Talk:History of scientific method

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[edit] Methodological naturalism?

Could anyone tell me if the following from the article is really true:

Later in the 20th century, methodological naturalism came to be accepted as central to the scientific method, partly in response to rise of creation science.

Who says so? And how do we know it to be the case? Personally I'm struggling to find naturalism important in any sense. Probably it just means that I don't understand the philosophy well enough although I should say it puzzles me that I've been reading around the philosophy of science for some years only to find there is something central to scientific method that I hardly know about. --Chris 00:03, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

It might help for starters if a definition of methodological naturalism were to be supplied by somebody. Otherwise it might be considered by some to be no better than a vague and mystifying dogma of some ilk. Jon Awbrey 02:38, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Methodological naturalism gets talked about a whole lot as something central to the definition of science, though perhaps more by scientists than professional philosophers. I added that methodological naturalism sentence recently, because it gets invoked so often (especially in the creationism and intelligent design related articles, where it is hard to insert much historical/philosophical nuance without getting accused of POV and mired in massive discussions about single-word edits), but under the assumption that it has always been part of what was considered the definition of science. I'm inclined to agree with you, Chris, about it not being central to scientific method in philosophy work (though my knowledge of philosophy of science is limited). However, look at Portal:Scientific method, which asserts "methodological materialism" (linked to Naturalism (philosophy), which has the definition of MN, as foundational to scientific method. The naturalism article makes the same claim, even though scientific method doesn't mention it.

I think all three pages (naturalism, scientific method, and the portal) suffer from somewhat of a scientisitic bias; assuming falsificationism as an unproblematic criterion for science (despite lots of debate on its merits by philosophers), presenting the step by step observation-hypothesis-experiment-analysis scientific method of high school science class, and plenty of cramming historical examples into the definition of scientific method given. But I'm not really up for the work it would take to convince the science patriots to make these articles give some room to a more social contructionist viewpoint.

Notice that in scientific method, "philosophical issues" don't even figure in the article until nearly the end; it isn't really about the scientific method from a philosophy of science or history of science perspective.

Maybe the way it is now, the sentence is problematic, but not mentioning methodological naturalism (or scientific naturalism, methodological materialism, or whatever you want to call it) would actually lead to the impression that it has always simply been taken for granted, given the context of the other articles.--ragesoss 03:44, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

By the way, Chris: I like what you did with the scientific method intro... it's a big improvement.--ragesoss 04:13, 12 January 2006 (UTC)


I decided finally to remove the text on naturalism on the grounds that it is not especially pertinent to a discussion of scientific method. Here's the removed text in case someone argues for its reinsertion: --Chris 07:42, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

The modern methodological assumption of naturalism in scientific inquiries can be also traced back to ideas of thinkers of the period:

By the late Middle Ages the search for natural causes had come to typify the work of Christian natural philosophers. Although characteristically leaving the door open for the possibility of direct divine intervention, they frequently expressed contempt for soft-minded contemporaries who invoked miracles rather than searching for natural explanations. The University of Paris cleric Jean Buridan (a. 1295-ca. 1358), described as "perhaps the most brilliant arts master of the Middle Ages," contrasted the philosopher’s search for "appropriate natural causes" with the common folk’s erroneous habit of attributing unusual astronomical phenomena to the supernatural. In the fourteenth century the natural philosopher Nicole Oresme (ca. 1320-82), who went on to become a Roman Catholic bishop, admonished that, in discussing various marvels of nature, "there is no reason to take recourse to the heavens, the last refuge of the weak, or demons, or to our glorious God as if He would produce these effects directly, more so than those effects whose causes we believe are well known to us." [1]

[edit] 2-some reels & 3-some reels

|      The Deil's awa wi th' Exciseman
|
| There's threesome reels, there's foursome reels,
|   There's hornpipes and strathspeys, man,
| But the ae best dance e'er cam to the land
|   Was The Deil's awa wi th' Exciseman.
|
|                          Robert Burns (1792)

JA: I probably should warn you about a caltrop in the road ahead, in the matter of the 2-or-3-ductions. Aristotle, Kant, and Peirce were charmed by 3-some reals in this regard, and so there will be quite a bit of incommensurability to iron out when it comes to coordinating their thought with thinkers who thought in 2-some reals. For instance, Peirce's induction is not the same induction as the one that pairs off with deduction in a 2's-company way. For him the cycle of inquiry has the natural order (ab-, de-, in-)duction, and so a lot of the job that others give to in- Peirce alots to ab-, while in- for him is more like a graveyard testing shift that doesn't go to work until after the other two shifts have gone home for the night. Jon Awbrey 05:54, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

