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Birth
Thomas Kuhn was born to Samuel and Minette Kuhn in Cincinnati, Ohio. Samuel was an industrial engineer, a graduate from both Harvard and MIT, and a WW1 veteran. Minette was born from a wealthy family, was a graduate from Vassar College, and did freelance work -
PhD
After his work in the war efforts on radio and radar technologies, Kuhn returned to Harvard. Where he finished his masters in 1946 and doctorate in 1949 by writing: The Cohesive Energy of Monovalent Metals as a Function of the Atomic Quantum Defects. -
The Copernicus Revolution
While teaching undergrads Kuhn offered a course on the renaissance era. He became perplexed by and even scrutinized Nicolaus Copernicus’s famous book De revolutionibus. This would become the bases of his first book: The Copernican Revolution. Where he criticized Copernicus for his model being too simple and appealing to aesthetics rather than science. -
Professor of History
During this year Kuhn was promoted to professor, but instead of philosophy of science like he wanted, they made him a professor of the history of science. -
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
The most impactful work by Thomas Kuhn was in his book titled: The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. In this book he attempts to describe the process of paradigm shifts. From normal science, to a model crisis, to a model revolution, and finally the paradigm shift. Here is a video describing the shift: Youtube -
Incommensurability
Besides just paradigms, Kuhn also described the concept of incommensurability. The concept that things and ideas become so different that they can no longer be compared. Like between Aristotle and Newtons ideas. Here is a video describing that idea: Youtube -
Death
Thomas Kuhn passed away from cancer at the age of 73 in his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts.