Pierre Duhem Research Articles

Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds. Pierre Duhem , Roger Ariew

<i>Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds</i>. Pierre Duhem , Roger Ariew

An Account of the Scientific Titles and Works of Pierre Duhem

Certain authors, in speaking of their works, say: My book, my commentary, my history, etc. They smack of these bourgeois homeowners, with “my house” always on their lips. They should rather speak of: our book, our commentary, our history, etc., since, generally speaking, there is far more in them of others than of their own.

Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds. Pierre Duhem , Roger Ariew

Previous articleNext article No AccessBook ReviewsMedieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds. Pierre Duhem , Roger Ariew Edward PetersEdward Peters Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Isis Volume 78, Number 2Jun., 1987 Publication of the History of Science Society Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/354446 Views: 2Total views on this site Copyright 1987 History of Science Society, Inc.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Pierre Duhem. &lt;italic&gt;Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds&lt;/italic&gt;. Translated by Roger Ariew. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1985. Pp. xxxi, 601. $35.00

Journal Article Pierre Duhem. Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds. Translated by Roger Ariew. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1985. Pp. xxxi, 601. $35.00 Get access Duhem Pierre. Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds. Translated by Ariew Roger. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1985. Pp. xxxi, 601. $35.00. Norma E. Emerton Norma E. Emerton Cambridge University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The American Historical Review, Volume 92, Issue 1, February 1987, Page 112, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/92.1.112 Published: 01 February 1987

Pierre Duhem and the history of philosophy of science

ADVERTISEMENT RETURN TO ISSUEPREVArticleNEXTPierre Duhem and the history of philosophy of scienceRobert P. Rooney Cite this: J. Chem. Educ. 1986, 63, 2, 129Publication Date (Print):February 1, 1986Publication History Received3 August 2009Published online1 February 1986Published inissue 1 February 1986https://doi.org/10.1021/ed063p129RIGHTS & PERMISSIONSArticle Views123Altmetric-Citations-LEARN ABOUT THESE METRICSArticle Views are the COUNTER-compliant sum of full text article downloads since November 2008 (both PDF and HTML) across all institutions and individuals. These metrics are regularly updated to reflect usage leading up to the last few days.Citations are the number of other articles citing this article, calculated by Crossref and updated daily. Find more information about Crossref citation counts.The Altmetric Attention Score is a quantitative measure of the attention that a research article has received online. Clicking on the donut icon will load a page at altmetric.com with additional details about the score and the social media presence for the given article. Find more information on the Altmetric Attention Score and how the score is calculated. Share Add toView InAdd Full Text with ReferenceAdd Description ExportRISCitationCitation and abstractCitation and referencesMore Options Share onFacebookTwitterWechatLinked InReddit PDF (2 MB) Get e-Alerts Get e-Alerts

Galileo and the Continuity Thesis

In his review of my Prelude to Galileo (1981a), Ernan McMullin rejects my emendation of Pierre Duhem's “continuity thesis” wherein I develop the case for a pronounced medieval-scholastic influence on Galileo's science based on parallels between Galileo's early Latin compositions and lectures given by contemporary Jesuits at the Collegio Romano (McMullin 1983). He does so on two grounds: (1) that the evidence of derivation I provide, using textual parallels, is so strong that it refutes the claim for any intellectual influence, being a better instance of mindless copying than one of personal appropriation; and (2) that, in any event, the logical structure of the argument which I attribute to Galileo's mature work is not that of demonstration ex suppositione as understood by Aquinas, and so the example I provide of Galileo's use of suppositio “does not link him in any significant way to the specifically Thomist tradition of natural science” (1983, p. 173). An adequate reply to this critique would require the introduction of more historical evidence than would be appropriate for the pages of this journal. A few remarks, however, may be in order concerning such evidence which bears directly on McMullin's first ground, and concerning the implications of this evidence for contemporary philosophy of science, which bear on his second.

Saving the appearances of the appearances: The foundations of classical geometrical optics

