Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'History and philosophy of science'

Philosopher of science Wilfrid Sellars argues that there are two mutually exclusive images of human-in-the-world that philosophy ought to unify: the "manifest image" of common, shared experience and the "scientific image" of imperceptible objects. Process philosophy, as a metaphysical framework, is in a unique position to allow both images to sit together in dynamic tension, rather than allowing one image to collapse into the other. Not only do I maintain that process philosophy is logically robust, but I also argue that there are several instances of empirical verification of process as an ontology.

Taking a process ontology seriously, however, requires that we re-articulate an understanding of the two grand narratives that are utilized to explain our origins: the socio-cultural evolution of consciousness and the objective evolution of the universe. I call these the history of science and the science of history, respectively. In Western academia, the science of history is usually given ontological priority; but within a process metaphysic, neither can be said to be explanatorily primary. That which holds these two narratives together, and that which produces spacetime itself, I refer to as "pretemporal origination." The mode through which this process elicits evolution is through creative-discovery, wherein creation and discovery are not two separate modes of mind-universe interaction, but unified on a continuum of constraints.

This dissertation tracks the development of German political philosophy over the course of the first half of the seventeenth century, with an emphasis on the disciplinary, methodological, and pedagogical concerns of Politica writers. These figures produced large-scale technical textbooks on politics, which attempted to make sense of the chaotic civil sphere through the application of disciplinary structures. The main influences on their thought came from the sixteenth century: Aristotelianism, reason of state, natural law, and neostoicism were the competing traditions that they attempted to fit into comprehensive treatments of their subject. Generally, these thinkers have been organized by historians into schools divided by their political and confessional commitments. I argue that, while these factors were important, their disciplinary and methodological choices also decisively shaped their vision of politics, and indeed their positions on the critical questions of their day. I do this by focusing on four specific writers, one from each of the four faculties of the early modern university: Bartholomaus Keckermann from the arts faculty, Henning Arnisaeus from Medicine, Christoph Besold from Law, and Adam Contzen from Theology. I show how each Politica author?s disciplinary background inflected their construction of politics as an academic discipline, and how this in turn shaped their opinions on the confessional and constitutional debates which were then fracturing the Holy Roman Empire. While the dissertation does focus on the differences among these figures, it also tracks a trajectory which they all participated in. I argue that their attempts to discipline politics as a subject resulted in the centering of the state as a disciplinary and administrative institution. Their motivation was to prevent political upheaval through the application of technical expertise, which meant that they were able to find ever more aspects of human life which required treatment under the rubric of political philosophy, because almost anything could be conceived of as either a threat or a source of strength for the political order. This in turn suggested a vastly expanded conception of the regulatory and disciplinary powers of the state. I thus contend that, although the Politica writers are mostly forgotten today, they represent a critical phase in the intellectual development of the idea of the state.

This dissertation looks at the life and work of famed English Aristocrat Robert Boyle. Specifically, I examine his treatment of generation and its organizing forces—seminal principles, plastic powers, and petrifick spirits. Generation, I argue, provided the context by which Boyle was introduced both to chymistry and anatomy. The problem of generation would remain at the forefront of his concerns as he experimented in chymistry, pneumatics, minerals, anatomy, transmutation, and plants. Looking at the various communities in Europe with which Robert Boyle interacted, I show that the mechanical philosophy was actually quite diverse. As one of the most influential scholars of his time, Boyle presents a distinctly mechanical account of generation that would have a profound effect upon Western science.

