Chalmers The Scientist's Atom and the Philosopher's Stone

How Science Succeeded and Philosophy Failed to Gain Knowledge of Atoms
1. Auflage 2009
ISBN: 978-90-481-2362-9
Verlag: Springer Netherlands
Format: PDF
Kopierschutz: 1 - PDF Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, Band 279, 287 Seiten

Reihe: Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science

Drawing on the results of his own scholarly research as well as that of others the author offers, for the first time, a comprehensive and documented history of theories of the atom from Democritus to the twentieth century. This is not history for its own sake. By critically reflecting on the various versions of atomic theories of the past the author is able to grapple with the question of what sets scientific knowledge apart from other kinds of knowledge, philosophical knowledge in particular. He thereby engages historically with issues concerning the nature and status of scientific knowledge that were dealt with in a more abstract way in his What Is This Thing Called Science?, a book that has been a standard text in philosophy of science for three decades and which is available in nineteen languages. Speculations about the fundamental structure of matter from Democritus to the seventeenth-century mechanical philosophers and beyond are construed as categorically distinct from atomic theories amenable to experimental investigation and support and as contributing little to the latter from a historical point of view. The thesis will provoke historians and philosophers of science alike and will require a revision of a range of standard views in the history of science and philosophy. The book is key reading for students and scholars in History and Philosophy of Science and will be instructive for and provide a challenge to philosophers, historians and scientists more generally.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Chalmers, Alan

