of academic honesty stated in A Student's Guide to Academic Integrity at the University of Oklahoma. We also assume you are honest unless proven otherwise, so if you are not sure about something ask us. We encourage you to work together (and with us) to prepare for class, exams and essays -- on the understanding that the final version is all your own work. 'Plagiarism' used to mean copying out of a book. Electronic media like Encarta and Wikipedia pose special problems. While we encourage you to

4 use them as sources of ideas and information, no sentence that you submit as your own work should be identical to any sentence in a book or electronic medium. If we judge that work you submit fails to meet these standards, the following things will happen: (1) On the first occasion, you will be asked to amend the work and resubmit it to receive a grade. (2) On the second occasion you will receive a formal admonition, as explained in Rights and Responsibilities under the Academic Misconduct Code, and a grade of zero for the work. (3) On the third occasion, a complaint of academic misconduct will be filed, as explained in Rights and Responsibilities under the Academic Misconduct Code. Students with disabilities Students in this course who have any disability that may prevent them from fully demonstrating their abilities should contact the Instructor as soon as possible to discuss accommodations necessary to ensure full participation and facilitate their educational opportunities.

5 Study guide for Peter J. Bowler and Iwan Rhys Morus Making Modern Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). C H A P T E R 1 1. What was a Whig? How does a concept like "Whig history" apply in the history of science, where there are no political parties? 2. Why do you think "... some scientists find the results uncomfortable" when historians of science reject "Whig" histories? 3. "The history of science certainly challenges many of the myths created by those who present science as a disembodied search for truth -- but does it necessarily support those who claim that science is no more than the expression of a particular value system?"(b&m, p.3) How do the authors respond to this question in the remainder of the chapter? 4. Who coined the term "scientist" and when? What did scientists call themselves before that? 5. Have science and religion always been believed to conflict? 6. "The first specialist [history of science] departments only began to flourish after World War II..." When was OU's department founded? Hint: 7. What were "Merton's norms"? 8. Which side of the "Science Wars" do the authors support? C H A P T E R 2 9. What previous view of the Scientific Revolution is rejected by the authors? 10. What was "the mechanical philosophy" and what predecessor views was it an alternative to? 11. What were the Novum Organon, Due nouve scienze, and Phonurgia nova new accounts of? 12. How did Boyle's conception of scientific method differ from Newton's? 13. If there was no "scientific revolution", in the sense rejected in question (9), is there any legitimate use for the term? Hint: compare the title of Kuhn's book. C H A P T E R What was the aim of alchemy and how did the doctrine of signatures support this aim? 15. What was iatrochemistry? 16. How did pneumatic chemistry differ from alchemy? 17. Why should pneumatic chemistry be counted as part of the "New Science"?

6 18. What was phlogiston, and why did Lavoisier reject it? 19. What two key concepts introduced by Lavoisier did Dalton employ in his atomic theory? 20. Why do B&M deny that Lavoisier's work was a revolution? Why does Kuhn think it is? Who is right? C H A P T E R How did the following viewpoints account for the most important features of the earth's surface? Neptunism; Erosion; Vulcanism; the cooling of the Earth; Ice Ages. 22. What was uniformitarianism? What are most important differences between nineteenthcentury uniformitarianism and the current paradigm in geology? 23. What is a deist? Is there anything odd about the phrase (p. 121) "... religious beliefs, which were deist rather than Christian"? Is a deist more likely to be a uniformitarian? 24. Give an example of a normal science prediction made by Lyell on the basis of uniformitarianism. 25. What category from Kuhn's cyclic model applies to the uniformitarianism belief that the center of the earth is hot, but has not cooled in the course of geological time? 26. Why did the discovery of radioactivity induce a crisis in geology? C H A P T E R What was the system of biological classification introduced by Carl von Linné? How many levels does it now contain? Hint. 28. What were the main differences between Lamarck's 'descent with modification' and Darwinian 'evolution'? 29. What was the argument from design and what role did it play in biology before Darwin? 30. What other writers influenced Darwin's thinking while he was developing his theory of evolution? 31. If H.M.S. Beagle returned to England in 1836, why did Darwin not publish the Origin until 1859?

