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Science and Play

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2022

Michael Goldman
Michael Goldman*
Affiliation:
Miami University
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Extract

Many philosophers interested in problems of scientific progress—what it is and whether it is possible—have in recent years, and with good reason, focused on the challenges directed by Kuhn (1962) and Feyerabend (1975) to the traditional belief in progress by accretion. I have argued (in response to Feyerabend's proliferation theory) that the proper locus for a solution to these problems must be the social (or what I prefer to call the “material”) conditions in which proposed competing theories must exist (Goldman 1980)). Recently, Gonzalo Munévar has proposed similar criteria in his book Radical Knowledge (1981). Our approaches have much in common. Most importantly they eschew the wholly “intellectual” criteria offered by almost all philosophers; that is, criteria which focus entirely on a theory's ability to solve problems arising only in thought (whether they be called ‘conceptual’ or ‘empirical’ problems).

Type
Part IX. Philosophy of Science, past and Future: Metaphor and Play
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1982 , Issue 1: Volume One: Contributed Papers 1982 , 1982 , pp. 406 - 414
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1982

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Footnotes

1

This paper was written while I was studying under a National Endowment for the Humanities Residential Fellowship for College Teachers. I am grateful to my colleagues in that program for their suggestions, and to Peter Schuller, my colleague at Miami University, with whom I have discussed these issues.

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