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1;Preface;6
1.1;Note;9
2;Contents;10
3;1 Atomism: Science or Philosophy?;14
3.1;1.1 Introduction;14
3.2;1.2 Science and Philosophy Transcend the Evidence for Them;17
3.3;1.3 How the Claims of Science are Confirmed;18
3.4;1.4 Inference to the Best Explanation;21
3.5;1.5 Science Involves Experimental Activity and Conceptual Innovation;23
3.6;1.6 Reading the Past in the Light of the Present;24
3.7;1.7 Writing History of Science Backwards;25
3.8;1.8 The Structure of the Book;26
3.9;1.9 A Note on Terminology;30
3.10;Notes;30
4;2 Democritean Atomism;31
4.1;2.1 Philosophy as the Refinement of Common Sense by Reason;31
4.2;2.2 Parmenides and the Denial of Change;33
4.3;2.3 The Atomism of Leucippus and Democritus: The Basics;36
4.4;2.4 Atomic Explanations of Properties;39
4.5;2.5 Atomic Explanations of Specific Phenomena;40
4.6;2.6 Atomism as a Response to Zeno’s Paradoxes;41
4.7;2.7 Aristotle’s Critique of Indivisible Magnitudes;45
4.8;2.8 Did Democritus Propose Indivisible Magnitudes as a Response to Zeno?;46
4.9;2.9 Democritean Atomism: An Appraisal;50
4.10;Notes;53
5;3 How does Epicurus’s Garden Grow?;54
5.1;3.1 Epicureanism;54
5.2;3.2 Physical Atoms in the Void;55
5.3;3.3 Atoms and Indivisible Magnitudes;56
5.4;3.4 Atomic Speeds and Observable Speeds;59
5.5;3.5 Gravity;60
5.6;3.6 Explaining the Phenomena by Appeal only to Atoms and Void;62
5.7;3.7 The Status and Role of the Evidence of the Senses;64
5.8;3.8 Knowledge of Atoms: Getting Closer?;66
5.9;Notes;68
6;4 Atomism in its Ancient Greek Perspective;70
6.1;4.1 Philosophical Atomism Versus Less Ambitious Projects;70
6.2;4.2 The Aristotelian Alternative;72
6.3;4.3 Hints of a Granular Account of Matter in Aristotle;76
6.4;4.4 Granular Versus Ultimate Structures;80
6.5;4.5 Greek ‘Science’;82
6.6;Notes;84
7;5 From the Ancient Greeks to the Dawn of Science;86
7.1;5.1 Introduction;86
7.2;5.2 Natural Minima;87
7.3;5.3 Hard Line Versus Liberal Interpretations of Aristotle;89
7.4;5.4 Aristotelianism and Alchemy;91
7.5;5.5 Geber’s ‘Atomism’;94
7.6;5.6 The Status and Fate of Geber’s Integration of Alchemy and Aristotle;96
7.7;5.7 Currents of Thought Leading to Sennert’s Atomism;97
7.8;5.8 Sennert’s Atomic Theory;99
7.9;5.9 The Status of Sennert’s Atomism;102
7.10;Notes;105
8;6 Atomism, Experiment and the Mechanical Philosophy: TheWork of Robert Boyle;107
8.1;6.1 WhatWas Scientific About the Scientific Revolution?;107
8.2;6.2 Boyle’s Version of the Mechanical Philosophy;109
8.3;6.3 Boyle’s Case for the Mechanical Philosophy;111
8.4;6.4 Boyle’s Use of the Macroscopic/Microscopic Analogy;113
8.5;6.5 Boyle’s Experimental Science as Distinct from the Mechanical Philosophy;116
8.6;6.6 Empirical Support for the Mechanical Philosophy;120
8.7;6.7 The Lack of Fertility of the Mechanical Philosophy;124
8.8;6.8 The Various Senses of ‘Mechanical’;127
8.9;6.9 Boyle’s Mechanical Philosophy and Experimental Support for Atoms;131
8.10;Notes;131
9;7 Newton’s Atomism and its Fate;133
9.1;7.1 Introduction;133
9.2;7.2 Newton’s Science;134
9.3;7.3 Newton’s Atomism4;137
9.4;7.4 The Case for Newton’s Atomism;140
9.5;7.5 The Fate of Newtonian Atomism in the Eighteenth Century;144
9.6;Notes;148
10;8 The Emergence of Modern Chemistry With No Debt to Atomism;149
10.1;8.1 Introduction;149
10.2;8.2 Klein on Geoffroy and the Concepts of Chemical Substance, Compound and Combination;151
10.3;8.3 Reflections on Klein’s Account of Chemical Combination;157
10.4;8.4 Boyle’s Chemistry: Some Preliminaries;160
10.5;8.5 Boyle’s Mechanical Rather than Chemical Construal of Substances;161
10.6;8.6 Boyle on the Properties of Chemical Corpuscles;165
10.7;8.7 Chemical Properties and Essential Properties;168
10.8;8.8 The Mechanical Philosophy Versus the Experimental Philosophy;171
10.9;8.9 Newtonian Affinities;174
10.10;8.10 Chemistry from Newton to Lavoisier;177
10.11;Notes;178
11;9 Dalton’s Atomism and its Creative Modification via Chemical Formulae;182
11.1;9.1 Introduction;182
11.2;9.2 Dalton’s Atomism;183
11.3;9.3 Dalton’s Atomic Chemistry;186
11.4;9.4 The Introduction of Chemical Formulae by Berzelius;191
11.5;9.5 The Binary Theory of Berzelius;193
11.6;9.6 Chemical Formulae and the Rise of Organic Chemistry;194
11.7;9.7 Chemical Formulae a Victory for Atomism?;197
11.8;9.8 Dalton’s Resistance to Chemical Formulae;199
11.9;9.9 Is My Critique of Nineteenth-century Atomism Positivist?;203
11.10;Notes;205
12;10 From Avogadro to Cannizzaro: The Old Story;208
12.1;10.1 Introduction;208
12.2;10.2 Avogadro’s Hypothesis According to Avogadro;209
12.3;10.3 Amp` ere’s Version of Avogadro’s Hypothesis and Geometrical Atomism;211
12.4;10.4 Vapour Densities and Specific Heats as a Path to Atomic Weights;212
12.5;10.5 Cannizzaro Reappraised;213
12.6;10.6 Was the Determination of Atomic Weights Important?;218
12.7;Notes;221
13;11 Thermodynamics and the Kinetic Theory;223
13.1;11.1 Introduction;223
13.2;11.2 The Rise of Thermodynamics;224
13.3;11.3 Thermal Dissociation and Affinities;226
13.4;11.4 Early Versions of the Kinetic Theory;227
13.5;11.5 The Statistical Kinetic Theory;229
13.6;11.6 Problems with the Kinetic Theory;231
13.7;11.7 The Status of the Kinetic Theory in 1900;235
13.8;Notes;238
14;12 Experimental Contact with Molecules;240
14.1;12.1 Introduction;240
14.2;12.2 Brownian Motion;241
14.3;12.3 The Density Distribution of Brownian Particles;242
14.4;12.4 Experimental Details;243
14.5;12.5 Support for the Kinetic Theory;245
14.6;12.6 The Mean Displacement and Mean Rotation of Brownian Particles;246
14.7;12.7 The Kinetic Theory Confirmed? – A Nuanced Discussion;248
14.8;Notes;252
15;13 Experimental Contact with Electrons;254
15.1;13.1 Introduction;254
15.2;13.2 Historical Background to the Experiments of 1896/7;255
15.3;13.3 Discovery of the Zeeman Effect;260
15.4;13.4 Thomson’s Experiments on Cathode Rays;262
15.5;13.5 The Significance of Experiments on Charged Particles;265
15.6;Notes;267
16;14 Atomism Vindicated?;268
16.1;14.1 Introduction;268
16.2;14.2 Did Philosophical Atomism Play a Productive Heuristic Role?;270
16.3;14.3 Twentieth-century Atomism a Victory for Scientific Realism?;272
16.4;14.4 In the End is My Beginning;274
16.5;Notes;275
17;References;276
18;Author Index;284
19;Subject Index;288