Hermeneutic strategies in Gerd Buchdahl’s Kantian philosophy of science

Gerd Buchdahl’s international reputation rests on his masterly writings on Kant. In them he showed how Kant transformed the philosophical problems of his predecessors and he minutely investigated the ways in which Kant related his critical philosophy to the contents and methods of natural science. Less well known, if only because in large part unpublished, are the writings in which Buchdahl elaborated his own views on the methods and status of the sciences. In this paper I examine the roles of hermeneutics in Buchdahl’s reconstruction of Kant’s philosophical system and in his own ‘transcendental methodological’ approach to the philosophy of science. The first section looks at Buchdahl’s views on the theory and practice of historical interpretation and at the Husserlian hermeneutic scheme of reduction and realisation that he used in his later accounts of the philosophies of science of Kant and himself. The second section concentrates on Buchdahl’s treatment of the grounds of science in Kant; and the third on the hermeneutic strategies Buchdahl employed in articulating and justifying his own views. The paper closes with reflections on the impact and importance of Buchdahl’s interpretation of Kant’s critical philosophy in relation to the sciences and of his own hermeneutically based philosophy of science.     

The rhetorical strategy of William Paley’s Natural theology (1802): Part 1, William Paley’s Natural theology in context

This article reconstructs the historical and philosophical contexts of William Paley’s Natural theology (1802). In the wake of the French Revolution, widely believed to be the embodiment of an atheistic political credo, the refutation of the transmutational biological theories of Buffon and Erasmus Darwin was naturally high on Paley’s agenda. But he was also responding to challenges arising from his own moral philosophy, principally the psychological quandary of how men were to be kept in mind of the Creator. It is argued here that Natural theology was the culmination of a complex rhetorical scheme for instilling religious impressions that would increase both the virtue and happiness of mankind. Philosophy formed an integral part of this strategy, but it did not comprise the whole of it. Equally vital were those purely rhetorical aspects of the discourse which, according to Paley, were more concerned with creating ‘impression’. This facet of his writing is explored in part one of this two-part article. Turning to the argumentative side of the scheme, part two examines Paley’s responses to David Hume and Erasmus Darwin in the light of the wider strategy of inculcation at work throughout all his writings.     

‘Good Sense’ in context: A response to Kidd

In his response to my (2010), Ian Kidd claims that my argument against Stump’s interpretation of Duhem’s concept of ‘good sense’ is unsound because it ignores an important distinction within virtue epistemology. In light of the distinction between reliabilist and responsibilist virtue epistemology, Kidd argues that Duhem can be seen as supporting the latter, which he further illustrates with a discussion of Duhem’s argument against ‘perfect theory’. I argue that no substantive argument is offered to show that the distinction is relevant and can establish that Duhem’s ‘good sense’ can be understood within responsibilist virtue epistemology. I furthermore demonstrate that Kidd’s attempt to support his contention relies on a crucial misreading of Duhem’s general philosophy of science, and in doing so highlight the importance of understanding ‘good sense’ in its original context, that of theory choice.     

Scientific perspectivism: behind the stage door

Adopting the stage metaphor suggested in Brown’s review, and treating Scientific perspectivism as a play in five acts, I respond to his review as a playwright might respond to a generally favorable review. Taking the reader behind the stage door, I discuss the playwright’s intentions for each act, paying special attention to the expected audience for the play as a whole. The result, therefore, supplements the review from the standpoint of the playwright. It also provides answers to some of the reviewer’s questions.     

Hume’s Theorem

A common criticism of Hume’s famous anti-induction argument is that it is vitiated because it fails to foreclose the possibility of an authentically probabilistic justification of induction. I argue that this claim is false, and that on the contrary, the probability calculus itself, in the form of an elementary consequence that I call Hume’s Theorem, fully endorses Hume’s argument. Various objections, including the often-made claim that Hume is defeated by de Finetti’s exchangeability results, are considered and rejected.     

Making sense of Day 1 of the Two New Sciences: Galileo’s Aristotelian-inspired agenda and his Jesuit readers

This study proposes an explanation for the choice of topics Galileo addressed in Day 1 of his 1638 Two New Sciences, a section of the work which has long puzzled historians of science. I argue that Galileo’s agenda in Day 1, that is the topics he discusses and the questions he poses, was shaped by contemporary teaching commentaries on Books 3 through 8 of Aristotle’s Physics. Building on the insights and approach of theorists of reader reception, I confirm this interpretation by examining the response of professors of natural philosophy at the Jesuit Collegio Romano to Galileo’s text.     

Radical mathematical Thomism: beings of reason and divine decrees in Torricelli’s philosophy of mathematics

Evangelista Torricelli (1608-1647) is perhaps best known for being the most gifted of Galileo’s pupils, and for his works based on indivisibles, especially his stunning cubature of an infinite hyperboloid. Scattered among Torricelli’s writings, we find numerous traces of the philosophy of mathematics underlying his mathematical practice. Though virtually neglected by historians and philosophers alike, these traces reveal that Torricelli’s mathematical practice was informed by an original philosophy of mathematics. The latter was dashed with strains of Thomistic metaphysics and theology. Torricelli’s philosophy of mathematics emphasized mathematical constructs as human-made beings of reason, yet mathematical truths as divine decrees, which upon being discovered by the mathematician ‘appropriate eternity’. In this paper, I reconstruct Torricelli’s philosophy of mathematics—which I label radical mathematical Thomism—placing it in the context of Thomistic patterns of thought.     

‘This inscrutable principle of an original organization’: epigenesis and ‘looseness of fit’ in Kant’s philosophy of science

Kant’s philosophy of science takes on sharp contour in terms of his interaction with the practicing life scientists of his day, particularly Johann Blumenbach and the latter’s student, Christoph Girtanner, who in 1796 attempted to synthesize the ideas of Kant and Blumenbach. Indeed, Kant’s engagement with the life sciences played a far more substantial role in his transcendental philosophy than has been recognized hitherto. The theory of epigenesis, especially in light of Kant’s famous analogy in the first Critique (B167), posed crucial questions regarding the ‘looseness of fit’ between the constitutive and the regulative in Kant’s theory of empirical law. A detailed examination of Kant’s struggle with epigenesis between 1784 and 1790 demonstrates his grave reservations about its hylozoist implications, leading to his even stronger insistence on the discrimination of constitutive from regulative uses of reason. The continuing relevance of these issues for Kant’s philosophy of science is clear from the work of Buchdahl and its contemporary reception.     

Gravity’s cause and substance counting: contextualizing the problems

This paper considers Newton’s position on gravity’s cause, both conceptually and historically. With respect to the historical question, I argue that while Newton entertained various hypotheses about gravity’s cause, he never endorsed any of them, and in particular, his lack of confidence in the hypothesis of robust and unmediated distant action by matter is explained by an inclination toward certain metaphysical principles. The conceptual problem about gravity’s cause, which I identified earlier along with a deeper problem about individuating substances, is that a decisive conclusion is impossible unless certain speculative aspects of his empiricism are abandoned. In this paper, I situate those conceptual problems in Newton’s natural philosophy. They arise from ideas that push empiricism to potentially self-defeating limits, revealing the danger of allowing immaterial spirits any place in natural philosophy, especially spatially extended spirits supposed capable of co-occupying place with material bodies. Yet because their source ideas are speculative, Newton’s method ensures that these problems pose no threat to his rational mechanics or the profitable core of his empiricism. They are easily avoided by avoiding their source ideas, and when science emerges from natural philosophy, it does so with an ontology unencumbered by immaterial spirits.     

The intelligibility of motion and construction: Descartes’ early mathematics and metaphysics, 1619-1637

I argue for an interpretation of the connection between Descartes’ early mathematics and metaphysics that centers on the standard of geometrical intelligibility that characterizes Descartes’ mathematical work during the period 1619 to 1637. This approach remains sensitive to the innovations of Descartes’ system of geometry and, I claim, sheds important light on the relationship between his landmark Geometry (1637) and his first metaphysics of nature, which is presented in Le monde (1633). In particular, I argue that the same standard of clear and distinct motions for construction that allows Descartes to distinguish ‘geometric’ from ‘imaginary’ curves in the domain of mathematics is adopted in Le monde as Descartes details God’s construction of nature. I also show how, on this interpretation, the metaphysics of Le monde can fruitfully be brought to bear on Descartes’ attempted solution to the Pappus problem, which he presents in Book I of the Geometry. My general goal is to show that attention to the standard of intelligibility Descartes invokes in these different areas of inquiry grants us a richer view of the connection between his early mathematics and philosophy than an approach that assumes a common method is what binds his work in these domains together.     

Philosophy and history of science: Beyond the Kuhnian paradigm

At issue in this paper is the question of the appropriate relationship between the philosophy and history of science. The discussion starts with a brief sketch of Kuhn's approach, followed by an analysis of the so-called ‘testing-theories-of-scientific-change programme’. This programme is an attempt at a more rigorous approach to the historical philosophy of science. Since my conclusion is that, by and large, this attempt has failed, I proceed to examine some more promising approaches. First, I deal with Hacking's recent views on the issues in question, particularly his notion of a ‘style of reasoning’. Next, Nickles's reconstructionist interpretation of the development of science and his views on Whig history are addressed. Finally, I propose an account of philosophy as a theoretical, an interpretative and explanatory, enterprise. Thus, three alternatives to the Kuhnian paradigm are discussed, alternatives that share a recognition of the relative autonomy of philosophy from history. Hence, they assume a less tight relationship between philosophy and history of science than is the case within the Kuhnian paradigm.     

How not to integrate the history and philosophy of science: a reply to Chalmers

Alan Chalmers uses Robert Boyle’s mechanical philosophy as an example of the irrelevance of ‘philosophy’ to ‘science’ and criticizes my 2006 book Atoms and alchemy for overemphasizing Boyle’s successes. The present paper responds as follows: first, it argues that Chalmers employs an overly simplistic methodology insensitive to the distinction between historical and philosophical claims; second, it shows that the central theses of Atoms and alchemy are untouched by Chalmers’s criticisms; and third, it uses Boyle’s analysis of subordinate causes and his debate with Henry More in the 1670s to demonstrate the inadequacy of Chalmers’s construal of the mechanical philosophy.     

History and scientific practice in the construction of an adequate philosophy of science: revisiting a Whewell/Mill debate

William Whewell raised a series of objections concerning John Stuart Mill’s philosophy of science which suggested that Mill’s views were not properly informed by the history of science or by adequate reflection on scientific practices. The aim of this paper is to revisit and evaluate this incisive Whewellian criticism of Mill’s views by assessing Mill’s account of Michael Faraday’s discovery of electrical induction. The historical evidence demonstrates that Mill’s reconstruction is an inadequate reconstruction of this historical episode and the scientific practices Faraday employed. But a study of Faraday’s research also raises some questions about Whewell’s characterization of this discovery. Thus, this example provides an opportunity to reconsider the debate between Whewell and Mill concerning the role of the sciences in the development of an adequate philosophy of scientific methodology.     

Grasping the spirit in nature: Anschauung in Ørsted's epistemology of science and beauty

The intersection between art, poetry, philosophy and science was the leitmotif which guided the lives and careers of romantic natural philosophers including that of the Danish natural philosopher, H. C. Ørsted. A simple model of Ørsted’s career would be one in which it was framed by two periods of philosophical speculation: the youth’s curious and idealistic interest in new attractive thoughts and the experienced man’s mature reflections at the end of his life. We suggest that a closer look at the epistemological aspects of his works on the theory of beauty reveals a connection between this late work and his early philosophical work including experimental philosophy, but also with the work in teaching and textbook writing, that lies in between. The latter includes Ørsted’s view on the application of mathematics in natural philosophy as well as his failed attempt at a genetic presentation of elementary geometry.     

Thomas Reid and the problem of induction: from common experience to common sense

By the middle of the eighteenth century the new science had challenged the intellectual primacy of common experience in favor of recondite, expert and even counter-intuitive knowledge increasingly mediated by specialized instruments. Meanwhile modern philosophy had also problematized the perceptions of common experience — in the case of David Hume this included our perception of causal relations in nature, a fundamental precondition of scientific endeavor.In this article I argue that, in responding to the ‘problem of induction’ as advanced by Hume, Reid reformulated Aristotelian foundationalism in distinctly modern terms. An educator and mathematician self-consciously working within the framework of the new science, Reid articulated a philosophical foundation for natural knowledge anchored in the human constitution and in processes of adjudication in an emerging modern public sphere of enlightened discourse. Reid thereby transformed one of the bases of Aristotelian science — common experience — into a philosophically and socially justified notion of ‘common sense’. Reid's intellectual concerns had as much to do with the philosophy of science as they did with moral philosophy or epistemology proper, and were bound up with wider social and scientific changes taking place in the early modern period.     

The epistemological virtues of assumptions: towards a coming of age of Boltzmann and Meinong’s objections to ‘the prejudice in favour of the actual’?

Two complementary debates of the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth century are examined here: the debate on the legitimacy of hypotheses in the natural sciences and the debate on intentionality and ‘representations without object’ in philosophy. Both are shown to rest on two core issues: the attitude of the subject and the mode of presentation chosen to display a domain of phenomena. An orientation other than the one which contributed to shape twentieth-century philosophy of science is explored through the analysis of the role given to assumptions in Boltzmann’s research strategy, where assumptions are contrasted to hypotheses, axioms, and principles, and in Meinong’s criticism of the privileged status attributed to representations in mental activities. Boltzmann’s computational style in mathematics and Meinong’s criticism of the confusion between representation and judgment give prominence to an indirect mode of presentation, adopted in a state of suspended belief which is characteristic of assumptions and which enables one to grasp objects that cannot be reached through direct representation or even analogies. The discussion shows how assumptions and the movement to fiction can be essential steps in the quest for objectivity. The conclusion restates the issues of the two debates in a contemporary perspective and shows how recent developments in philosophy of science and philosophy of language and mind can be brought together by arguing for a twofold conception of reference.     