It's a jungle out there.
But you should have read this section before. There is a way to explain it-- all of it. Just don't quite know what it is yet-- I think it has something to to with working from the problem of induction that they got stuck on, to confidence as a variable... and diligently avoiding any discussion of the transcendental aesthetic along the way. I think we'll figure an explanation without getting to a megabyte of article length here. I'm done for now; take care...Kenosis 06:50, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

JA: Well, I thought I read it, but then it was a little late. The thing is that the so-called "problem of induction" (POI) will mean something different if it's 2-finger POI or 3-finger POI. For Peirce, the bale shifts to abduction as the definitive task of pragmatism to explain, which explanation naturally involves an abduction of course, hence the recursion, which has to ground out on the basis of one or more kinds of primitive abduction. What are those? For one, there's our "native instinct for lucky shots" (NIFLS), that W.S. McCulloch personified as Agatha Tyche. There may be others, what's your guess? Jon Awbrey 16:08, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I'll have to report back on that one. In my own compartmentalized way I had thrown NIFLS into the psychology box, with but a few scattered crumbs of it in the excessive induction compartment of the science box. Among the myriad pitfalls and pratfalls along the way to sensible method involving a community of participants, no doubt what you say is true. Can't make a list for you offhand, but NIFLS certainly is one. My personal favorite is that it requires inductive reasoning to come up with the POI, which is where Kant comes in. As to primitive abduction per se, don't know..Kenosis 18:53, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I made a relatively large edit of the text on Aristotle. I've restricted myself to discussion of why Aristotle chose deductive reasoning over induction since that seems to fit with the content of the article so far. I'm not sure if it would be better to instead use the space to fully outline the norms of Aristotle's approach to scientific enquiry. Any thoughts? --Chris 14:12, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Aristotle and Medieval philosophy

From the Article:

"Up until the seventeenth century, Aristotle's teachings were seen not as a starting point for further studies, but instead as ancient wisdom to be relearned, preserved and defended without alteration."

This is a widespread assumption, but it seems to be at least controversial for today’s specialists in medieval thinking:

[To assert that medieval philosophy is just the continuation of ancient philosophy by other means] … underestimates the liveliness of mediæval philosophers, who cheerfully reinterpret, revise, reject, and even ridicule Aristotle’s views if they don’t stand up to scrutiny. Seeing a problem Aristotle didn’t see was no barrier to their ingenuity. - From [1](page 01) at [2].

The theory of impetus, by Jean Buridan, is a good example of revision in Aristotle's teachings. --Leinad ¬ »saudações! 18:00, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

As it happens I had considered qualifying the statement with some words about critics such as Ockham, Buridan and Albert of Saxony. I only decided not to because my knowledge of their work is sketchy. The statement could be removed, replaced or qualified. While I look into it, what would you advise? --Chris 21:35, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


I tried to find to what extent the conservatism of the time extended to Aristotle’s teachings. I started from the notion that Aquinas had reconciled Aristotelian philosophy with Christian theology so convincingly that an attack on Aristotle’s philosophy would have been tantamount to an attack on the church. Aristotle’s primary-mover is, after all, used by Aquinas to help prove the existence of God.
If this was a valid surmise then I have not found much evidence for it. Therefore I must agree with you that the original statement is controversial. While Aristotle was unmistakably mainstream, I can’t get a feeling for how much divergence from his teachings was tolerated. I've replaced it with something less controversial, although Galileo still reads as being heroic in his opposition to Aristotelian teaching. That may also have to change.
In support of the sentence I used as a replacement I offer this article on the influence of Aristotle on renaissance philosophy. The article notes that "Richard Blum has counted 6653 such commentaries for the period 1500 to 1650. The magnitude of this number should be considered significant — especially in comparison to the ca. 750 commentaries listed for the fifteenth century". The replacement sentence in the article reads, "Aristotle therefore had his critics and detractors. This notwithstanding, by the seventeenth century, Aristotle's teachings had become, if anything, more influential." --Chris 14:30, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