1 Simplicius, at third hand from Eudemus through Sosigenes, reports that Plato proposed the by now dog-eared problem of finding "by the supposition of what uniform, circular, and ordered motions the appearances of planetary movements could be saved" (Tivojv vnoredevrœv of' ofxaXcbv xai eyxvxMojv xai rerayfievojv xivtjoeojv ovvrjeorai oiaoojOfjvai rei neql rovc Tikavwjbievovc (paivo/ueva, In Aristotelis De caelo commentarla II, 12, 221a30-32, ed. I. L. Heiberg, Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca, vol. 7 [Berlin, 1894], p. 493). Moreover, Simplicius continues, it was Eudoxus, Plato's student, who first responded to the challenge by devising his theory of homocentric spheres. So if Simplicius is to be credited, Plato, by inspiring Eudoxus, was responsible for the birth of classical mathematical astronomy. Now whether it was Plato himself, or Eudoxus, who actually set out the problem has been a somewhat vexed issue, but on the whole it is accepted that the idea of regularizing the apparent planetary vagaries by means of uniform circular motion is at least consonant with Platonic doctrine (c/., however, J. Mittelstrass, Die Rettung der Phanomene [Berlin, 1962]). More vexed is the issue of what the challenge itself really intendedan issue raised to prominence by Pierre Duhem in his ZQZEIN TA A "to save" appearances meant to fit them into a preconceived mathematical model without regard for the physical reality or truth of the model itself. In short, saving the appearances was a positivist endeavor. The second alternative/school was fundamentally "realist"; it was not enough to frame an adequate mathematical hypothesis. The hypothesis itself had to reflect the real, physical nature of things. Duhem clearly had methodological fish to fry; he wanted to show that the seeds of modern science were not only sown by Plato and his astronomical followers but were nurtured (with some notable exceptions) throughout the middle ages and renaissance

Pierre Duhem on the Testing of Hypotheses

Pierre Duhem on the Testing of Hypotheses

Quinn on Duhem: An Emendation

In recent years there has been a rebirth of interest in the philosophy of Pierre Duhem. Although I applaud the spirit of this movement, one finds the critics of Duhem frequently lacking in a basic understanding of Duhem's tenets, sometimes to the extent that one doubts a familiarity with the Duhemian text. One of the few papers which is designed to remedy this state of affairs is that of Philip Quinn entitled “What Duhem Really Meant.” Quinn is to be applauded for his meticulous and rigorous exegetical work on the Duhemian text. Unfortunately, Quinn's characterization of the logical relations of two of the central Duhemian theses is erroneous. I shall endeavor to correct these errors in this paper.

Science and Creation in the Middle Ages: Henry of Langenstein (d. 1397) on Genesis (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 227 Science and Creation in the Middle Ages: Henry of Langenstein (d. 1397) on Genesis. By Nicholas H. Steneck. (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1976. Pp. xiv + 213. $14.95) Ever since the ground-breaking studies of Pierre Duhem in the first decades of this century, historians of science have tussled with the problem of determining the relationship of late medieval science to the development of "modern" scientific method in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Yet, in spite of the wealth of new information unearthed by numerous scholars, no single analysis of the overall problem posed by Duhem has won universal acceptance , and general historians of early modern science as well as specialists not directly familiar with medieval scientific literature still frequently tend to fall back upon outmoded generalizations . It is largely in response to this state of affairs, Steneck informs us, that the present study was undertaken. Its aim is to provide a "general survey of late medieval science" through an analysis of the work of a representative medieval scientist. The author's particular concern is to isolate the "working world view," the "actual procedures" that characterized medieval science , so as to establish a foundation for a general comparison with the practices of modern scientists. Given the breadth of this expressed purpose, Steneck's choice of a representative medieval scientist may occasion some surprise. Henry of Langenstein or Hesse (1325-1397) was a renowned theologian who taught at the Universities of Paris and Vienna. He composed several works of an overtly scientific character , presumably in conjunction with his teaching in the arts faculty at Paris. These were first examined by Thorndike, 1who noted their closeness in several respects to the work of Henry's great contemporary, Nicole Oresme, but criticized their author's lack of originality, consistency , and scientific rigor. By themselves, Henry's early writings hardly provide enough material for an overall study of the medieval scientist at work. So, although Steneck has made use of them in this book (taking issue as he does with Thorndike's rather harsh appraisal of their merit), he has drawn upon a far more comprehensive source for his assessment of Henry's science, and this from a somewhat unexpected quarter: Henry's massive series of lectures on the opening chapters of Genesis, composed during the author's years expounding theology at Vienna. Henry's preoccupations as a theologian clearly did not preclude his maintaining an avid interest in the study of natural science, and his lectures on the biblical account of creation contain a veritable goldmine of information covering a broad spectrum of scientific issues. In this respect, Steneck argues, they are closer in spirit to the encyclopedic hexameral literature of the twelfth century than to the more strictly theological commentaries on Genesis produced by thirteenth-century scholastics. Steneck performs an important service by demonstrating the centrality of the Lecturae to an understanding of Henry's place in the history of medieval science. He explores the full range of Henry's interests, following the order of the six days of creation. The exposition is admirably clear and engagingly written, imposing order on a bulky and complicated text. The author is careful to place Henry's position in proper historical perspective and displays both a familiarity with his major sources and a sensitivity to the intellectual framework within which his views were developed and to the functions they were intended to serve. He emphasizes Henry's dependence on Aristotle and Augustine while singling out as recurring themes his doctrine of seminal potencies predisposing prime matter for the reception of form and the limitation of the influence of celestial intelligences on the sublunar realm as a foil to astrological prognostication. Steneck stresses throughout the mechanistic aspects of Henry's worldview , arguing that his conception of the universe differs from that of early modern science chiefly in matters of detail, not in basic conceptualization. Although his analysis is thoughtprovoking , one cannot help but feel that this conclusion is at least in part a function of the ' L. Thorndike, A History of Magic and Experimental Science, 8 vols. (New York, 1923-1958), 3:472-510. 228 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY...

