Philosophy of Science

By Joshua T.
  • Period: to

    Heisenberg, Werner

  • Quantum Mechanics

    Heisenberg laid out the principles of quantum mechanics using matrices while working on a Rockefeller Grant with Niels Bohr in Copenhagen.
    David Cassidy. The Quantum Mechanic. History.aip.org. American Institute of Physics. 2017. Sun. 23 Sep 2018. https://history.aip.org/history/exhibits/heisenberg/p07.htm
  • Period: to

    Putnam, Hillary

    Hillary Putnam wrote a great deal on a number of different fields of philosophy, to include Philosophy of the Mind, Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Science, Metaphilosophy, and Philosophy of Mathematics, among others. Some of his most significant works are contained in the following: Epistemology, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science: Essays in Honour of Carl G. Hempel. Edited with Wilhelm K. Essler and Wolfgang Stegmüller. Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1985.

  • Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle

    This is Heisenberg's most well-known effort, and it has continued to have dramatic impact on scientists' understanding of particle relations and waveforms. Simply put, the principle states that the more certain the position of a particle is known, the less certainty there is about the particle's momentum. The following TED Ed video discusses the principle in more detail:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQKELOE9eY4
  • Period: to

    Noam Chomsky

    Avram Noam Chomsky is one of the most interesting characters living today. He holds honorary degrees from at least 42 different institutions around the world, and has been awarded numerous prizes in recognition of his many contributions. He is best known, perhaps, for his work in the field of linguistics; his work there has bled into countless other disciplines, not the least of which are philosophy, psychology, computer programming, political theory, and so on.

  • Heisenberg awarded Nobel Prize in Physics

    Heisenberg was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for the creation of Quantum Physics and the discovery of allotropic forms of hydrogen. Werner Heisenberg – Nobel Lecture. NobelPrize.org. Nobel Media AB 2018. Sun. 23 Sep 2018. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1932/heisenberg/lecture/

  • Putnam's doctoral dissertation

    Putnam publishes his doctoral dissertation, under the supervision of Hans Reichenbach. Interestingly, Reichenbach was a leading logical positivist, but Putnam adamantly rejected logical positivism throughout his career. Putnam's dissertation: The Meaning of the Concept of Probability in Application to Finite Sequences. Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los
    Angeles, 1951.

  • Chomsky publishes Syntactic Structures

    A work that distinguished the syntax of language from the semantics, Syntactic Structures was Noam Chomsky's first book to be published, and perhaps his most important across a broad number of areas. Chomsky, Noam. Syntactic Structures. The Hague: Mouton, 1957. Print.

  • Physics and Philosophy: The Revolution in Modern Science

    Although his greatest contributions to science overall were probably the development of quantum mechanics and his Uncertainty Principle, this book, first published in 1958, is the culmination of his work addressing the philosophy in physics. “What we observe is not nature itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning.” (Physics and Philosophy 2007) Heisenberg, Werner. Physics & Philosophy: the Revolution in Modern Science. HarperPerennial, 2007.

  • Chomsky: Cognitive Revolution

    Noam Chomsky, among others, is credited with inspiring the Cognitive Revolution which resulted in the creation of the field of cognitive science. His contribution was a critique and rejection of B. F. Skinner's behaviorist approach. Chomsky, N (1959). "A Review of B. F. Skinner's Verbal Behavior". Language. 35 (1): 26–58.

  • Interview of Putnam on Philosophy of Science by Professor Brian Magee

    This was a fascinating interview I discovered, with great applicability to our course. I also found it much more accessible and engaging than Putnam's lecture, but this interview is for a broader audience, and not merely students of philosophy.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kH785oawwkk

  • Hilary Putnam gives Fact/Value Dichotomy Critique lecture

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mN9ZTgLUOKs

  • The Fact/Value Dichotomy and Its Critics, by Hilary Putnam

    Although Hilary Putnam contributed a great deal to philosophy in a number of different fields, this treatise deals with how science and non-science coincide. He gave this lecture multiple times late in his life. Essentially, after arguing many different views over the years, he came to the conclusion that one cannot fully distinguish between a value judgment and a fact; value judgments may have factual basis, whereas scientific fact requires belief in certain institutionalized assumptions.

  • Chomsky: Science, Mind, and Limits of Understanding

    This article is a more detailed rendering of what Chomsky addresses in the video (1 May 2017 timeline event).
    Link: https://chomsky.info/201401__/ Chomsky, Noam. "Science, Mind, and Limits of Understanding." The Science and Faith Foundation (STOQ), The Vatican, January 2014. chomsky.info. Rerieved 21 October 2018.

  • Chomsky: Descartes and the mind

    Noam Chomsky's take on Descartes, Newton, and their insights into reality (although not stated explicitly as such) is a very relevant view for our current class. The video is focused on Descartes' attempts toward proving a mechanical reality and concluding rather that the mind is what senses the world, but the "mechanical world" cannot itself be proven.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVFBABFdLXE Bonus content: Chomsky Style (3:19 in the video)
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJtHNEDnrnY