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History and philosophy of science

From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.

History and Philosophy of Science (HPS) is an academic discipline that encompasses the philosophy of science and the history of science. Although many scholars in the field are trained primarily as historians or philosophers, there are degree-granting departments of HPS at several prominent universities (see below).

While it may seem an umbrella term, people in the field of HPS consider this fusion of history of science with philosophy of science to be perfectly natural, as epitomised by Norwood Russell Hanson, "history of science without philosophy of science is blind, and that philosophy of science without history of science is empty" (paraphrasing Kant's famous quote "Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind.").

The origin of this hybrid approach can be seen in the career of Thomas Kuhn. His first permanant appointment, at the University of California, Berkeley, was to a position advertised by the philosophy department but he also taught courses from the history department. When he was promoted to full professor in the history department only, Kuhn was offended at the philosophers' rejection because "I sure as hell wanted to be there, and it was my philosophy students who were working with me, not on philosophy but on history, were nevertheless my more important students"¹. This attitude is also reflected in his historicist approach, as outlined in Kuhn's seminal Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962, 2nd ed. 1970), wherein philosophical questions about scientific theories and, especially, theory change are understood in historical terms, employing concepts such as paradigm shift.

More recently the sociology of science and technology studies have become popular topics and a few HPS departments have become Science Studies departments, e.g. the School of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of New South Wales was known as the School of Science and Technology Studies (STS) from the mid-1980s until 2001. For this reason it can be argued that the fields are identical and that the difference is only one of emphasis. While it may seem that STS is a broader concept, leaving room for other approaches to science such as sociology of science, HPS departments are not usually as exclusive as a literal interpretation of the name might imply.

Note 1: "A Discussion with Thomas S. Kuhn" in The Road Since Structure, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000, p. 302.

Contents

1 Universities with History and Philosophy of Science Programs

2 See also

2.1 Related topics
2.2 Related people

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Universities with History and Philosophy of Science Programs

The following universities have departments dedicated to the History and Philosophy of Science:

Cambridge University [1] (http://www.hps.cam.ac.uk/)
Indiana University, Bloomington [2] (http://www.indiana.edu/~hpscdept/index.shtml)
University of Melbourne [3] (http://www.hps.unimelb.edu.au/)
University of New South Wales [4] (http://www.arts.unsw.edu.au/hps/)
University of Pittsburgh [5] (http://www.pitt.edu/~hpsdept/)
University of Sydney [6] (http://www.usyd.edu.au/hps)

University of Leeds has a unit for HPS within the philosophy department [7] (http://www.hps.leeds.ac.uk/)

These universities offer inter-departmental programs in HPS:

University of California, Berkeley offers a program in HPS administered by the departments of History and Philosophy [8] (http://philosophy.berkeley.edu/html/programs/gradhps.html)
University of Notre Dame offers a graduate program in HPS through their Reilly Center for Science, Technology, and Values with students admitted to either the history or philosophy department [9] (http://www.nd.edu/~hps/)
Stanford University offers a program in HPS administered by the departments of History and Philosophy [10] (http://www.stanford.edu/dept/HPS/)

Many universities also have history of science programs, which do not include any philosophy of science. Others may provide a philosophy of science track within normal philosophy departments.

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