Programme 2004, Winnipeg

ABSTACTS /RéSUMéS

 

Arthur, Richard (McMaster)

“On the Premodern Theory of Motion: Galileo and Descartes”

 

        According to a modern understanding of motion, a moving body has at every instant of its motion an instantaneous velocity that is a function of time elapsed, and whose magnitude is given by the slope of the tangent to the curve representing the trajectory of the body on a graph of space traversed against time elapsed. Such a geometric representation of the trajectory of a body in motion has its origins in the algebraic geometry of Descartes, and the concept of  instantaneous velocity derives from the notion of a degree of speed used by Galileo in his analysis of uniform acceleration (and, perhaps to a lesser extent, from Descartes' notion of conatus).

        Nevertheless, I maintain, attempts to read the modern understanding back into the works of Galileo and Descartes are in error. There is ample empirical evidence, as I shall try to show, that the understanding of motion was in a state of Kuhnian crisis until the work of Newton and Leibniz became known late in the seventeenth century. This raises the question: how was motion understood prior to this modern conception? I offer some conjectures, distilled by a careful analysis of the paradoxes that have arisen in trying to interpret key passages from Varron, Galileo and Descartes.

 

 

Beatty, John and Piers J. Hale, Piers J. (UBC)

“A fairy Tale of Transformation: Charles Kingsley, The Water Babies, and the History of Science”

 

        In this paper we reconsider Charles Kingsley’s fairy tale The Water Babies (1863) in respect of contemporary developments in the history of science. Several authors have pointed out that The Water Babies is rife with evolutionary metaphor, however, we contend that Kingsley is a much more important figure in the Darwinian revolution than has thus far been acknowledged. An Anglican churchman, Chartist sympathiser and outspoken advocate of reform in education, sanitation, and child labour laws, Kingsley was also an accomplished novelist, poet and naturalist. Importantly, he had accepted the idea of evolution prior to 1859 and became an enthusiastic correspondent of Darwin, Lyell, Wallace, and Hooker. Until his death in 1875 he contributed to contemporary debates in natural history ranging from geology to variation and speciation.  Significantly, Kingsley perceived the implications of Darwinian science to be supportive not only of his theological beliefs, but also of his drive for social and political reform.

 

 

Brysse, Keynyn (U. of Toronto)

“Wiping the Slate Clean: Paleontologists, Progress, and the Alvarez Impact Hypothesis”

 

        Following the acceptance of Darwin’s evolution by natural selection, and particularly after the Modern Synthesis, evolution has been seen as a non-teleological process, in which randomly arising variations are selected according to the environmental pressures of the moment. Although this process is not directed toward some final purpose, there is nevertheless a component of progress or directional change inherent in it, which has been accepted implicitly or explicitly by paleontologists for most of the twentieth century. The concept of competition provides a mechanism for such directional biological change: if organisms and species are in constant competition with each other such that only the fittest survive to reproduce, the overall fitness of organisms and species must be increasing in some absolute sense.  Before the proposal of the Alvarez impact theory in 1980, which suggested that an asteroid hit the Earth 65 million years ago and caused the Cretaceous-Tertiary mass extinction, such extinctions were thought of as the mechanism by which the less fit species were eliminated.  But the impact theory forced a reassessment of the concept of progressive or constructive evolution. The impact of a 10-kilometre asteroid was not an event that any species could have become adapted to survive; the survivors of such an impact could not therefore be considered more fit than the victims – only luckier. I will explore the concept of developmental evolution as it was accepted by paleontologists before the Alvarez theory, and show how the impact theory changed their views of mass extinction, and their understanding of evolution itself.

 

 

Campanario, Juan Miguel (Universidad de Alcalá, Madrid))

“Studying the Resistance to New Ideas in Science”

 

        The history of science is dotted with stories documenting how many important discoveries were initially resisted or ignored by fellow scientists. Some important discoveries were ‘premature’, in the sense that they did not fit in the common paradigms, and/or their implications could not be connected by a series of simple logical steps to the existing scientific knowledge. In other instances, some theories or discoveries collided with the dominant paradigms in science and they were resisted or scorned at with a generous dose of scepticism. In this communication, we review the origin of resistance to scientific discovery. To do so, we have studied instances taken from autobiographies, personal accounts, Nobel lectures, and so. In addition, we have done a survey among scientist that are authors of important or highly cited papers. We have studied scepticism by part of the scientific community toward discoveries that eventually would be awarded with the Nobel Prize. In some instances, we can recognise the phenomenon of delayed recognition. When this happen, as a general rule, the discovery may be unnoticed at all for years, until the scientific community begins to recognise its value or the scope of its implications which are reflected in the attention that it receives: a clear sign that it has been 'discovered' by the scientific community.

 

 

Chakravartty, Anjan (U. of Toronto)

“Metaphysics, Empiricism, and Stance Relativism”

 

        In The Empirical Stance, Bas van Fraassen argues for a reconceptualization of empiricism, and a rejection of its traditional rival, speculative metaphysics, as part of a larger and provocative study in epistemology. Central to his account is the notion of voluntarism in epistemology, and a concomitant understanding of the nature of rationality.  In this talk I offer a critical assessment of these ideas, with the ultimate goal of clarifying the nature of debate between metaphysicians and empiricists, and thus more specifically, between scientific realists and empiricist antirealists. Despite van Fraassen's assertion to the contrary, I argue that voluntarism leads to a form of epistemic relativism. But traditional worries about relativism are perhaps misplaced here. Rather than stifling debate, this ‘stance’ relativism places precise constraints on possibilities for constructive engagement between metaphysicians and empiricists, and thus distinguishes, in broad terms, paths along which this debate may usefully proceed from routes which offer no hope of progress.

 

 

Dea, Shannon (UWO)

“Heidegger and Galileo’s Slippery Slope”

 

        In Die Frage Nach Dem Ding, Martin Heidegger characterizes Galileo as one of the key actors in the struggle to replace the Aristotelian conception of nature with that of Newton. For Heidegger, Galileo’s freefall experiments demonstrate Galileo’s mathematical, a priori commitment to the uniformity of nature. This, he argues, marks (at least) two substantial changes in science. Whereas Aristotelian empeiria was characterized by a hermeneutical openness to nature’s presencing, Galilean experiment is always only a demonstration of what has already been deduced mathematically. Whereas Aristotle regarded natural bodies as possessing distinctive motions and places proper to them, Galileo reconceives nature in terms of universal laws. Against this monochromatic account of Galilean science, I argue that Galileo was not a fully modern scientist but a properly transitional figure. His proto-inertial framework never develops into a veritable inertial theory since he retains the Aristotelian notion of intrinsic force. Moreover, while his freefall experiments may indeed have been mere demonstrations of prior mathematical projections, his law of fall was the product of his 1604 discovery of the times-squared law. Stillman Drake has argued that this earlier discovery could only have been possible by chance – that, in fact, it would have been precluded by mathematical projection. That is, the freefall experiments have their origin in Aristotelian empeiria. As such, in terms of the heterogeneous worlds of Aristotle and Newton, Galileo must be regarded as a citizen of neither and of both.

