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The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (Princeton Science Library)

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The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (Princeton Science Library) (Paperback)

~ (Author), Philip P. Wiener (Translator)

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Editorial Reviews

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The central proposition of this famous book is that physical theories are conventions serving to economize scientific thought rather than descriptions or explanations of the way the world is made. The work remains intensely alive in a climate of opinion in which strong skepticism about scientific realism is motivated by social and political considerations that could scarcely be more at variance with Duhem's ultra-Catholic conservatism. The introduction by Jules Vuillemin, at once expository and critical, is the clearest commentary on Duhem's philosophy of science that I have had the pleasure of reading. Duhem's phenomenalism, Vuillemin points out, distinguishes between humanity and nature and opposes the naturalism that would make reason merely an aspect of the natural processes it studies.
(Charles C. Gillispie, Da}ton-Stockton Professor of History of Science Emeritus, Princeton University, )

Product Description

This classic work in the philosophy of physical science is an incisive and readable account of the scientific method. Pierre Duhem was one of the great figures in French science, a devoted teacher, and a distinguished scholar of the history and philosophy of science. This book represents his most mature thought on a wide range of topics.

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Product Details

Paperback: 344 pages
Publisher: Princeton University Press (July 9, 1991)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 069102524X
ISBN-13: 978-0691025247
Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #828,448 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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5.0 out of 5 stars Compulsory reading for philosophers of science, February 27, 1998

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"The Aim and Structure" is a very influential book in the history of philosophy of science. Duhem rejects the methodology of crucial experiment and inductivism. He emphasizes that scientific experiments are not observations of raw empirical data, but they are highly dependent on theory (theory-ladenness of observation). But the most famous thesis of this book is epistemological holism; according to W.V.O. Quine it is a "milestone of empiricism". I consider "The Aim and Structure" an excellent introduction to some philosophical problems of science, a compulsory reading for a philosopher of science.

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0 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Philosophy of science with a cheap history-facade, April 19, 2008

By	Viktor Blasjo - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

"A physical theory is not an explanation. It is a system mathematical propositions, deduced from a small number of principles, which aim to represent as simply, as completely, and as exactly as possible a set of experimental laws." (p. 19). "[W]e recognize in a theory a natural classification, if we feel that its principles express profound and real relations among things," and thus "we shall not be surprised to see its consequences anticipating experience and stimulating the discovery of new laws." (p. 28).

"It is not to [the] explanatory part that a theory owes its power and fertility; far from it. Everything good in the theory, by virtue of which it appears as a natural classification and confers on it the power to anticipate experience, is found in the representative part; all of that was discovered by the physicist while he forgot about the search for explanation. On the other hand, whatever is false in the theory and contradicted by facts is found above all in the explanatory part; the physicist has brought error into it, led by his desire to take hold of realities." (p. 32). An illustrative example is Descartes' work on optics. The "representative" part is quite flawless, while the explanatory part contains many silly things, e.g.: "Light is only an appearance; the reality is a pressure engendered by the rapid motions of incandescent bodies within a 'subtle matter' penetrating all bodies. This subtle matter is incompressible, so that the pressure which constitutes light is transmitted in it instantaneously to any distance" (p. 33). Indeed, Descartes was "the one who contributed most to break down the barrier between physical method and metaphysical method, and to confound their domains, so clearly distinguished in Aristotelian philosophy" (p. 43). He used the same principle in his physics, where he tried to prove that "all natural phenomena may be derived completely from this single proposition: 'The essence of matter is extension' ... He investigated the question of constructing the world with shape and motion by starting with this definition. And when he reached the end of his work, he stopped to contemplate it, and declared that nothing was missing in it: 'That there is no phenomenon in nature not included in what has been explained in this treatise'---so runs the title of one of the last paragraphs of the Principia Philosophiae." (p. 44). Newton used the right scientific approach (pp. 47-48), but his work was rejected by the Cartesians because of their garbling of science and metaphysics (pp. 15-16, 46-49). Newton won but "toward the end of the nineteenth century, hypothetical theories which were offered as more or less probable explanations of phenomena were extraordinarily multiplied. The noise of their battles and the fracas of their collapse have wearied physicists and led them gradually back to the sound doctrines Newton had expressed do forcefully." (p. 53).

Theory-ladenness of experiment. "An experiment in physics is the precise observation of phenomena accompanied by an interpretation of these phenomena; this interpretation substitutes for the concrete data really gathered by observation abstract and symbolic representations which correspond to them by virtue of the theories admitted by the observer." (p. 147). This implies, for example, that no one hypothesis can be tested in isolation (p. 187). Duhem attributes great philosophical importance to the theory-ladenness of experiment, speculating about incommensurability issues, etc. But this is pure philosophical speculation with no historical examples to back it up. In fact, the only historical examples Duhem does mention in these sections are examples showing that, on the contrary, "theory-ladenness" can often be quite easily disentangled from experiments, allowing reinterpretation in a new theory (p. 160).

Against models. "Physical theory ... is not to be resolved into a mass of disparate and incompatible models" (p. 220), says Duhem, mocking "the English," who do things like try to explain atomic phenomena in terms of springs and jelly and whatnot (p. 82). Again Duhem has no historical evidence that models are bad. On the contrary, one must "admit frankly that the use of mechanical models has been able to guide certain physicists on the road to discovery" (p. 99). Even so Duhem simply proclaims with no evidence that "the share of booty it has poured into the bulk of our knowledge seems quite meager when we compare it with the opulent conquests of abstract theories." (p. 99). Duhem is also upset that the method of models in many cases "appears as the instrument of discovery whereas it has only been a means of exposition" (p. 94). But why "only"? Did not Duhem himself just argue that science is "only" representation, i.e. exposition?

Similarly, Duhem dislikes, on philosophical grounds, the idea that physical hypotheses should be drawn from experiment, without being able to offer any historical examples of this method being counterproductive, and while recognising the fruits of this method in the works of, e.g., Newton and Amp�re (pp. 219, 190-200).

Duhem compensates for being unable to offer historical support for his main theses by throwing in a trivially true decoy thesis---"hypotheses are not the product of sudden creation, but the result of progressive evolution" (p. 220)---which he then goes on to support by giving a ridiculously elaborate 30-page account of the prehistory of the law of gravitation.

Finally, a great Napoleon quotation: "I take greater pleasure in reading this material than a girl does in reading a novel." (p. 59)

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