7 32. Which aspects of Darwin's theory were accepted and which rejected? 33. How did Ernst Haeckel's account of evolution differ from Darwin's? 34. What developments since 1900 revived Darwin's theory? 35. Looking back to the beginning of the chapter if necessary, what was the accepted history of the Darwinian revolution and what, according to the authors, is wrong with that account? C H A P T E R Does Galileo's trial show that religion is naturally opposed to science? 37. What are some of the ways in which Protestantism has been supposed to support science? 38. Which aspects of the Old Testament received the most attention from geologists? 39. Distinguish between Deism, natural theology and Materialism. 40, Why did design arguments reappear in Britain in the early 1800s? Is there any similarity to the case of the United States in the second half of the twentieth century? 41. What prevented Darwinian evolution from being seen as another means of fulfilling divine purpose in nature? 42. Who were "Soapy Sam" and "Darwin's Bulldog"? What did they say to each other at the British Association meeting in 1860? Link 43. What was the main response to the problems of Darwin's theory before 1900? 44. What is the current position of the Catholic church on evolution? Jean Paul II 45. What ideas in nineteenth and twentieth century physics could be used to resist Materialism? C H A P T E R What disciplines effectively replaced 'natural history' as the main life sciences during the nineteenth century? 47. What was the "cell theory"? Who introduced it and when? Did Virchow really produce "the final version of cell theory"? 48. Distinguish vitalism, mechanism and wholism (organicism). Do these positions represent disciplines, theories or paradigms?

8 49. What key idea did Liebig share with Lavoisier? How else did Lavoisier contribute to the development of the life science in the nineteenth century? 50. What discipline played the most important role in founding biology as an academic field? 51. Although this chapter describes the emergence of the modern paradigm in biology from earlier sciences of life, it does so without using the concepts of anomaly and crisis. What historical arguments are introduced to account for the appearance of modern biology? C H A P T E R What are the authors' aims in this chapter? Are they successful? 53. Explain the difference between preformation and epigenesis as theories of embryo development. 54. "Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny." Who said this and what did it mean? 55. If Mendel was not trying to establish "laws of heredity", what was he trying to achieve in the experiments with peas? 56. What was "saltation"? What problem in Darwin's original theory was mutation theory a response to? 57. What are the chief differences between "classical genetics" as developed by Thomas Hunt Morgan before 1919, and the current view of genetics? 58. What problems in classical genetics did the double-helix structure of DNA resolve? 59. What is the "Central Dogma" of molecular biology? Link C H A P T E R Throughout this chapter there is a contrast between positions that are materialistic or reductionistic (which regard complex systems as analyzable without residue into simpler material parts) and holistic or organismic positions (which regard complex systems as more than the sum of their parts). Try to classify each position as it is mentioned. 61. What is an Abrahamic religion? What is "the Abrahamic concept of land"? 62. What was "Humboldtian science"? 63. How did the Dustbowl of the 1930s undermine the "climax population" theory of prairie life? 64. What is "the principle of competitive exclusion"? 65. What is the "Gaia hypothesis"?

9 C H A P T E R What fundamental entity was discovered by J. J. Thomson in 1896? 67. Why did Ernest Rutherford propose that atoms were largely empty space, except for their small, heavy nucleus? 68. What institution did Thomson and Rutherford direct, in succession? 69. How did Niels Bohr resolve the most important defect of Rutherford's atomic model? 70. What is the difference between the Special and General Theories of Relativity? If there was a revolution in physics at the beginning of the twentieth century, what was the paradigm that was replaced, and how many paradigms replaced it? 71. Where was Werner Heisenberg when he developed the Uncertainty Principle? 72. What was the Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics? Why did Schroedinger and Einstein object to it? 73. What fundamental entity was discovered by James Chadwick in 1932? Peter Barker, 2006.

10 Study Guide for Kuhn Structure of Scientific Revolutions Peter Barker Preface 1. What is Kuhn's most fundamental objective' in S.S.R.? 2. What limitations does he acknowledge in the present book? Ch. I: A role for history 3. What is the traditional image of science, and how does Kuhn isolate it? 4. What does Kuhn see as the task of the traditional historian of science? 5. What does this activity presuppose? 6. What is the alternative view of science suggested by Kuhn? 7. How does he view the task of the historian? 8. What aspects of science emerge to prominence in the course of this effort? 9. What three kinds of issues must be settled before "effective research" begins? 10. What is normal science? 11. What is a scientific revolution? 12. "The commitments that govern normal science specify not only what sort of entities the universe does contain, but also, by implication, those that it does not." Suggest an example from earlier in the course to illustrate this point. 13. Is "scientific revolution" a bad choice of phrase for what Kuhn wants to describe? (Compare: "The French Revolution occurred in 1779" with "The Copernican Revolution happened in 1543")