 

 

Desjardins, Eric (UBC)

“Que reste-il du gène moléculaire?”

 

        Il est fréquent en philosophie de la biologie de discuter de la divergence entre les concepts de gènes mendélien et moléculaire. Le premier est un lieu chromosomique (locus ou allèle) associé à un phénotype et servant d’unité de calcul en génétique des populations. Le second est un segment d’ADN codant pour un polypeptide. Il est toutefois plus rare de rencontrer l’idée selon laquelle le concept de gène moléculaire a lui aussi subi d’importants changements. L’avènement du génie génétique donna lieu à plusieurs découvertes qui finirent par montrer la nature éclatée du gène présent chez les organismes eucaryotes. Les découvertes des processus de modifications post traductionnelles (épissage, clivage protéolytique, etc.) ont conduit à ce que le gène moléculaire perde la solidité que lui avait souhaitée ses fondateurs. Cet éclatement implique que l’identification et la définition des gènes se font indirectement par l’entremise de molécules généralement impliquées dans le processus d’expression génétique. Suivant la proposition de Thomas Fogle, le gène moléculaire peut être qualifié de “gène consensuel”. Cela fait de lui un concept instrumental et remet en cause son aspect réel. étant donné que les généticiens sont à la recherche d’indices de présence du gène, ils retournent vers l’approche phénoméniste généralement associée à la génétique mendélienne. Il semble donc que le gène a non seulement perdu sa ‘solidité’, mais aussi sa matérialité; ce n’est que par défaut que l’on identifie le gène à une structure car il correspond davantage à un processus.

 

 

Ede, Andrew (U. of Alberta)

“Discovering the Earth: The International Geophysical Year”

 

        The International Geophysical Year (or ‘IGY’ as it is more commonly known) took place in 1957, the Year of the Active Sun. This massive research program was the first non-partisan, multi-science and multi-national science project during the Cold War. Although it was overshadowed by the launch of Sputnik I, the research conducted by the IGY scientists covered fundamental aspects of earth, atmospheric and celestial science, including unravelling the secrets of plate tectonics, lightning, and the magnetosphere or van Allen belts.

        Although the broad range of scientific subjects was important, IGY was even more significant as an attempt by scientists to promote and re-affirm science as a socially beneficial profession in an era of East-West confrontation and fear of nuclear holocaust. There was a strong emphasis on co-operation, freedom of information and open procedures.  While these ideals were not completely welcomed by the governments involved, the scientists generally felt that IGY represented the true spirit of scientific inquiry. Most concluded that IGY was a success. By tracing the history and progress of the IGY effort, we can discover why 1957 was a pivotal year in modern science.

 

 

Gattei, Stefano (Università degli Studi di Milano)

“Karl Popper’s Philosophical Breakthrough”

 

        Karl Popper’s critical rationalism is well-known for its strict deductivism. However, if we read his early (and still unpublished) German writings we see that he clearly held an inductivist position. Contrary to Freud’s, Adler’s and others’ psychological theories, which often go beyond what is factually verifiable and impose on empirical facts, he argued, natural science theories only abstract from empirical data, never asserting something beyond the facts.

        As I shall argue, the year 1929 bridges the gap between Popper’s early and later views. In a thesis written in order to qualify for teaching mathematics and physics in secondary school (Axiome, Definitionen und Postulate der Geometrie), Popper moves his first steps towards a consistent deductive position. Up to 1929 epistemology enters as far as the problem is that of the justification of the scientific character of these fields of research. In 1929 Popper explicitly discusses the cognitive status of geometry without referring to psycho-pedagogical aspects, thus marking his turn from cognitive psychology to the logic and methodology of science.

        Applied geometry sets the context for Popper’s discussion of scientific rationality, enabling Popper’s future philosophical progress: in the following years, he will be applying the hypothetico-deductive model to all natural sciences (which, unlike geometry, are not axiomatic).

 

 

Gauthier, Yvon (U. de Montréal)

“Hermann Weyl on Minkowski and Riemann”

 

        If we suppose on one side that Minkowski had derived his world picture, what we call now Minkowski diagramms, from his work on number grids  “ Zahlengitter ” in the geometry of numbers - which is his main achievement in number theory - there is no question of the mathematical nature of Minkowskian space-time. On the other side, if we insist on his postulate of the absolute world “Postulat der absoluten Welt” as it is termed in his celebrated lecture “Raum und Zeit” of 1908 (see 2, pp. 432-444), the Minkowskian world picture has physical significance, for Minkowski opposes the postulate of relativity (which Einstein wanted to call invariance), since, as he says, the meaning of the postulate is that phenomena are given in an absolute four-dimensional world of space and time. It is this world postulate that Hermann Weyl will want to exploit in his own work on General Relativity (cf. 3 and 4).

        Although Weyl uses freely the Minkowskian vocabulary of world, world-lines and world-points - even the Minkowskian “Substanz” to designate matter - he is more concerned with the metric structure of the world and its Riemannian geometry, which is curiously absent from Minkowski. It seems that Weyl refers to Minkowskian space-time as a convenient tool from Special Relativity Theory and as a philosophical aid to his own world picture which remains essentially Kantian (see 5).

        I shall end up with some philosophical remarks on the constructivist character of Weyl’s endeavour in mathematics and physics (see 1).

REFERENCES

1.        Gauthier, Y. Internal Logic. Foundations of Mathematics from Kronecker to Hilbert, Kluwer , Synthese Library, Dordrecht/Boston/London, 2002.

2.        Minkowski, H. Gesammelte Abhandlungen, hrsg. v. D. Hilbert, Chelsea, New York, 1967.

3.        Weyl, H. Gesammelte Abhandlungen, hrsg. v. K. Chandrasekharan, Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, 1968.

4.        Weyl, H. Space, Time, Matter, trans. by H.L. Brose, Dover Publications, 1950.

5.       Weyl, H. Philosophy of Mathematics and Natural Science, Atheneum, New York, 1963.

 

 

 

 

 

Gomatam, Ravi V. (Bhaktivedanta Institute, Berkeley)

“Quantum Theory and Experimental Praxis — Shall the twain ever meet?”