For the 2 first paragraphs of the section, I would write something like this:
"Despite being initially seen as a possible threat to Christian orthodoxy, Aristotle’s ideas flourished during the medieval Renaissance of the 12th century. This was due mainly to the success of Thomas Aquinas in reconciling Aristotelian philosophy with Christian theology. While some instances show that medieval philosophers were not afraid of disagreeing with Aristotle, their achievements can be seen more as modifications or corrections to Aristotle's basic philosophy than a huge departure from his views. During the Renaissance, the rejection of previous medieval traditions coupled with extreme reverence for classical sources further enshrined Aristotelian influence over European society. By the seventeenth century, Aristotle's teachings had become influential to the point of hindering further speculation and scientific discovery.
It was during the decidedly conservative period of (…)."
Also, at least for now, I would avoid suggesting the connection: Christian church = Aristotle = Dogmatism that had to be overturned... Since, it may be more a reminiscence of 19th century prejudices than the currently prevalent view among scholars (see Conflict thesis). A person we may consult to clarify this matter is user:SteveMcCluskey, he’s a medievalist and PhD in History of Science, he's also very active in the project. Best wishes, Leinad ¬ »saudações! 17:22, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm very happy with your suggestion, so I went ahead and changed the article. I certainly will ask Steve what he thinks. Thanks very much for your help so far. --Chris 17:50, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I just noticed that I wasn’t clear at least in one point of the above text. First I wrote about the Renaissance of the 12th century, latter I wrote about the traditional Renaissance (starting around the 15th century) without explaining that they are separate events. I don’t know how you understood the text, but I’m sure many will be confused if we leave it that way. I did a quick fix in the article, feel free to comment and further edit the text. --Leinad ¬ »saudações! 19:37, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
I've made a few changes about the Medieval background (Aquinas isn't the only scholastic theologian) and added comments on the new philosophies of the Renaissance. I still need to put in some references. --SteveMcCluskey 03:15, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Peer review in medieval Islam?

Passages like this appear in this article and others dealing with medieval and islamic science:

The scientific method in its modern form arguably developed in early Muslim philosophy, in particular, using experiments to distinguish between competing scientific theories, along with the methods of citation ("isnad"), peer review and open inquiry, leading to development of consensus ("ijma" via "ijtihad"), and a general belief that knowledge reveals nature honestly. During the Middle Ages, Islamic philosophy developed and was often pivotal in scientific debates–key figures were usually scientists and philosophers.

These claims appear without any citations and seem to be a stretch when we get to the definition of Peer review. It is a systematic process in which manuscripts or research proposals are submitted by publishers or funding agencies to third parties who are experts in the field for consideration before the manuscript is published or the research proposal is funded.

Such a system of peer review is highly improbable in medieval culture, which lacked centralized agencies for publishing and in which patronage of scientific research was highly capricious. I am marking these articles with the {{fact}} template and will delete these claims if they are not supported with appropriate citations. --SteveMcCluskey 16:15, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

After examining the claims for Islamic "peer review" in various articles, they seem to stem from an interpretation at Avicenna#Philosophy where Avicenna's production of commentaries on Aristotle is seen as leading to peer review. This doesn't seem to stand up to close inspection.
  • Such commentaries can be seen as the origin of medieval scholastic commentaries, but not of peer review.
  • Avicenna was not the first figure to write commentaries on Greek philosophers. Such commentaries go back to late antiquity (see W. Stahl, Roman Science, p. 38)
Unless there is some other evidence, I don't see how the claim for an Islamic origin for peer review can be supported. --SteveMcCluskey 16:56, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks Steve for bringing up this issue. For me it would be preferable to remove the whole paragraph and say something more solid about the relation of Islamic Philosophy to scientific method. If it is true that "scientific method in its modern form arguably developed in early Muslim philosophy", then I for one would have difficulty arguing exactly that argument.
I also have a problem with the paragraph in the same section starting,
"Roger Bacon, under the tuition of Grosseteste, was inspired by the writings of Muslim alchemists (particularly Alhazen)".
I suspect that it is only conjecture that Alhazan was of special influence, possibly based on the information that both Alhazan and Bacon both studied optics.
On a side note, Leinad writing above thinks you may have an opinion regarding our discussion on the role of Aristotelian science around the time of Galileo. If you have anything to add to what we say above I think we would both be grateful. --Chris 20:32, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Looking at the linked articles on the Islamic concepts of isnad, ijma, and ijtihad, these topics seem to pertain more to Islamic legal studies than to Islamic philosophy and science. Of course, there may be interactions among those traditions, but the author who made such claims is obligated to document them and spell them out.
(Incidentally, neither isnad nor ijma cite any sources, and ijtihad is remarkably sparse. I presume there is scholarly material in the Encyclopedia of Islam that knowledgeable editors could cite).
Having recently updated the article on Alhazen and the section on Bacon in History of Optics, I'm doubtful of a methodological influence from Alhazen to Bacon. Again, this claim needs to be documented: Bacon cites his sources, does he cite Alhazen on methodological issues? --SteveMcCluskey 16:01, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
It is possible to invert the reasoning, by citation of Alhazen -
  • "He used the example of the pinhole camera, which produces an inverted image, to support his argument. This contradicted Ptolemy's theory of vision that objects are seen by rays of light emanating from the eyes. Alhazen held light rays to be streams of minute particles that travelled at a finite speed. He improved Ptolemy's theory of the refraction of light, and went on to discover the laws of refraction."
-- this is from the light article. (Alhazen's example of the use of scientific method as an improvement on Ptolemy's theory.) In that case, someone reading Alhazen could have learned scientific method by example. --Ancheta Wis 10:32, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the reference. From what I know of Alhazen's optics, the idea of pinhole images doesn't play a major part in his theory of vision. I'm going to flag that passage in light with a {{citation needed}} template. --SteveMcCluskey 13:32, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Grosseteste understanding or misunderstanding

