Prof John Worrall

This course is available on the BSc in Philosophy and Economics, BSc in Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method and BSc in Politics and Philosophy. This course is available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit and to General Course students.

No prior systematic knowledge of physical and biological science is presupposed.

The course examines a number of fundamental issues in philosophy of science, as they arise from instances of important theory-changes (so-called 'scientific revolutions') in the history of science. It is therefore by no means a ‘straight’ course in history of science: it looks at historical episodes to test and/or illustrate philosophical theses about science and its development.

1. The Copernican revolution: the switch from the Ptolemaic geocentric view of the world to the Copernican heliocentric one was probably the greatest revolution in human thought ever: What justified the switch? Was Ptolemaic theory definitively refuted by the data? Was Copernican theory simpler? Was the Church's view that Copernican theory should only be thought of as an instrument for calculating astronomical data purely theologically motivated or does it have some scientific rationale? What role was played in the eventual acceptance of the Copernican view by predictive success? Do we need to invoke social or other non-intellectual factors to explain why this 'revolution' occurred?

2. Galileo: Galileo and the telescope: are all observations 'theory-laden' and does this mean that there is a subjective element to all theory-choices? Galileo and the argument for his law of free fall: can theories be 'deduced from the phenomena'?

3.The Newtonian revolution: What was the relationship between Newton's theory and Kepler's and Galileo's laws? What does this tell us about theory-change in general?

4.19th Century revolutions in Optics: the switches from the corpuscular theory to the wave theory of light and from the wave theory to the electromagnetic  theory. What do these cases of theory-change tell us about the twin theses of scientific rationality and scientific realism?

5. The Darwinian Revolution: This revolution certainly ranks alongside the Copernican one in terms of its impact on man's view of herself. But debates about the scientific credentials of Darwin's theory began immediately on the publication of Darwin's work and continue to this day. Is Darwinian theory unfalsifiable (or even just one big tautology)? Can 'scientific' creationists explain everything that Darwin can?; What objections were raised by Darwin's critics to particular aspects of Darwinian theory? Were these valid objections and, in so far as they were, have they now been resolved?

10 hours of lectures and 8 hours of classes in the MT. 10 hours of lectures and 10 hours of classes in the LT. 1 hour of lectures and 2 hours of classes in the ST.

Students will be expected to write at least two essays per term and to give class papers.

Background reading: T S Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions; Imre Lakatos 'Falsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes' in his The Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes, Philosophical Papers 1; G Holton (revised by S Brush): Theories and Concepts in Physical Science.

Recommended reading: The central text for the first part of the course is T S Kuhn, The Copernican Revolution, Harvard University Press; the central text for part 5 is Philip Kitcher: Abusing Science: the case against Creationism. MIT Press. There will be lecture slides on each topic including (i) a list of essential reading and suggestions for further reading and (ii) 'study questions' to guide your thought. Aside from the above reading for the section of the course on the Copernican revolution, reading for particular topics will be in the form of articles and selections from books. These will be made available through a combination of handouts, course pack and the Offprint Collection.

Exam (100%, duration: 3 hours) in the main exam period.