11 Ch. II: The route to normal science 14. What is a paradigm? 15. What are the two essential characteristics which paradigms share? 16. What distinguishes a pre-paradigm period from a paradigm period? 17. What are the historical indicators that a paradigm has been accepted? 18. What is Kuhn's demarcation between science and pseudo-science? Ch. III: The nature of normal science 19. How does Kuhn's use of the term "paradigm" differ from the normal use? 20. What are the three foci of factual investigation in normal or paradigm-based research? 21. What are the three kinds of theoretical work which typify normal science? 22. What is the distinction between factual and theoretical work? 23. What sort of consequences can normal science have for the paradigm which supports it? Ch. IV: Normal science as puzzle solving. 24. Normal science does not aim at "unexpected novelty". What motivates normal science 25. from the viewpoint of the paradigm? 26. from the viewpoint of the individual researcher? 27. How does a puzzle differ from a problem? 28. What gives a scientific problem this status? 29. What becomes of problems which are not converted to puzzles? 30. What do most scientists do? What do most scientists not do? Is Kuhn a pessimist?

12 31. What is the second major parallel between puzzles and normal science? 32. What responses does Kuhn suggest are available to a scientists confronted by an anomaly, as illustrated by the problem of the motion of the moon? 33. What results do each of these have for the current paradigm? 34. The rules obeyed by scientists fall into four major categories. Identify the categories and rank them in order of importance. 35. Looking at your answer to the last question, what principle underlies your ranking? 36. What does Kuhn mean by a methodological commitment? 37. Why is normal science not entirely governed by rules (or commitments)? Ch. V: The priority of paradigms 38. How does Kuhn use the expression "paradigm" on the first page of this chapter? 39. What must be done, beyond paradigm identification, to identify shared rules? 40. In the absence of a competent body of rules, what restricts the scientist to a particular normal scientific tradition? 41. What distinguishes a situation in which "family resemblance" in an appropriate descriptive relation? 42. What are the four reasons Kuhn suggests as support for the view that paradigms function independently of articulated bodies of rules? 43. How many senses of "paradigm" and "rule" are involved in the previous answer? Ch. VI: Anomaly and the emergence of scientific discoveries. 44. "... discoveries... are not isolated events, but extended episodes with a regularly recurrent structure." What are the three aspects of such episodes distinguished by Kuhn? 45. As Kuhn first introduces it, what is meant by the term anomaly?

13 46. By contrast, what are the traditional views of discovery and anomaly? 47. How are fact and theory linked in the discovery of a new phenomenon? 48. Is Roentgen's discovery an example of an anomaly? 49. "Not all theories are paradigm theories." (p. 61) Is this the same as saying that not all theories are scientific theories? 50. How does normal science " cause (anomalies) to arise"? Ch. VII: Crisis and the emergence of scientific theories 51. What is the difference between a crisis and an anomaly? 52. Often discoveries are made or theories are suggested and forgotten for a long time before second historically successful appearance. (Aristarchus is an extreme case.) Is this an embarrassment to the "traditional view" of science? How does Kuhn explain the phenomenon? 53. Why should a "normal scientist" ever recognize an anomaly or construct a new theory? Ch. VIII: The response to crisis. 54. What would happen if anomalies were treated as counterexamples? Why doesn't this happen? 55. What is the "only sort of paradigm rejection to which counterinstances by themselves can lead"? 56. Why is there no such thing as research without counterexamples? 57. "Either no scientific theory every confronts a counterinstance, or all such theories confront counterinstances at all time." (p. 80) Explain. 58. What features of science does Kuhn suggest have lead to the view that in science "truth and falsity are determined by the confrontation of statement with fact"? 59. When someone says, "These experiments are evidence for this theory," is the same mistake being made as when someone says, "Amoebas are blind"? 60. What sort of attendant circumstances enable an anomaly to become a crisis?

