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Pierre Maurice Marie Duhen is Born
Duhen was born in Paris, France to parents Pierre-Joseph Duhem and Alexandrine Fabre. -
Education begins
Duhem's father wanted him to be well educated, so by the age of 7 he begun learning grammar, arithmetic, Latin, and catechism. -
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Higher Education
At age 11, Duhem was enrolled at Collège Stanislas. By 1882 he was studying pure science at the prestigious École Normale Supérieure. Duhem graduate in 1888 and earned his Doctorates degree. (NWE 1) -
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Thermodynamics
Duhem is world renowned for his work on chemical thermodynamics, and in particular for the Gibbs–Duhem and Duhem–Margules equations. Through his life he had 5 publications involving Thermodynamics.(NWE 1) -
Philosophy of Science
In philosophy of science, Duhem is best known for his work on the relationship between theory and experiment, arguing that hypotheses are not straightforwardly refuted by experiment, and that there are no crucial experiments in science. (Ariew 2) -
The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory
The book focused on his disagreeance with Newton's theory that universal mutual gravitation comes from phenomena. Duhem stated that this theory clearly goes against Kepler's laws of planetary motion. Duhem also introduced Instrumentalism (which was used to predict phenomena), the underdetermination of theories by evidence, and confirmation holism. (Ariew 2) -
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Duhem-Quine Thesis / Problem
The problem concerns a “gap” between theory and observation. Though the problem can be given various formulations, in general the issue is that a singular theoretical claim has no direct observational consequences, and thus cannot be conclusively falsified by observation. (Ariew 2) -
La science allemande
This was one of Duhem last works, before he died. Duhem focused on the German "mind" of science and from his studies he states that truth requires both reason and argument(raison and raisonnement).
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Pierre Duhem Death
Duhem died of a chest infection in Cebrespine, France.