 

        Scientific realism calls for a realist attitude toward both the formalism and the observations. In quantum theory the two do not mesh. Experimentalists visualize the localized observations using a strictly particle approach. They avoid any conflict with the theoretical wave formalism by treating the superposed Y function as a formal tool for making statistical predictions concerning the observable behavior of an ensemble of particles.

        The theoretical realists treat the superposed Y function as describing the real state of the individual system, but I show they cannot be realists about the observations; they are obliged to treat the observations as our experiences. If so, the two do not meet.

        The attempt to directly combine the two results in ontological wave-particle duality and a ‘measurement problem’.

        I point out a way to treat them as two mutually exclusive approaches that seems to give us a chance to get at a paradox-free, unitary ontology.

 

 

Hubbard , Jennifer (Ryerson)

“Fishing for Stocks: Artic Exploration and Canada’s Marine Scientists 1914-1930”

 

        This paper will discuss the motivations and methods used in early 20^th century Canadian biological expeditions to the Canadian Arctic. During the 19^th and early 20^th century the Canadian Arctic exercised an enormous fascination for the northern scientific community. Expeditions were mounted by Norway, Sweden and Denmark to Canada’s north to discover the extent and nature of Canadian Arctic wildlife and territories. The most famous of these was the expedition of 1908-1913, led by Vilhjalmur Stefannson and sponsored by Canada’s Department of Naval Services. In the wake of this expedition the Department of Marine and Fisheries decided to mount several expeditions of its own, which included input and personnel from the Biological Board of Canada, Canada’s marine science organization. Unlike the earlier Stefannson expedition, designed to expose the exploitation and decline of Arctic wildlife, and the need to conserve Arctic resources, the Department of Marine and Fisheries Hudson’s Bay expeditions of 1914, 1920, 1927 and 1930 were focussed on discovering new, commercially exploitable fish stocks, and also included faunistic surveys. The expeditions were fraught with equipment and personnel problems and failures, especially regarding the unreliable and flamboyant Danish marine biologist Fritz Johanson, chosen for the 1920 expedition because he had served as expert in the earlier Stefannson expedition. His later involvement in the 1927 expedition resulted in one of the more unsavoury episodes in Biological Board history, with accusations of theft flying in both directions.  In spite of all the problems encountered, the research accomplished helped to broaden Canadian understanding of  northern wildlife and resources.

 

 

Hyder, David (U. of Ottawa)

“Kant, Helmholtz and the Determinacy of Physical Theory”

 

        In this paper, I analyse Helmholtz’s arguments for the centrality of forces in the opening sections of his Conservation of Energy monograph, paying special regard to Helmholtz’s insistence on the “determinacy” of physical science. According to Helmholtz, science aims at the “full comprensibility” of nature, meaning that we are driven to describe changing phenomena by means of maximally general mathematical laws, which laws should involve only concepts that are empirically determinate. Helmholtz applies these Kantian principles to prove that the intensity of forces must be a function of position, and that since position is definable only in relative space, force functions must be definable with regard only to the relative positions of the mass-points comprising a physical system. I claim that this argument derives from Kant’s criticisms of Newton’s parallelogram law of force additivity in the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science: for both Helmholtz and Kant, forces can only be well defined if they are conceived as connections between pairs of material points, thus all such definitions may take account only of the relative or “empirical” spaces determined by these points. Kant erroneously believes that, because the “pure empirical construction” of the concept of force in intuition requires the supposition of at least two mass-points, he can show that Newton’s law of force addition is apodictically necessary. In Kant as well, this argument depends on the claim that only central forces are consistent with the determinacy or Bestimmtheit of physical concepts.

        Common to Kant and Helmholtz is thus the conviction that forces, and laws for the combination of forces, that are defined relative to absolute space are ”transcendent” and empirically indeterminate, thus that they have no place in physical theory. Helmholtz martials this purely philosophical argument against competing electromagnetic theories: they are to be rejected because they involve such transcendent magnitudes. I conclude by arguing that Helmholtz’s 1854 defence of the Conservation of Energy against the physicist Rudolf Clausius’s objections makes evident a direct connection between these arguments concerning the determinacy of physical concepts and the much later papers on geometry. Helmholtz accuses Clausius of defining forces with reference to coordinate systems that exist “only on paper”, and objects that such definitions cannot “be applied [übertragen] to physical reality.” He lays special emphasis on the empirical conditions which are required to establish the congruence relations holding between pairs of points, objecting that Clausius’s forces are absolute and transcendent in the senses I have just outlined.

        If this interpretation is correct, we may have to adjust our view of Helmholtz as a simple empiricist opponent of Kant. My suggestion is rather that Helmholtz modifies Kant’s system from within, in that he systematically transforms Kant’s constitutive principles of the natural sciences into regulative ones. The metrical relations defined in geometry, in Helmholtz’s late view, are empirical in the sense that we could lack the means to measure with “real things”. But geometry retains its transcendental character precisely because it is required for the formulation of general physical laws.

 

 

Leme, Jose Luis (Universidade Nova de Lisboa)

“Foucault and the Universal Subject of Knowledge”

 

        In one of the last interviews he gave before dying, Michel Foucault considered naïve those who think that for him the truth does not exist. This reaction may seem strange to Foucault readers, since from the mid seventies he considered the history of truth as the conducting theme in his work. His countless philosophical and historical studies about the constitution of new scientific domains, the history of psychiatry, the history of social sciences, the history of sexuality, etc. are not only the history and analysis of the constitution of new objects of study, but also the history and analysis of new forms of telling the truth. Why then, in face of such abundance of studies on the truth, the necessity to emphasize the existence of truth itself?

        There are two reasons, from my point of view, that generated this mistake that still persists nowadays. On the one hand, the multiplicity of themes of study and the shifts in the forms of telling the truth within the various scientific domains takes some scholars to adopt the relativistic point of view to simplify the complexity of the problem; on the other hand, Foucault´s concept of truth is not totally straight forward.

        Keeping all this in mind, the main purpose of this paper is to explain and clarify the concept of truth in Foucault, and, having done so, showing that he is not a relativist.