Magnétisme et énergétique. La méthode de Duhem. A propos d'une lettre inédite de Pierre Curie.

SUMMARY. — The unpublished letter of 11 January 1902 from Pierre Curie to Pierre Duhem reveals, on the subject of a specific scientific problem, magneto-statics, more than the opposition between two men, that between two approaches to scientific reality : the one heir to the experimental and rationalist tradition of French science, the other more intent on submitting reality to the great principles of general thermodynamics (or energetics).

The genesis of a mediaeval historian: Pierre Duhem and the origins of statics

Summary Contrary to what might be expected given a religious or other motivation, Pierre Duhem's interest in mediaeval science was the result of his surprise encounter with Jordanus de Nemore while working on Les origines de la statique in the late autumn of 1903. Historical assumptions common among physicists at that time may explain this surprise, which occasioned a frantic search for more mediaeval precursors for Renaissance mechanics. It also raised serious historiographical problems that threatened even his methodological views, until they were resolved in his To save the phenomena of 1908.

Buridan, Ockham, Aquinas: Science in the Middle Ages

REVIEW ARTICLE BURIDAN, OCKHAM, AQUINAS: SCIENCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES r---rHE DEATH OF Ernest A. Moody in December of 1975 J_ _deprived the academic world of one of its foremost medievalists and intellectual historians, a person to be ranked surely with Pierre Duhem and Anneliese Maier for the many difficult texts he made available to scholars and for the novelty of the insights with which he continually stimulated them. Fortunate it was that just six months before his death the University of California Press saw fit to publish his collected papers, together with an autobiographical preface that explained his intellectual odyssey, why and when he wrote what he did from beginning to end, and how he finally evaluated the results of all his labors.1 This series 1 Ernest A. Moody, Studies in Medieval Philosophy, Science, and Logic. Collected Papers, 1933-1969. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975. 477 pp., no index, $20.00. Apart from the Foreword and the Preface, the papers include: "William of Auvergne and His Treatise De Anima," pp. 1-110, written as Moody's M. A. thesis at Columbia in 1933 and previously unpublished; "John Buridan on the Habitability of the Earth," pp. 111-126, which originally appeared in Speculum, Vol. 16 (1941); "Ockham, Buridan, and Nicholas of Autrecourt," pp. 127-160, reprinted from Franciscan Studies, Vol. 7 (1947); "Ockham and Aegidius of Rome," pp. 161-188, also from Franciscan Studies, Vol. 9 (1949); "Laws of Motion in Medieval Physics," pp. 189-202, reprinted from The Scientific Monthly, Vol. 72 (1951); "Galileo and Avempace: The Dynamics of the Leaning Tower Experiment ," pp. 203-286, reprinted from the Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 12 (1951); "Empiricism and Metaphysics in Medieval Philosophy," pp. 287-304, reprinted from The Philosophical Review, Vol. 67 (1958); "The Age of Analysis," pp. 305-320, reprinted from Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association, Vol. 36 (1963); "A Quodlibetal Question of Robert Holkot, O. P., on the Problem of the Objects of Knowledge and Belief," pp. 321-352, reprinted from Speculum, Vol. 39 (1964); "Buridan and the Dilemma of Nominalism," pp. 353-370, which appeared in The Harry A. Wolfson Jubilee Volume, published at Jerusalem in 1965 by the American Academy for Jewish Research; " The Medieval Contribution to Logic," pp. 371-392, reprinted from Studium Generale (Heidelberg ), Vol. 19 (1966); "Galileo and His Precursors," pp. 393-408, which appeared in Galileo Reappraised, ed. C. L. Golino, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966; " William of Ockham," pp. 409-440, reprinted from the Encycl

Duhem's Thesis, Observationality, and Justification

Adolf Grünbaum, [1], and Philip Quinn, [7], have proposed two problems as sharpened versions of theses suggested by Pierre Duhem. (1) Can an hypothesis which in itself has no observational consequences ever be falsified by the evidence ? (2) When a theory has observational consequences only in conjunction with auxiliary hypotheses and some of these consequences fail, can the theory always be reasonably defended by constructing alternative auxiliary hypotheses ?

