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Birth
Thomas Samuel Kahn was born on July 18,1922 in Cincinnati, Ohio. Kuhn was born into a very wealthy family and his parents liked to call him Tom. His younger brother Roger was born three years later. His parents were very successful, his father was a Cincinnati-born industrial engineer and investment consultant while his mother was a writer for various different agencies. When Kuhn was only a few months old him and his family had moved to New York. -
Harvard Education
Thomas Kuhn had decided that he would major in Physics in High School. Once he had gone to Harvard he had found studying in Physics harder than he expected. He had applied himself during his freshman year and pulled through with an A in his Physics class. In his Sophomore year, the U.S. had entered World War 2. -
Making Sense of Absurdity
In addition to physics Kuhn was increasingly fascinated by philosophy. He believed searching for his personal truth offered better prospects that what physics did. In 1947, he was offered to attend a History of Science course for undergraduates at Harvard. This is where his first love of philosophy grew. Kuhn realized that he couldn’t understand Aristotle’s ideas of motion because of everything he had already learned in Physics. -
The Paradigm Shift
This concept put Kuhn’s name on the map. This term became widely used in all subjects, not just science. The first appearance of this concept was in his book called “The structure of Scientific Revolutions.” Kuhn had looked at the framework of science through Aristotle’s eyes and through Galileo’s and Isaac Newton’s eyes, and he saw that it was very different. The change in framework was considered the Paradigm Shift. -
Death
Thomas Samuel Kuhn passed away at the age of 73 due to cancer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He had been battling throat and lung cancer for two years. He left behind his wife Jehane Barton Burns. -
Works Cited
Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Thomas S. Kuhn.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 14 July 2019, www.britannica.com/biography/Thomas-S-Kuhn. "Thomas Kuhn." Famous Scientists. famousscientists.org. 12 Jun. 2017. Web. 9/4/2019
<www.famousscientists.org/thomas-kuhn/>. -
Youtube Video
Chapter 2:1 Thomas Kuhn, normal science
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOGZEZ96ynI