This from the "Emergence" section:

"Grosseteste [is among the first] to fully understand Aristotle's vision of the dual path of scientific reasoning. Concluding from particular observations into a universal law, and then back again: from universal laws to prediction of particulars."

To my knowledge Aristotle is still understood to only accept as scientific, reasoning that leads to universals. Can we be sure that it is not Grosseteste's "dual path" (which I'm unfamiliar with) that is not the misunderstanding? --Chris 21:00, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Chris. I don't pretend to be an expert on Aristotle's philosophy of science, but there is certainly an interaction between the role of induction from observations to lead to universals, and deduction from the universals to lead back to particulars. As I read Crombie's interpretation of Grosseteste's commentary on the Posterior Analytics, that's what Grosseteste and Aristotle had in mind. You're right, of course, that Aristotle and his followers only considered reasoning that leads to knowledge of universals as "scientific."
(On a tangent for a moment, Aristotle's emphasis upon observation is one of the elements that set him apart from his master, Plato.) --SteveMcCluskey 02:25, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Aristotle the Muslim

Again from the "Emergence" section:

"Ideas from the Muslim world, particularly Alhazen and Aristotle’s ideas, were introduced..."

This seems to suggest that Aristotle was a Muslim. Perhaps we could reword to avoid this confusion. --Chris 21:07, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Scientific practice or scientific method?

I'm wondering what the balance should be in this article between the history of formal discussions of scientific method (e.g., those of Aristotle, Grosseteste, Descartes...) and the actual methods employed in scientific practice. My thought would be to emphasize the former; it's all too easy to claim that a scientific discovery implies the use of a particular scientific method, but it's really hard to demonstrate it. Witness, for example, the long disputes over the role of experiment in Galileo's discoveries which has only been unraveled by looking at his manuscript notes.

In a case like that, historians tend to go toward a complex interaction of experiment (or observation) with theoretical analysis. Any good discussion of actual scientific practice requires a rich body of evidence and investigations of their published and umpublished materials. We typically find that this has only been done for a few really major (and fairly recent) figures. That practical argument also points toward focusing on formal discussions of scientific method.

I imagine there are other points of view on this. --SteveMcCluskey 03:24, 21 October 2006 (UTC)


I'm glad you mentioned this and I do like the idea that we should focus on formal treatments of method. Could we have as a starting point the criterion that we only handle cases where a method has been articulated? It does raise one or two questions. I'm not sure where it would leave Galileo who, I believe, does not tackle scientific method explicitly. As for the Edwin Smith papyrus, from the introduction: can we equate medical procedures with scientific method? Perhaps we can if we argue that philosophers had not yet re-begun the work of "Knowledge" in the more profound, and as we would now like it, scientific sense. It might make no sense to project our ideas of scientific method backwards onto history and thereby discount the possibility that this papyrus expounds a scientific method. On the other hand, we must at least be able to recognise a discussion of scientific method as such. In the case of the papyrus, I’m not entirely convinced that I do. --Chris 20:13, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
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