Pierre Duhem's the aim and structure of physical theory: A book against conventionalism

✍ Scribed by Roberto Maiocchi

• Publisher: Springer Netherlands
• Year: 1990
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 907 KB
• Volume: 83
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0039-7857
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00413423

✦ Synopsis

I reject the widely held view that Duhem's 1906 book La Thgorie physique is a statement of instrumentalistic conventionalism, motivated by the scientific crisis at the end of the nineteenth century. By considering Duhem's historical context I show that his epistemological views were already formed before the crisis occured; that he consistently supported general thermodynamics against the new atomism; and that he rejected the epistemological views of the latter's philosophical supporters. In particular I show that Duhem rejected Poincard's account of scientific language, Le Roy's view that laws are definitions, and '~he conventionalist's use of simplicity as the criterion of theory choice. Duhem regarded most theory choices as decidable on empirical grounds, but made historical context the main determining factor in scientific change.