 

 

Lépine, Véronique (UQAM )

“La Compagnie de Jésus et la théorie de la gravitation universelle au XVIII^e siècle à l’intérieur des Mémoires de Trévoux”

 

        Les Mémoires pour l’histoire des sciences et des beaux-arts, aussi appelés Mémoires ou Journal de Trévoux, sont une entreprise littéraire menée par la Compagnie de Jésus et destinée à un public plus étendu que la seule sphère des savants. Les Mémoires sont un outil de transmission du savoir, un des canaux par où sont véhiculées les nouvelles théories et certains débats scientifiques de l’époque. En effet, les découvertes qui voient le jour aux XVII^e et XVIII^e siècles ont soulevé des controverses et favorisé des prises de position souvent discutées. En physique, ce sont les idées de Descartes qui s’imposent en France dans la seconde moitié du XVII^e siècle. Dès la fin du siècle, on sent venir lentement l’influence anglaise de Newton. Nous savons que ces deux factions, cartésiens et newtoniens, n’étaient pas si clairement divisées, ni si farouchement opposées et qu’il y avait des groupements dont la pensée était davantage un amalgame de ces deux systèmes. La publication des Jésuites en France nous offre la possibilité de voir, qu’en général, les auteurs admirent la mécanique céleste de Newton tout en se questionnant sur sa signification physique. Ces auteurs, souvent anonymes, rejettent en partie les anciennes théories, souvent tirées du cartésianisme, pour adhérer partiellement aux nouvelles, celles du newtonisme. Le père Louis-Bertrand Castel est un des auteurs qui s’expriment le plus souvent sur le thème de la physique dans les publications consultées. Les articles ayant servi à notre analyse sont ceux qui traitent de près ou de loin du thème de la physique, et ce, de 1701 à 1763.

 

 

 

Leroux, Jean (U. of Ottawa)

“The ‘Philosopher-Scientists’ Tradition and the Notion of Truth in Science”

 

        We want to indicate how the late 19^th-, early 20^th-century conceptions of science elaborated by Philosopher-Scientists such as Hermann von Helmholtz, Heinrich Hertz and Henri Poincaré, eschewed any notion of truth in science other than of pragmatic nature. In particular, the “correspondence theory” of truth was expressly absent from these views.

        We will first expose the legacy of Kantian Critical Philosophy with respect to the question of truth. We will then survey three major developments that have oriented 19^th century epistemology towards an image of science of which truth as correspondence cannot be predicated:

-   The adoption by Helmholtz of a semiotic conception of sensations, and its generalization to a semiotic conception of physical theory accomplished by Hertz.

-     The foundational research that led to modern geometry and the conventionalist lessons that Poincaré drew from it.

-   Developments within physics itself, starting from the middle of the 19^th century, which led to a “physics of principles” and a descriptivist standpoint with respect to the aim of science.

        We suggest that these developments have led to a generally accepted loss of the scientific image’s ontological import, at least in any univocal fashion. More specifically, the intuitive notion of truth as anchorage in reality became inoperative at the epistemological level. Scientific realism, as more recently portrayed in the “Philosophy of Science” tradition, had to await Tarski’s rehabilitation of the notion of truth and Hempel’s rehabilitation of explanation in science. Both logical models, however, provide an analysis of scientific theory that also points at the untenability of any notion of truth other than of pragmatic nature.

 

 

Lindsay, Debra (U. of New Brunswick)

“Living Together/Working Together: A Scientific Household in Antebellum Charleston”

 

        In September 1833 the Reverend John Bachman wrote John James Audubon inviting him to stay at his residence. Within a month the Audubon family was settling in for the first of a number of extended stays in Charleston. While the productive friendship of Bachman and Audubon is well known, there is little known about any but Maria Martin (a scientific illustrator) of the ten women living alongside them. Bachman’s first wife Harriet, the mother of his fourteen children, has all but disappeared from the record and a biography of Lucy Audubon focusses on her early years. Little is known about her middle years and even less is known about her two daughters-in-law: Maria Rebecca and Mary Eliza (neé Bachman). Aside from Maria Martin, these women were neither notable nor visible, but they all participated in a public and privileged culture as science became an avocation for them no less than for their husbands and fathers. Day-to-day life for Harriet and Maria Martin Bachman, for Lucy, Maria Rebecca and Mary Eliza Audubon, for the younger Bachman girls - Jane, Julia, Lynch and Catherine - and for the elder Mrs Martin, was as affected by the world of science, as it was by the southern culture in which they lived. This paper will examine the way in which domesticity and science intersected when two families cohabited an antebellum southern household.

 

 

Lozano, Sonia (école des hautes études en sciences sociales de Paris)

“Construction et transmission de la bactériologie au Mexique 1887-1910”

 

        La bactériologie médicale et les techniques européennes de immunisation arrivaient au Mexique en 1887, comme la représentation de la modernité et  revêtus de l’allure mythique de Pasteur et de la science française. Depuis-là, un certain nombre d’hommes de science et le gouvernement font des efforts pour pratiquer et appliquer la nouvelle science en profite des  besoins plus urgents du pays. Pour mettre en pratique les techniques bactériologiques et les avantages de l’immunisation, les groupes natives de travail ont du partager des idées ou paradigmes scientifiques, conventions de travail et corpus de règles et conventions anciens et nouvelles. Ainsi, l’une des activités prioritaires de la diffusion de la nouvelle science a été la communication entre paires et la publication de leurs expériences à l’intérieur et à l’extérieure du laboratoire et des écoles de médecine. Cette communication était faite, principalement, dans trois publications spécialisées et dans les thèses des jeunes médecines. Dans ce travail on va essayer de savoir, par l’analyse comparative des articles et des rapports de travail de médecins et jeunes étudiants, quels ont été les principes idéologiques et scientifiques qui a suivi la communauté scientifique mexicaine. On cherchera aussi à savoir, dans quelles conditions matérielles et idéologiques les techniques européennes, dites pasteuriennes, furent intégrées ou adaptées à l’activité scientifique nationale. Il faut remarquer que ce travail a été fait sur des archives françaises et mexicaines.

 

 

Lund, Matthew (U. of Illinois at Chicago)

“Toward a Conceptual Meteorology: Finding the Laws Governing the Cloud of Conjecture and Confusion”

 

        Two separate conceptions of theory-laden observation have arisen in recent philosophy of science: one negative and one positive. The negative conception (theory-infected observation) poses a threat to the objectivity of scientific knowledge and has received a great deal of attention from philosophers, whose main purpose has been to vindicate the objectivity of science. By contrast, the positive conception has quietly passed from notice. The positive conception asserts that the integration of our perceptual experience by concepts not only aids us in the acquisition of declarative empirical knowledge, but that this conceptualizing activity elicits expectations and incipient theoretical models, which can be tested and refined. Thus, theory-laden, or theory-informed, observation provides the first step in theory creation and model refinement. This notion of theory-informed observation was an important component of N.R. Hanson’s philosophy of science, but since Hanson is now primarily read as a precursor to Kuhn and thereby implicated in the objectivity debate, the positive conception of theory-laden observation has not received the attention it deserves.

        Because of the logical positivist commitment to antipsychologism, normative epistemology, and a belief that the only interesting logical links in science are deductive, the notion that good reasons can be adduced in favor of a newly created hypothesis received scant attention in the glory years of logical positivism. However, with the development of psychology and reliablist epistemology, and an increasing attention to the causal structure of cognition, the field is ripe for an appraisal of the process through which hypotheses are initially posited, and whether such positing is a rational affair.

 

 

Maranda, Guillaume (UQAM)

“A Reply to Grünbaum’s Challenge to Popperian Falsificationism”

 

        Thus far, it seems to us that Karl Popper’s criticism of the inductivist methodology has been mainly discussed on logical ground. The controversy which took place around the so called “Popper-Miller Theorem” is a good example of such a formal interchange.  But Adolf Grünbaum’s challenge to popperian falsificationism stands aside in a peculiar way. Here, we will divide it in two parts. First, we think we can address the main concern of Grünbaum’s analysis as follows: given Popper’s work, is it possible to maintain the validity of inductivism whitout any reference to the inductivist interpretation of the probability calculus? As a matter of fact, not only does he answer affirmativly to this question, he also pretends that rational criticism is implicitly inductivist.  Popper is held to have caricatured the inductivist tradition, beginning with Francis Bacon, and to have put forward a criteria of demarcation which is either too strong or inductive. Second, Grünbaum underlines the fact that the formalisation of Popper’s concept of corroboration is inadequate. In a Kuhnian way, he points out the inaptitude of logical comparaisons between incompatible theories. 

        In this conference we will show that Grünbaum’s arguments are either fallacious or surmontable.  First of all, the signification he tacitly gives to the concept of induction is so vague and weak logically that nobody could question it further. Hence, his advocacy of the inductivist methodology is flawed. Furthermore, we will expound breifely four non-logical criterions which can express the empirical comparaison of theories or axilliairy hypothesis and preserve the idea of corroboration.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Marchand, Nicolas (UQAM)

“De l’expérience de psychophysique à l’évaluation clinique: regard sur l’essor de la psychologie au Canada”

 

        La création du laboratoire de psychologie de l’Université de Toronto en 1890 par l’Américain James Mark Baldwin symbolise, pour plusieurs observateurs, l’implantation de la Nouvelle psychologie au Canada et les débuts de l’autonomisation de cette discipline au pays. Dès lors que la séparation de la psychologie d’avec la philosophie se consomma, la psychologie gagna lentement plusieurs milieux, dont l’enseignement supérieur, la santé, l’éducation, l’industrie privée, les services publics et militaires. L’exposé analysera à ce titre l’essor de la psychologie comme discipline et comme profession au Canada. Il s’attachera tout particulièrement aux décennies suivant la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Au cours de cette période charnière, la psychologie se trouva doublement intégrée au système national de la recherche et à celui des professions. Elle se présenta comme un savoir utile pour la gestion des ressources humaines, le contrôle des facteurs humains et le traitement des problèmes personnels. Cette période fut particulièrement marquée par la structuration du groupe social des psychologues, l’intensification de la valorisation de la psychologie dans la société, le parachèvement de l’autonomisation de la psychologie en milieu universitaire, et la diversification des usages de la psychologie (savoir et psychotechniques). En spécifiant les aspects qualitatifs et quantitatifs d’une rupture opérante à partir de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, l’étude révise la thèse “du virage vers la psychologie appliquée dans les années 1920 et du retour subséquent à la recherche expérimentale dans les années 1950”, en vigueur de manière plus ou moins explicite dans l’historiographie du sujet.

 

 

Marion, Mathieu (UQAM)

“Anti-Realism, Reasons and Games”

 

        This paper will be in two parts: (a) I reformulate Dummett’s manifestation argument [3] in terms of Brandom’s theory of assertions as ‘rational actions’ or, to use Wilfrid Sellars’ expression, as moves in the ‘game of giving and asking for reasons’ [2], therefore as argument to the effect that there is no coherent notion of there being such a thing as the meaning someone associates with a statement, unless she manifests what she counts as entitling her to assert it and what she is committed to by that assertion. (b) The notion of ‘game’ can be given precise logical content with the interpretation of logical connectives in terms of Dialogspiele first proposed by Lorenzen [5], [4]. A ‘game-theoretical’ or ‘dialogical’ semantics, in terms of the ‘game of giving and asking for reasons’, will be given for linear logic, following [1] and [6], and some of its aspects will be discussed.

 

REFERENCES

[1] A. Blass, ‘A Game Semantic for Linear Logic’, Annals of Pure and Applied Logic 56, 1992, 183-220.

[2] R. Brandom, ‘Asserting’, Noûs 17, 1983, 637-650.

[3] M. Dummett, ‘The Philosophical Basis of Intuitionistic Logic’, in Truth and Other Enigmas, London, Duckworth, 1978, 215-247.

[4] W. Felscher, ‘Dialogues as a Foundation for Intuitionistic Logic’, D. Gabbay & F. Günthner (eds.), Handbook of Philosophical Logic, Dordrecht, D. Reidel, III, 341-372.

[5] P. Lorenzen, ‘Logik und Agon’, Atti del XII Congresso Internazionale di Filosofia, Florence, Sansoni, 1960, IV, 187-194.

[6] S. Rahman, D. Gabbay & H. Rückert, ‘The Dialogical Way to the Semantics of Linear Logic’, to appear.

 

 

McArthur, Dan (Queen’s University)

“Does Structural Realism Entail Entity Realism?”

 

        Structural Realism has returned to prominence in recent years, due in large part to the writings of John Worrall. However, the view has been subject to vigorous criticism from various commentators such as Friedman, Demopoulos and Psillos. Recently, however, Anjan Chakravarty has proposed a compromise position, “semirealism” that accepts much of the criticism of structural realism while trying to preserve Worrall’s central insights. Chakravarty argues that structural realism and entity realism entail one another and together from a congenial combined position “semirealism”. In this paper I provide a brief review of the debate over structural realism and assess the merits of Chakravarty’s proposed solution. I show that while semirealism is not viable, the arguments I advance against it point the way to a workable position which I sketch in the remainder of my talk.

 

 

McDermid, Kirk (UWO)

“Crucial Experiments and Theoretical Rivals: QM and Bell Inequality Violations”

 

        Historically, crucial experiments seem to only temporarily favour one theory over another; the allegedly refuted theory can be rapidly restored to empirical adequacy by an adjustment in auxiliary hypotheses. One example of this in action is the generation of models that purport to classically account for apparent Bell inequality violations by exploiting various ‘loopholes’ in the experimental methods used in these ‘crucial experiments’. The typical response from both scientists and philosophers of science is to generate new experiments, designed to yield greater violations of a Bell inequality or to close or narrow exploitable loopholes.