To Save the Phenomena: An essay on the idea of physical theory from Plato to Galileo, By Pierre Duhem (translated from the French by Edmund Doland and Chaninah Maschler) with an introductory essay by Stanley L. Jaki. (Chicago and London, University of Chicago Press. Price 68s.)

To Save the Phenomena: An essay on the idea of physical theory from Plato to Galileo, By Pierre Duhem (translated from the French by Edmund Doland and Chaninah Maschler) with an introductory essay by Stanley L. Jaki. (Chicago and London, University of Chicago Press. Price 68s.) - Volume 45 Issue 174

Pierre Duhem (1969): To Save the Phenomena (tr. by Edmund Doland and Chaninah Maschler, with an introductory essay by Stanley L. Jaki). Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. $7.50. Pp. xxvi + 120.

Previous articleNext article No AccessReviewsPierre Duhem (1969): To Save the Phenomena (tr. by Edmund Doland and Chaninah Maschler, with an introductory essay by Stanley L. Jaki). Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. $7.50. Pp. xxvi + 120.MARY HESSEMARY HESSEUniversity of Cambridge Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science Volume 21, Number 3August 1970 Society: The British Society for the Philosophy of Science Views: 3Total views on this site Views: 3Total views on this site Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1093/bjps/21.3.303 Views: 3Total views on this site © 1970 by The Author. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

The “Calculatores” in Early Sixteenth-century Physics

The aim of this paper is to report some little-known aspects of sixteenth-century physics as these relate to the development of mechanics in the seventeenth century. The research herein reported grew out of a study on the mechanics of Domingo de Soto, a sixteenth-century Spanish scholastic,1 which has been concerned, in part, with examining critically Pierre Duhem's thesis that the English “Calculatores” of the fourteenth century were a primary source for Galileo's science.2 The conclusion to which this has come, thus far, is that Duhem had important insights into the late medieval preparation for the modern science of mechanics, but that he left out many of the steps. And the steps are important, whether one holds for a continuity theory or a discontinuity theoryvis-à-visthe connection between late medieval and early modern science.

Duhem, Quine and a New Empiricism

As in the case of great books in all branches of philosophy, Pierre Duhem's Le Théorie Physique, first published in 1906, can be looked to as the progenitor of many different and even conflicting currents in subsequent philosophy of science. On a superficial reading, it seems to be an expression of what later came to be called deductivist and instrumentalist analyses of scientific theory. Duhem's very definition of physical theory, put forward early in the book, is the quintessence of instrumentalism:A physical theory is not an explanation. It is a system of mathematical propositions, deduced from a small number of principles, which aim to represent as simply, as completely, and as exactly as possible a set of experimental laws [p. 19].

Duhem, Quine and a New Empiricism

As in the case of great books in all branches of philosophy, Pierre Duhem's Le Théorie Physique, first published in 1906, can be looked to as the progenitor of many different and even conflicting currents in subsequent philosophy of science. On a superficial reading, it seems to be an expression of what later came to be called deductivist and instrumentalist analyses of scientific theory. Duhem's very definition of physical theory, put forward early in the book, is the quintessence of instrumentalism:A physical theory is not an explanation. It is a system of mathematical propositions, deduced from a small number of principles, which aim to represent as simply, as completely, and as exactly as possible a set of experimental laws [p. 19].

Models and Analogies in Science: Duhem versus Campbell?

RECENT WORK on the role of models and analogies in science has claimed descent from the conflicting views of N. R. Campbell' and Pierre Duhem.2 In fact, their views on this topic conflict hardly at all. My object here is to set the record straight and to indicate its continuing relevance. is well known that Duhem depreciates the role of models in theoretical explanation; it seems less well known that he contrasts this role sharply with that of analogy: It is well also, if we wish to appreciate with accuracy the fruitfulness that the use of models may have, not to confuse this use with the use of analogy.3 The confusion of which Duhem complains has been widespread in subsequent literature, with the result both that Duhem's views have been misrepresented and, more seriously, that much controversy on these topics has been misdirected. In the attempt to remedy this confusion and its unfortunate consequences, it is convenient to compare Duhem's views in some detail with those of Campbell, who has frequently been contrasted with Duhem as the great advocate of the use of models in scientific theories. I shall argue that Campbell's views have also been misrepresented, that they are in fact very similar to those of Duhem, and that such difference as remains is largely terminological. Duhem is quite clear about what he means by a model. He means, as the title of the chapter shows,4 a mechanical model, of the sort seized upon by the broad, weak, visualizing minds5 characteristic (for Duhem) of the English. To take his justly famous example: