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The two-dimensional view of the history of chemistry
pp. 369-377
Abstrakt
As far as this article is concerned with the metaphor of the dimensions of the history of science, it needs some comments on G. Holton's discussion of the two-dimensional view of science.1 G. Holton calls the standard philosophical view of science which has its roots in empirism or positivism a two-dimensional view. To explain that view he uses a mnemonic device of two orthogonal axes representing the two dimensions of a plane. These dimensions are phenomenal and analytic. A scientific statement, in the 'standard" view, is analogous to an element of area in the plane, and the projection of it onto axes are the aspects of the statement that can be rendered, respectively, as the phenomenal aspect (protocol of observation) and the analytic one (protocol of calculation). In other words, any scientific statement has "meaning" only so far as it can be shown to have phenomenal and/or analytic components in the plane.
Publication details
Published in:
Gavroglu Kostas, Christianidis Jean, Nicolaidis Efthymios (1994) Trends in the historiography of science. Dordrecht, Springer.
Seiten: 369-377
DOI: 10.1007/978-94-017-3596-4_26
Referenz:
Pechenkin Alexander A. (1994) „The two-dimensional view of the history of chemistry“, In: K. Gavroglu, J. Christianidis & E. Nicolaidis (eds.), Trends in the historiography of science, Dordrecht, Springer, 369–377.