        The aim of this paper is to show that the true empirical success of QM is poorly demonstrated by such experiments, and that the continued pursuit of decisive single-datapoint experiments is doomed to failure. Of course, this is because of the issue of underdetermination. But if this is so, can we ever formulate any sort of crucial experiment that can decisively favour QM over its rivals? We will bring some considerations to bear on this question that may suggest that we should shift from generating ‘extremal’ tests of Bell violation to experiments that test the range of predictions of QM, including even non-Bell-violating configurations. By testing the entire range of predictions generated by QM’s systematic dependency of non-local correlation on degree of entanglement, we can go some way towards decisively supporting QM over its rivals - despite the problem of underdetermination - by exploring the idea that two theories with equivalent empirical consequences may nevertheless be differentially supported by that evidence.

 

Nicholas, John (UWO)

“ Integration versus Modularity in Vision”

 

        Much contemporary psychological and neurological work on consciousness relies on a pool of rather ill-fitting ideas about what is to be explained and what philosophical constraints exist on the admissibility of candidate explanations. For specificity, I examine mainly the work of Semir Zeki and his collaborators on the modularity of visual consciousness both spatially in the cortex and related areas, and also in time. A central issue is whether Zeki et al have made intelligible how elements of consciousness can be ‘bound’ into what they term the ‘integrated percept’, without invoking some central area to which specialized sensory processing systems project.  I will focus on experiments of Moutoussis and Zeki (1997), Zeki and Moutoussis (1997), and replications by several other groups, which indicate that attributes of the visual scene are processed at different times, colour before orientation and orientation before motion. I will attempt to make some points of comparison with different historical strategic traditions in the defining of consciousness in visual perception, particularly with respect to the difference between the construction of percepts from the activation of the so-called ‘mind’s eye’.

 

 

Normandin, Sebastian (McGill)

“Bergson and AI: The Vital Limit on Machine Intelligence”

 

        While generally disregarded by researchers in artificial intelligence (AI), many of the insights in Henri Bergson’s L’Evolution creatrice (Creative Evolution) (1907) are relevant to the theoretical underpinnings of their work. This essay uses highlights from the history of AI to argue that Bergson’s thinking anticipates many of the field’s most intractable problems. It develops a vitalist critique of the underlying assumptions of AI, and in particular the mechanical minds thought possible in the discipline’s  ‘strong’ period, whose theoretical framework was largely formed by the work of Alan M. Turing. The philosophical stance of AI research is thus presented as predominantly mechanistic, positivistic and Cartesian. There is the further suggestion that Bergson’s important insights regarding the nature of the living and his characteristic division between intelligence and instinct are, despite being overlooked, relevant to AI theory, which has instead been modeled on behaviorism, experimental psychology and neuroscience. Questions are raised regarding the character of knowledge and understanding and their relationship to action, choice and the innate and contextual nature of language. The essay concludes that living minds are unique, non-deterministic, ‘embodied’ and not subject to be being simulated

 

 

Palmieri, Diana (UWO)

“Russell’s Foundationalism”

 

        I believe that a case can be made for the view that Russell’s Our Knowledge of the External World [KEW] has been wrongly interpreted as clearly presupposing the epistemological position of “weak foundationalism”. What is commonly called “Cartesian foundationalism” involves the project of deriving a robust system of beliefs on epistemic grounds that are themselves more certain than other kinds of beliefs. This is not the project of deriving a system of beliefs on epistemic foundations that are allegedly certain. The claim is that the degree of certainty in the foundations is higher than in the rest—not the highest possible. Evidence for the certainty of those beliefs consists in facts like that they cannot be doubted, that they are self-evident or obvious, primitive in some sense, and so on. A separate and stronger thesis adds that the foundations are certain and infallible. The weaker, and more interesting thesis is that of weak foundationalism. I examine here a natural anti-foundationalist interpretation of KEW in this weak sense; the interpretation will explain Russell’s views found in other works, including Analysis of Matter.

 

 

Peacock, Kent A.  (U. of Lethbridge)

“The Energy of Entangled States

 

        In entangled quantum states there is mutual information encoded in the correlations between measurement outcomes on the particles in the system. When a measurement is made on one particle, the entangled state collapses to a mixture, destroying information embodied in the quantum mechanical correlations and reducing our ability to make inferences from the observed properties of one particle to experimental outcomes on the other. By Landauer’s Theorem the mutual information associated with entanglement must be converted into waste heat in this process. Whatever can be converted into heat is a form of energy; entanglement, therefore, must be associated with an energy distinct from the local kinetic, potential, and rest-mass energies of the particles. Entanglement energy is nonlocal in that it is a property of the entangled state as a whole. It can probably be expressed in terms of phase relationships between the components of the entangled state; it may also be related to Bohm’s quantum potential.

        I will briefly discuss the implications of this finding for some philosophically-charged questions about the interpretation of quantum mechanics.

 

Penner, Myron A. (Purdue)

“Counting the Cost: Can Externalism Save Scientific Realism?”

 

        According to Stathis Psillos [Scientific Realism: How Science Tracks Truth (London and New York: Routledge, 1999), the most powerful single argument in favor of scientific realism is the No-Miracle Argument (hereafter NMA).  Here’s a simplified version:

Simple NMA

(1)     The theories and methods of science lead to correct predictions and experimental success.

(2)     (1) requires explanation.

        Psillos defends NMA against the charge of vicious circularity by appealing to epistemological externalism, according to which positive epistemic properties like justification and warrant depend only on the successful operation of truth-conducive belief-forming faculties and not on the subject’s being aware that some justifying criterion has been satisfied. 

        I argue that an externalist defense of NMA comes at a philosophical price.  First, it’s likely that one must posit something akin to Aristotelian ‘final causes’ in order to overcome a standard objection to reliabilist accounts of externalism—the Generality Problem.  Second, externalist epistemologies can coherently account for warranted belief in the existence of all sorts of unobservables (God, aliens, spirits, etc.), and the prospects are not good for finding a non-arbitrary externalist criterion that fails to warrant belief in spirits while warranting belief in electrons.  And third, externalist epistemology runs roughshod over standard accounts of epistemic probability, for typical judgments concerning the degree to which a rational agent should believe that p are irrelevant if p (or ~p) receives externalist warrant.

 

Prud’homme, Julien (UQAM)

“Spécificité francophone et évolution des pratiques de recherche en thérapie du langage dans le Québec francophone, 1956-2000”

 

        L’orthophonie est une discipline paramédicale vouée aux troubles de communication et dont l’histoire au Canada commence dans les années 1950. Dès l’origine, les milieux scientifiques francophones du Québec se trouvent à la confluence de deux traditions distinctes : principalement affiliés aux écoles américaines, ils sont aussi directement exposés aux influences de l’Europe francophone l’usage du français chez les patients québécois demeurant l’objet principal de la pratique clinique. Cette spécificité francophone rend parfois problématique une affiliation massive aux écoles américaines, générant des tensions qui marquent l’évolution des pratiques scientifiques dans la discipline.

