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On the Heuristic Value of Scientific Models

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Herman Meyer
Herman Meyer*
Affiliation:
Enschede, Holland
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Extract

Preliminary Remarks: Before entering into the subject matter of the paper, it may be useful to present American readers with a sketchy outline of present-day European philosophy of science, as it appeared to me at the International Congress of Philosophy of Science, held in Paris at the Sorbonne on October 15–22, 1949. The sections of which I can give a first hand impression and which are of particular interest for our subject, are those of physical science and of probability.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 18 , Issue 2 , April 1951 , pp. 111 - 123
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1951

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Footnotes

∗

Augmented text of a lecture delivered at the Xth International Congress of Philosophy, Amsterdam 11–18 August 1948.

References

1 A remarkably clear exposition, without the use of mathematics, by L. de Broglie is to be found in the “Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale,” 1938, p. 325–337 under the title, “Physique ponctuelle et physique du champ.”

2 For a first introduction see J. L. Destouches, “La mécanique ondulatoire” (series “Que sais-je?,” Presses Universitaires de France, 1948).

3 Special reference is made to Vol. 2, No. 3/4 (1948) of the Swiss review DIALECTICA, which is entirely devoted to this subject by such contributors as N. Bohr, A. Einstein, L. de Broglie, W. Heisenberg, H. Reichenbach, Prof. and Mrs. Destouches and F. Gonseth.

4 The writer has made an attempt to bring these problems nearer to solution, having regard to modern theory of matter, in a book which has just appeared under the title “Kennis en Realiteit,” (Knowledge and Reality), W. de Haan, Utrecht 1949, in a series edited by Professor J. Clay, of the University of Amsterdam.

5 H. Reichenbach: “Axiomatik der Wahrscheinlichkeitsrechnung” Math. ZS, 34, p. 568–619, 1932, and “Wahrscheinlichkeitslehre,” Leiden 1935 by the same author. A. Kolmogoroff: “Grundbegriffe der Wahrscheinlichkeitsrechnung,” (Ergebnisse der Mathematik, II), Berlin, 1933. The system of axioms developed by these authors makes use of the notion of “measure” as defined by the French mathematician H. Borel.

6 Evert W. Beth: Natuurphilosophie, Gorinchem (Holland) 1948, p. 112; cp. my review in Synthese, Amsterdam, 1949.