"Structure joins the evocative concept of paradigm, a disarmingly simple dialectic of scientific change (long periods of paradigmatic "normal science" punctuated by short "revolutions"), and the apparent authority of historical example to show that major conceptual shifts in the natural sciences are effected not by logical argument alone but also by appeals to worldviews, religion, metaphysical commitments, notions of simplicity and order, and so on. The view that science, like other thought systems, advances or retreats through rhetoric and persuasion, not by logical necessity, was a revelation to people who had never practiced it or studied its history. The book comforted social scientists who wanted to assimilate their discipline to physics, Luddites who blamed social problems on scientists and engineers, and everyone who rejected authority. It repelled the philosophers of science at which it was aimed for the good reason that it undercut their belief that scientific knowledge advances by the application of rational criteria to the products of observation and experiment."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_L._Heilbron
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
John L. Heilbron
John Lewis Heilbron (March 17, 1934 – November 5, 2023) was an American historian of science best known for his work in the history of physics and the history of astronomy.
4 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by John L. Heilbron →
Related Quotes
"The physicists of Gilbert's time had recourse to mechanism infrequently, and its effective explanations touched only …"
"Kuhn's revolution was not yet a Kuhnian revolution, although he dated his intention to write the book that became Str…"
"Kuhn had the genius to find the words and sketch the concepts that made important old philosophical problems relevant…"
"Technology...has become the prime source of material change and so determines the pattern of the total social fabric."
"My great-grandmother would talk about her uncles who served in the Maine Regiment during the Civil War, my great-gran…"
"A friend who did a lot of consulting work when tenure-track jobs were not readily forthcoming once told me that havin…"
"The past contains many answers, but until we ask the right questions their meaning eludes us."
"We need some citizens committed to exploring and producing knowledge, as well as consuming it, and the outcomes canno…"
"...All historians are nonfiction writers, whether we know it or not."
"...After the more prosperous era of the mid-1990s through around 2008, we seem to have forgotten the truly dreadful m…"