        De 1956 à 1980, la volonté d’intégrer les circuits scientifiques américains est indissociable des revendications pour un meilleur statut professionnel. La question de l’autonomie professionnelle teinte ainsi considérablement les rivalités internes entre les tenants des écoles franco-belge ou américaine. Sur le front extérieur, les menées universitaires pour affranchir la profession de l’autorité médicale associent aussi l’importation de modèles américains à la conquête d’une véritable autonomie professionnelle. Après 1985, des équipes de recherche apparaissent en milieu clinique où elles participent à l’implantation de nouvelles activités diagnostiques. Toujours d’importation américaine, ces innovations exigent cependant un matériel (tests, normes) qui n’existe pas en français. Mobilisées autour de ce problème, les équipes de recherche se développent alors essentiellement autour d’activités de production et de validation d’outils cliniques destinés à remplir les besoins propres à la spécificité francophone québécoise.

        Dans les années 1960 et 1970, les orthophonistes du milieu universitaire québécois promeuvent ainsi une intégration aux circuits scientifiques américains pour des raisons partiellement corporatives et au détriment des contacts avec l’Europe. De 1985 à 2000, ce sont plutôt les limites pratiques de cette intégration qui poussent les nouvelles équipes de recherche clinique à définir leurs activités.

 

 

Richardson, Alan (UBC)

“Committing Empiricism on Historical Grounds: History and Rationality in van Fraassen’s The Empirical Stance”

 

        Bas van Fraassen’s recent book, The Empirical Stance, is a densely layered piece of philosophy that promotes a vision of what being an empiricist amounts to ultimately. I present an interpretation of the main message of the book, provide a glimpse at how van Fraassen uses  history to motivate that message, and provide an alternative account of the relation of empiricism to its history. The main message of the book, I argue, is that a commitment to empiricism is a non-rational commitment, a commitment based on will, emotion, and tradition, a stance, not a belief.  Perhaps the most interesting aspect of van Fraassen’s message is the way he marshals the history of science and the history of philosophy–especially the history of empiricism itself–in motivating and explaining his project. Van Fraassen’s history  highlights the voluntaristic tendencies of recent empiricism and finds pride of place for James’s “will to believe” and Reichenbach’s conventionalism. 

        I will provide two additions to van Fraassen’s story. First, I will sketch a richer history of recent voluntarist empiricism. Second, I will suggest an alternative relation of current empiricism to its history by arguing in a MacIntyrean vein that van Fraassen’s empiricism has a more rational foundation than van Fraassen allows. His empiricism has an historical rationality–it explains our philosophical past and offers us philosophical projects here and now. I end with some meditations on the stability of such a thoroughly historicized empiricism.

 

 

Sheldon Richmond (Independent Scholar)

“Technology Learning: An Application of Kuhn, Polanyi and Popper”

 

        A fundamental problem in the design, development and support of computer systems is that no matter how sophisticated the design, development and support become, the learning of new systems always frustrates even the most sophisticated users of computers. Why? The explanation for this involves the use of three opposing philosophies of science–those of Kuhn, Polanyi and Popper. Firstly, applying Kuhn-- computer developers and technologists use a different paradigm for computer systems than that used by even the most sophisticated users of computer technology.  Secondly, applying Polanyi-- the learning of computer systems requires immersion in the culture of computer technology for long periods of time, but the technology undergoes constant revolution defying the development of sufficient levels of expertise. Thirdly, applying Popper–learning requires risk taking and error making, however, computer technology is designed to prevent users from tampering with the systems (by locking down systems, preventing access to the code, etc. with the important exception of “open systems” such as Linux).

My two conclusions are as follows: 1. We need to change the “ecology” or socio-technical system of computer technology such that we form one culture with technology developers and technology users.  2. We need a new and deeper understanding of computer technology systems.

 

Rousseau, Jean-jacques (U. of Toronto)

“Trading Zones: From Formation to Development”

 

        The question of how disciplines come about is central to science studies. Expectedly, subscribing to a theory of discipline formation will inform the way one recounts the history of disciplines.  Historian of physics Peter Galison introduces the trading zone as his theory of how disciplines arise while retelling the story of particle physics.

        In my view, Galison’s historical interests are not well served by his theory of discipline formation.  He presents the trading zone, a conceptual and physical space in which disciplines arise, as a kind of Creole where sub-disciplines like theory and instrument making are equal participants in the formation of the disciplines in which they participate. However, unlike languages that contribute to a Creole, what identity could experiment have without the context of a disciplinary practice?  The question that Galison does not ask is: Does the autonomy displayed by a sub-discipline at the early stages of discipline formation survive the process of discipline maturation?

        I argue that the autonomy of sub-disciplines does not survive the maturation of discipline.  While the trading zone offers a plausible account of how disciplines come about, it does not adequately account for its development.  To push the linguistic metaphor, a discipline is not a Creole but a koine, that is, a new practice variety that emerges out of the interaction of genetically and typologically related practices.

 

Schlimm, Dirk (Carnegie Mellon)

“Theoretical Aspects of Theory Development”

 

        In traditional accounts of the development of science the formation of a theory is often motivated by the discovery of new data that is incompatible with a given theory. However, the appearance of new data is not the only reason that leads scientists to change and modify their theories (e.g., Copernicus did not have essentially different observational data than his predecessors). In order to focus on the theoretical aspects of theory development, I concentrate in the present paper on mathematical theories, since the driving forces behind theory development in mathematics are largely independent of empirical factors. However, many considerations carry over to theories in the natural sciences.  

        I identify two kinds of theoretical motivations for the development of theories: (a) Conservative motivations include the desires to clarify the logical structure of a given theory and to purify the theory from references to entities or methods that are considered external to it. (b) Innovative motivations aim at extending or restricting the scope of a given theory. Surprisingly, conservative motivations can lead to innovative developments (e.g., non-Euclidean geometries were invented in the attempt to clarify the logical structure of Euclidean geometry) and innovative aims can result in a deeper understanding of a given theory (e.g., the consideration of infinite groups led to a refinement of the theory of finite groups).

        My explication of the internal forces of theory development is based on axiomatic presentations of theories and I argue that these forces can not be accounted for in a purely semantic understanding of theories (e.g., van Fraassen 1987). I conclude, against the view that axiomatizations are the endpoints of theory development (e.g., Hempel 1970), that axiomatics is a powerful device for theory development.