This dissertation examines the importance of geography, performance, and microscopy in the construction of theories of human difference in Europe in the eighteenth century, with a particular focus on "fringe groups" such as albinos with black parents and individuals with complexion disorders. It joins a growing discussion in history, the history of science and medicine, and critical racial theory about the social and philosophic bases of early-modern human taxonomic schemas. Collectively, the fields analyzed in this study share a common conceptual root in their dependence on transferable physical processes—techniques—as much as on the intellectual frameworks investing those gestures with meaning. The necessarily embodied processes of exploration, spectatorship, and microscopic visual analysis produced discrete ways of seeing human difference which influenced the conclusions that natural philosophers reached through those embodied experiences. Marginal groups of individuals with unexpected or "abnormal" complexions drew a disproportionate amount of attention in the eighteenth century, because they were not easily identifiable with pre-existing conceptions of human difference and consequently provided a strong impetus to reconsider those epistemic categories. Overwhelmingly, the perspectives of eighteenth-century natural philosophers were profoundly non-racial in nature; instead, they drew upon ideas as varied as monstrosity, morality, self-analysis, dramatic tragedy, entertainment, and imagination to position experiences of unexpected human diversity in a distinctly valuative and sensational understanding of human difference. Through the interrogation of new and underutilized sources, this dissertation argues for an enrichment of our understanding of the "history of race" by taking into account the diversity of the physical techniques that were used by eighteenth century thinkers to arrive at ideas about human difference, while simultaneously demonstrating the centrality of hitherto understudied groups—such as albinos with black parents—in the formulation of systems of human difference.

I consider the claims made by medical ethicists that funding by pharmaceutical companies threaten the integrity of medical research and the claims of philosophers of science that evidence-based medicine can provide a sound epistemic foundation on which to base medical treatment decisions. Drawing on both game theory and medical history, I argue that both medical ethicists and philosophers of science have missed crucial aspects of medical research. I show that both veritistic and commercial aims are enduring and entrenched aspects of medical research. Because these two drives are perpetually pulling medical research in different directions, I identify the resultant conflict as the fundamental antagonism

The primary task of the dissertation is to provide a framework that incorporates both drivers of medical research. Specifically, I argue that medical research is best conceived of as an asymmetric arms race. Such a dynamic is typified by a series of moves and countermoves between competing parties who are adjusting to one another's behavior, in this case between those who seek to make medical practice more responsive to good evidence and those whose primary motivations are instead commercial in character.

Such a model presents three challenges to standard evidential hierarchies which equate epistemic reliability with methodological rigor. The first is to show that reliability and rigor can (and do) come apart as a result of the countermeasures employed by manufactures. This fact suggests that in considering policy proposals to improve epistemic reliability, it is robustness (i.e. resistance to manipulation) that should be the crucial desideratum. The second consequence is a reorientation of medical epistemology. One of the primary strategies that manufacturers have employed is to manipulate the dissemination of information. A focus on an isolated knower obscures the impact that industry has in shaping what information is available. To address these problems medical knowledge must be understood from a social epistemological framework. Finally, and most importantly, the arms race account suggests that the goal of identifying the perfect experimental design or inference pattern is chimerical. There is no final resolution to the fundamental antagonism between commercial and scientific forces. There is only a next move.

Explores the foundations of political community as understood in two complementary ways: first, in contemporary normative political and social theory. Second, in the history of politics and in the history of philosophy. Particular attention is given to David Hume, Adam Smith, and Edmund Burke, as well as their relationship to contemporary political philosophers like Bernard Williams, John Rawls, Jeremy Waldron, Alasdair MacIntyre, Charles Mills. Using Wittgenstein’s concept of a form of life (lebensform) in the Philosophical Investigations, argues that there is a family within the history of political thought whose members share the understanding that a shared form of life, which develops organically and historically, is a necessary condition for a free society to work well. Examines how political and social obligation, trust and commerce, as well as sympathy and concepts of rights, all require interdependence and shared assumptions and expectations. This family balances the impulses of political realism and political idealism, though is somewhat more anti-idealist than pro-realist. Bottom-up thinking that doesn’t fall in to the trap of idealism or of rationalism, due to a commitment to epistemological limits and the recognition of our finite capacities. In particular, I am interested in how we can combine the seemingly competing forces of culture and tradition (ways we have been doing things, one might say) with the necessary desire for change, reform, and progress. My approach to these questions can help shape the way we think about the size of states, if and when foreign intervention makes sense, the pace of change, and the necessary variety of political and social orders suited to a varying world.