14 61. What happens to a paradigm during a crisis phase? 62. What are the universal effects of crisis states? 63. How may a crisis state end? 64. What extraordinary procedures are characteristic of crisis states? 65. "... how an individual invents... a new way of giving order to date... must here remain inscrutable and may be permanently so." (p. 90) How if at all does Kuhn's position differ from the traditional acceptance of a distinction between context of discovery and context of justification? Ch. IX: Nature and necessity of scientific revolutions. 66. What are scientific revolutions? 67. Review q. 13 in the light of What are the two basic similarities between scientific and political revolutions? 68. What are the two main ways in which a theory may be introduced without conflict with other theories? What consequences does the acceptance of these mechanisms as the preferred account of theory introduction have for our description of scientific change? 69. "There are, in principle, only three types of phenomena about which a new theory might be developed." (p. 97) What are they? 70. Why must paradigms, and theories developed under different paradigms, be logically incompatible? Ch. X: Revolutions as changes of World View 71. What sort of change is a change in world view? 72. On what grounds does Kuhn object to Hanson's position (briefly, that change in world view is a perceptual transformation of the kind called by psychologists a "gestalt switch")? 73. What sorts of evidence can historical studies provide in determining the characteristics of perception that are central to scientific development?

15 74. Is Herschel's discovery of Uranus a Paradigm-induced change? If so, what changed, and what aspect of the paradigm induced it? 75. "Many readers will surely want to say that what changes with a paradigm is only the scientists interpretation of observations that are themselves fixed once and for all by the nature of the environment and of the perceptual apparatus." (p. 120) What objections does Kuhn raise to this position? 76. "... Postrevolutionary science invariably includes many of the same manipulations, performed with the same instruments and described in the same terms as its prerevolutionary predecessor." (p. 130) How can such "enduring manipulations" be said to change with change of paradigm? 77. How does the experimental evidence attendant upon the acceptance of Dalton's paradigm fit into the categories suggested earlier in the course for evidence required n replacing one theory by another? Ch. XI: The Invisibility of Revolutions 78. What is the aspect of science introduced in this chapter which "... distinguishes it from any other creative pursuit except perhaps theology."? 79. What is it that scientific texts, popularisations and philosophical works modeled on them have in common? 80. How do textbooks etc. "truncate the scientists sense of his discipline's history and... supply a substitute for what they have eliminated."? 81. If this is true has the scientist lost anything? Has the philosopher of science? 82. If "... the domination of a mature science by... texts significantly differentiates it's developmental pattern from that of other fields" (p. 137), then only cultures with a written language can develop sciences. Suggest some counterexamples. (Hint: the historical component of the course dealt only with the scientific traditions of societies with written languages, specifically ancient Greece and its Western European descendants. Counterexamples should therefore be sought in pre-greek or non-western cultures.) 83. In the light of your answer to #80, is this whole chapter undermined, or do texts, etc. still have a function which previously has gone unnoticed?

16 Ch. XII. The Resolution of Revolutions 84. What are the circumstances which facilitate the transition of the individual scientist from one paradigm to another? Why should these individual concerns be of any interest? 85. When does testing occur? When does testing not occur? 86. What is Kuhn's basic objection to accounts of science which take verification (perhaps augmented by probability or confirmation theory) as their starting point? 87. Do these objections also apply to falsificationist accounts? 88. Which two features of Kuhn's account correspond to the features of science emphasized respectively by verificationists and falsificationists? 89. Why is the choice between two paradigms "not the sort of battle that can be resolved by proofs"? 90. "The transfer of allegiance from paradigm to paradigm is a conversion experience that cannot be forced." (p. 151) In the light of #87, does this mean that paradigm choice is irrational? 91. What sorts of argument does Kuhn suggest are effective in battles over paradigm change? Why are such arguments "neither individually nor collectively compelling"? 92. What, in this chapter, does Kuhn suggest as the key factor in paradigm choice? Ch. XIII: Progress through Revolutions 93. Why does normal science progress? What unique factors facilitate this process? 94. Why does science progress through revolutions? What unique factors aid this process? 95. Are either or both of the Kuhnian answers to #91 and #92 question begging? 96. "Revolutions close with a total victory for one of the two opposing camps." (p. 166) Does Kuhn offer any explanation for the occurrence of this phenomenon in the sciences, but not in the arts or philosophy? 97. In choosing between paradigms, "What better criterion than the decision of the scientific group could there be?" (p. 170)

17 98. Explain the analogy between the evolution of organisms and the evolution of science through paradigm change. If we accept the analogy, what are the consequences for the idea of science as progress towards the truth? Peter Barker 1995