 

 

Shields, William M. (Virginia Tech)

“Karl Popper’s Quantum Ghost”

 

        Karl Popper, though not trained as a physicist and embarrassed early in his career by a physics error pointed out by Einstein and Bohr, ultimately made substantial contributions to the interpretation of quantum mechanics. As was often the case, Popper initially formulated his position by criticizing the views of others—in this case Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg.  Underlying Popper’s criticism was his belief that, first, the “standard interpretation” of quantum mechanics, sometimes called the Copenhagen interpretation, abandoned scientific realism and second, the assertion that quantum theory was “complete” (an assertion rejected by Einstein among others) amounted to an unfalsifiable claim. Popper insisted that the most basic predictions of  quantum mechanics should continue to be tested, with an eye towards falsification rather than mere adding of decimal places to confirmatory experiments. His persistent attacks on the Copenhagen interpretation were aimed not at the uncertainty principle itself and the formalism from which it was derived, but at the acceptance by physicists of an unclear epistemology and ontology that left critical questions unanswered. In 1999, physicists at the University of Maryland conducted a version of "Popper's Experiment", re-igniting the debate over quantum predictions and the role of locality in physics.

 

 

Tésio, Stéphanie (U. Laval)

“Au Canada, quand médecine et botanique se rencontrent au XVIII^ème siècle”

 

        La communication vise à montrer, à partir des écrits de Michel Sarrazin et de Jean-François Gaultier, médecins du roi à Québec, la possible influence des plantes canadiennes dans la pharmacopée française de l’époque.

        En colonisant l’Amérique du Nord, et en particulier le Canada, la France implante un certain nombre d’institutions calquées sur le modèle métropolitain : le gouverneur, l’intendant de justice, police et finances, la seigneurie, la paroisse, les communautés religieuses, et bien évidemment tout le corps médical civil, accompagné de tout son savoir et de ses prétentions : des médecins du roi, des lieutenants du premier chirurgiens du roi, des chirurgiens et quelques apothicaires. Afin de surveiller tout ce personnel en place, Michel Sarrazin (1699-1734) et Jean-François Gaultier (1742-1756), sont nommés médecins du roi dans la colonie. En parallèle de leurs fonctions professionnelles centrées sur la visite des malades de l’hôtel-Dieu de Québec, ils ont pour tâches de recueillir des données scientifiques : anatomiques, minéralogiques, météorologiques et botaniques. Données envoyées à l’Académie royale des sciences de Paris. A cet effet, leur temps libre est occupé, entre autres, par l’herborisation et la description des végétaux qui poussent dans la vallée du Saint-Laurent. Le premier décrit 204 plantes, et le second 175. Parmi toute cette masse d’informations, les deux médecins daignent s’attarder sur et décrire pour certains végétaux leur valeur thérapeutique attribuée par les amérindiens ou les chirurgiens canadiens. Ainsi, la communication vise à montrer la part des plantes et des remèdes, d’origine canadienne, dans la pharmacopée française, et leur influence dans les pratiques médicales.

 

Tsou, Jonathan Y. (U. of Chicago)

“Genetic Epistemology: Piaget’s Philosophy of Science”

 

        Jean Piaget’s (1896-1980) theory of genetic epistemology is typically understood as a theory of cognitive development in children. This understanding, however, fails to appreciate the scope of genetic epistemology and, in particular, the relevance of Piaget’s theory for scientific knowledge. Inasmuch as Piaget can be labeled as a child psychologist or cognitive-developmental theorist, he can rightfully be viewed as a historian and philosopher of science. This paper discusses Piaget’s philosophy of science and, in particular, the picture of scientific development suggested by his theory of genetic epistemology. The aims of the paper are as follows: (1) to explicate genetic epistemology as a theory concerning the growth of knowledge both in the individual and in science, (2) to explicate Piaget’s view of ‘scientific progress’ that is grounded in his theory of equilibration, and (3) to juxtapose Piaget’s notion of scientific progress with Thomas Kuhn’s. Issues of scientific development, evolutionary epistemology, neo-Kantianism, and scientific realism are discussed.

 

 

Turner, Steven (U. of New Brunswick)

“Testing the Joerges-Shinn Thesis: The Late Blight Disease and Molecular Biological Methods, 1983-2000”

 

        In 2001 Terry Shinn and Bernward Joerges introduced their much-discussed concept of “research technologies,” proposing the concept as simultaneously a synthesis of, and challenge to, extensive recent work on the impact of instruments and instrumentation on the nature of post-WWII science. The research methods of molecular biology, especially those deployed in “green,” or agriculture-related biotech, have been advanced by various writers as a paradigmatic instantiation of the Joerges-Shinn thesis. This paper tests these claims, as well as the efficacy of the “research-technology” concept, by examining the penetration of molecular-biological research methods into one small corner of biological science, the exploration of the late blight disease of potatoes and its causal organism, the oomycete fungus Phythophora infestans. Between 1983 and 2000 this problem-field generated a research literature of about 100 articles per year world wide, and that literature testifies to transformative innovations in the dominant research methodologies at work in the area. This paper concludes that development of this problem-field is well-described by the Joerges-Shinn thesis, but that the new research technologies have not transformed the cognitive structure of the field in the ways that some advocates of the thesis would have predicted.

 

 

Villeneuve, Jean-Philippe ( U. de Montréal)

“Cauchy et l’utilisation de la généralisation structurelle”

 

        Dans son Résumé des Leçons sur le calcul infinitésimal de 1823, Cauchy prouve, entre autres, que les “sommes de Cauchy” d’une fonction continue convergent vers un nombre qu’il définit comme l’intégrale définie. De ce fait, il obtient un critère d’intégrabilité des fonctions continues, lequel sera ensuite généralisé, par Cauchy, aux fonctions continues ayant un nombre fini de singularités. Nous allons, après évidemment avoir expliqué dans le détails ces deux critères, montrer que cette généralisation est une généralisation du type structurel. En effet, ce type de généralisation est caractérisé par le fait que la preuve du premier critère est ‘incluse’ dans celle du second, ce qui est évidemment le cas pour la généralisation faite par Cauchy. D’une part, il faut noter que ce type de généralisation n’est pas seulement présent chez Cauchy, puisque nous avons trouvé le critère d’intégrabilité de Lipschitz de 1864 et celui de Jordan de 1892 ont été généralisés de la même façon. Ajoutons d’autre part que ce type de généralisation, du fait qu’il n’y a pas eu de décontextualisation et que ce processus semble être nécessaire à l’abstraction, n’est pas une abstraction. Nous obtenons donc un bel exemple d’un certain type de généralisation qui n’est pas une abstraction.