Scientific Discovery: Case Studies

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxv

   PDF

2. Understanding Scientific Discovery

   1. Scientific Judgment: Creativity and Discovery in Scientific Thought

      • Marx W. Wartofsky

      Pages 1-16

   2. Discussion of Wartofsky’s Paper

      • Thomas Nickles

      Pages 17-20

   3. The Rational Explanation of Historical Discoveries

      • Thomas Nickles

      Pages 21-49

3. Theoretical and Methodological Innovation in the Copernican Era and Beyond: Social Factors

   1. The Legitimation of Scientific Belief: Theory Justification By Copernicus

      • Bruce Wrightsman

      Pages 51-66

   2. Wilhelm IV of Hesse-Kassel: Informal Communication and the Aristocratic Context of Discovery

      • Bruce T. Moran

      Pages 67-96

   3. The Clock Metaphor in the History of Psychology

      • Paul McReynolds

      Pages 97-112

4. Biological Sciences from Darwin to Computer Diagnosis

   1. The Evolving Systems Approach to Creative Scientific Work: Charles Darwin’s Early Thought

      • Howard E. Gruber

      Pages 113-130

   2. Ought Philosophers Consider Scientific Discovery? A Darwinian Case-Study

      • Michael Ruse

      Pages 131-149

   3. Theory Construction in Genetics

      • Lindley Darden

      Pages 151-170

   4. Discovery in the Biomedical Sciences: Logic or Irrational Intuition?

      • Kenneth F. Schaffner

      Pages 171-205

   5. Comment on Schaffner

      • Nancy L. Maull

      Pages 207-209

   6. Reply to Maull

      • Kenneth F. Schaffner

      Pages 211-212

   7. Reductionistic Research Strategies and Their Biases in the Units of Selection Controversy

      • William C. Wimsatt

      Pages 213-259

5. Physics and Chemistry in the Twentieth Century

   1. The Discovery of a New Quantum Theory

      • Edward MacKinnon

      Pages 261-272

   2. The Personal Character of the Discovery of Mechanisms in Cloud Physics

      • William T. Scott

      Pages 273-289

   3. The Structure of Discovery: Evolution of Structural Accounts of Chemical Bonding

      • David A. Bantz

      Pages 291-329

6. The Revolution in Geology: Continental Drift

   1. The Method of Multiple Working Hypotheses and the Development of Plate Tectonic Theory

      • Rachel Laudan

      Pages 331-343

   2. Hess’s Development of His Seafloor Spreading Hypothesis

      • Hank Frankel

      Pages 345-366

7. Back Matter

   Pages 367-382

   PDF

The history of science is articulated by moments of discovery. Yet, these 'moments' are not simple or isolated events in science. Just as a scientific discovery illuminates our understanding of nature or of society, and reveals new connections among phenomena, so too does the history of scientific activity and the analysis of scientific reasoning illuminate the processes which give rise to moments of discovery and the complex network of consequences which follow upon such moments. Understanding discovery has not been, until recently, a major concern of modem philosophy of science. Whether the act of discoyery was regarded as mysterious and inexplicable, or obvious and in no need of explanation, modem philosophy of science in effect bracketed the question. It concentrated instead on the logic of scientific explanation or on the issues of validation or justification of scientific theories or laws. The recent revival of interest in the context of discovery, indeed in the acts of discovery, on the part of philosophers and historians of science, represents no one particular method'ological or philosophical orientation. It proceeds as much from an empiricist and analytical approach as from a sociological or historical one; from considerations of the logic of science as much as from the alogical or extralogical contexts of scientific tho'¢tt and practice. But, in general, this new interest focuses sharply on the actual historical and contem­ porary cases of scientific discovery, and on an examination of the act or moment of discovery in situ.

• Charles Darwin
• Nicolaus Copernicus
• logic
• scientific discovery
• scientific thought

• Department of Philosophy, University of Nevada, Reno, USA

  Thomas Nickles

Policies and ethics