Many concerns contributed to the creative success of Charles Darwin’s theorizing, including his humble character, reading Wordsworth, courting Emma for his wife, and considering the origins of creative thought in a material mind. Creativity is not straightforward; in Darwin’s case, it was fed by diverse interests, literary sensitivities, character traits, unusual introspection and even thoughts of marriage.

During the time frame of this study, the two important years between his return from the Beagle and his Malthusian insight that led to natural selection, Darwin twice read The Excursion and fell in love. While he thought hopefully of Emma, he was focused on reproduction to understand species transmutation and pondered evolved roots for emotions like love, thus linking his sexual and creative stimulation. Part of his drive to succeed was for Emma’s approval, to be a victorious naturalist and demonstrate that he would be a good provider. Emma appreciated Darwin’s humble character, a trait that also allowed him to question belief systems and intellectual conceits that restricted other naturalists. Darwin noted that many of his peers were blocked from understanding species transmutation by their intellectual vanities—like the idea that man was the crown of creation instead of just one species in nature’s panoply.

In the intellectual culture of Darwin’s time creationism was science, while scientists competed with poets for authority over explaining nature. Wordsworth epitomized creativity while asserting that The Excursion’s themes were man, nature and human life—parallel to Darwin’s. Wordsworth’s insights into human emotions, morality and creativity were important to Darwin, who needed to explain all human traits, physical, emotional and mental, as evolved from simpler animals. Darwin reflected on the roots of imaginative thought and proposed a process for thinking that he applied it to his own theorizing; from nascent generation of ideas through rigorous dialectic testing to solid conclusions, thus demonstrating thoughts in competition.

The strong correlation between the productivity of Darwin’s theorizing and his humility, poetry, Emma and considerations of creativity, offers new insights into the path of his theorizing, and perhaps into the origins of creativity itself.

For most of his presidency (1789-1797), George Washington worked to establish the federal government's legitimacy in the eyes of America's citizens while trying to gain international respect for the new nation. Although there was a broad elite consensus at the start of the decade it quickly dissipated in the face of basic questions about the federal government's power and scope of authority. Domestic political issues became entangled with foreign policy problems to create an intractable divide between opposing groups of Americans termed the Federalists and the Republicans. The two parties contended to see not only who would administer the government, but also to determine which group would define the new nation's identity.

This study places George Washington at the center of the contest over the formation of America's national identity during the 1790s. Washington envisioned America as the embodiment of Enlightenment ideals of freedom and liberty. He believed it had the potential to stand in stark contrast to the monarchies and despotism of the Old World. The United States could inspire other nations to follow its lead on the path to freedom.

America could only achieve this position if it were secure, united and independent. These three characteristics would give the nation legitimacy on the international stage. In his efforts to establish America's claim to nationhood, Washington incurred the displeasure of the Republican Party who viewed the president as a tool in the hands of Alexander Hamilton and other Federalists. In his quest to establish security, unity, and independence, they argued, the President betrayed the ideals of the Revolution. Ultimately, it was the public who cast aside Washington's vision for American national identity, not because they disagreed with it, but because they had already mythologized Washington to the point where he was more myth than man. He was a living deity who served a symbolic importance for unity, but had little impact on the nation's identity.

Historiographically, no scholar has undertaken an in-depth examination of Washington's political philosophy (as president), and specifically how this philosophy affected the nascent nation-state's identity. Works like Paul Longmore's The Invention of George Washington, Glenn Phelps's George Washington and American Constitutionalism and the recently published, The Political Philosophy of George Washington (Jeffry Morison) examine one aspect of Washington's political beliefs, or focus on a specific chronological period. My exploration of Washington's beliefs (the heart of the studies mentioned above) is only one part of the dissertation. No attempt has been made to investigate Washington's substantive impact on nationalism and identity. David Waldstreicher, Len Travers, and Joanne B. Freeman have all looked at the formation of nationalism and identity in the 1790s, but Washington's political philosophy and presidency earns little of their attention. Washington was the most well regarded American, nationally and internationally, of his era. The lack of a proper study on his political beliefs and their reception among his fellow Americans is a lacuna which the dissertation seeks to remedy.