Quantitative realizations of philosophy of science: William Whewell and statistical methods

In this paper, I examine William Whewell’s (1794–1866) ‘Discoverer’s Induction’, and argue that it supplies a strikingly accurate characterization of the logic behind many statistical methods, exploratory data analysis (EDA) in particular. Such methods are additionally well-suited as a point of evaluation of Whewell’s philosophy since the central techniques of EDA were not invented until after Whewell’s death, and so couldn’t have influenced his views. The fact that the quantitative details of some very general methods designed to suggest hypotheses would so closely resemble Whewell’s views of how theories are formed is, I suggest, a strongly positive comment on his views.     

Thomas Reid’s Newtonian Theism: his differences with the classical arguments of Richard Bentley and William Whiston

Reid was a Newtonian and a Theist, but did he found his Theism on Newton’s physics? In opposition to commonplace assumptions about the role of Theism in Reid’s philosophy, my answer is no. Reid prefers to found his Theism on a priori reasons, rather than on physics. Reid’s understanding of physics as an empirical science stops it from contributing in any clear and efficient way to issues of natural theology. In addition, Reid is highly sceptical of our ability to discover the efficient and final causes of natural phenomena, knowledge of which is essential for natural theology. To bring out Reid’s differences with classical Newtonian Theists Richard Bentley and William Whiston, I examine their use of the law and force of general gravitation, and reconstruct what would be Reidian objections.     

Relations between Karl Popper and Michael Polanyi

Karl Popper and Michael Polanyi grew up in central Europe and, having escaped from Nazism, went on to pursue academic careers in Britain where they wrote prolifically on science and politics. Popper and Polanyi corresponded with each other, and met for discussions in the late 1940s and early 50s, but they seldom referred to each other in their publications. This article examines their correspondence so as to produce a picture of their intellectual relations. The most important of the letters was one that Popper wrote in 1952, which we reproduce in its entirety, indicating his dissatisfaction with ideas that Polanyi had expressed in a paper of that year, ‘The Stability of Beliefs’. In this paper, Polanyi used the example of the framework of Zande witchcraft to shed analogical light on science and other systems of belief, arguing that ‘frameworks of belief’ equip their adherents with intellectual powers whose use reinforces commitment to the framework, inoculating adherents against criticism. Polanyi’s 1952 paper and his 1951 and 1952 Gifford Lectures (to which that paper is intimately tied) are the first articulation of Polanyi’s sharp rejection of the modern critical philosophical tradition that by implication included Popper’s philosophical ideas. The 1952 paper is also part of Polanyi’s constructive philosophical effort to set forth a fiduciary philosophy emphasizing commitment. Popper regarded Polanyi’s position as implying cognitive relativism and irrationalism, and from the time of Polanyi’s 1952 paper their personal relationship became strained. Discord between them became publicly manifest when Polanyi subtitled his book Personal Knowledge (1958), Towards a post-critical philosophy, and Popper lambasted the idea of a ‘post-critical’ philosophy in his Preface in The Logic of Scientific Discovery (1959).     

William Whiston, Isaac Newton and the crisis of publicity

William Whiston was one of the first British converts to Newtonian physics and his 1696 New theory of the earth is the first full-length popularization of the natural philosophy of the Principia. Impressed with his young protégé, Newton paved the way for Whiston to succeed him as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics in 1702. Already a leading Newtonian natural philosopher, Whiston also came to espouse Newton’s heretical antitrinitarianism in the middle of the first decade of the eighteenth century. In all, Whiston enjoyed twenty years of contact with Newton dating from 1694. Although they shared so much ideologically, the two men fell out when Whiston began to proclaim openly the heresy that Newton strove to conceal from the prying eyes of the public. This paper provides a full account of this crisis of publicity by outlining Whiston’s efforts to make both Newton’s natural philosophy and heterodox theology public through popular texts, broadsheets and coffee house lectures. Whiston’s attempts to draw Newton out through published hints and innuendos, combined with his very public religious crusade, rendered the erstwhile disciple a dangerous liability to the great man and helps explain Newton’s eventual break with him, along with his refusal to support Whiston’s nomination to the Royal Society. This study not only traces Whiston’s successes in preaching the gospel of Newton’s physics and theology, but demonstrates the ways in which Whiston, who resolutely refused to accept Newton’s epistemic distinction between ‘open’ and ‘closed’ forms of knowledge, transformed Newton’s grand programme into a singularly exoteric system and drove it into the public sphere.