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Getting Philosophy of Science Socially Connected

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Janet A. Kourany
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Abstract

Nearly a half century ago, Thomas Kuhn, Paul Feyerabend, Stephen Toulmin, Norwood Russell Hanson, and others issued a challenge to us philosophers of science to make our field more relevant to actual science. That challenge, over time, has elicited a number of useful responses but very few efforts to situate science within its wider social context when philosophizing about science. The unit of analysis for philosophy of science has tended to remain science-in-a-vacuum. I consider the justifications we offer for this failure, our resources for change, and our prospects if we do change.

Type
How Should Philosophy of Science be Socially Relevant?
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 73 , Issue 5: Proceedings of the 2004 Biennial Meeting of The Philosophy of Science Association. Part II: Symposia Papers. Edited by Miriam Solomon , December 2006 , pp. 991 - 1002
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

An early version of this paper was written while I was a Visiting Fellow at the Center for Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh and presented at the Center's 5th Quadrennial International Fellows Conference in Rytro, Poland. I would like to thank the audience there (especially Alexander Afriat, Deborah Dysart-Gale, Philip Ehrlich, John Norton, and David Schrader) for very helpful comments and questions and both the Center and the University of Notre Dame for research support.

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