"Robert Cohen" wrote in message
oups.com...
the accepting/rejecting of ideas

Thomas Kuhn, THE STRUCTURE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, and related others,
citca early 1960s, Univ of Chicago publications, continues to
enormously influence my perceptions about these phenomena.

Kuhn discusses rhe political-social aspects of the process of
literature professional journal publishing.

He apparently coined/popularized "paradigm"
norming/formulating/"shifting."

Kuhn's philosophical ideas were explicitly promoted by my southeastern
state university's college of arts & sciences as I recall in the
mid-1960s.

In fact his writing was the only "official" xerox/mimeograph handed-out
which (seemingly) every freshman was expected to read.

I wonder if he Is still so highly held/regarded ?

Who are the Thomas Kuhns of now?

When John Beaz regularly posted on sci.physics.relativity he mentioned a
number of modern philosophers of science he thought were doing good work -
one name I recall is Max Jammer - so if you are interested in that sort of
thing he may fit the bill. A philosopher I do like is Victor Stenger - but
he is also a physicist -
http://www.colorado.edu/philosophy/vstenger/

Personally, while I do not think philosophy is silly, irrelevant or anything
like that, (although some philosophers like Hegel make you wonder - but that
is another story) I believe some rather simple philosophical ideas are all
that is necessary to do good science - but to each his/her own. It is
interesting that while some great physicists like Einstein and Bohr were
heavily influenced by philosophy others such as Feynman, Dirac and Landau
(in fact Landau wanted to remove all tracers of what he called 'philology'
from physics - a worthwile but I beleive doomed undertaking) were not. In
fact it would seem an understanding of mathematics and its relation to
physics is of greater worth in making progress in physics -
http://modeling.asu.edu/R&E/SecretsGenius.pdf

Thanks
Bill

In article ,
Bill Hobba wrote:

"Robert Cohen" wrote in message
roups.com...
the accepting/rejecting of ideas

Personally, while I do not think philosophy is silly, irrelevant or anything
like that, (although some philosophers like Hegel make you wonder - but that
is another story) I believe some rather simple philosophical ideas are all
that is necessary to do good science - but to each his/her own. It is

Simpler than you might think. Modern thinking is that a theory might be
validated but not verified, while earlier scientist tried to verify their
theories. But in terms of the end product, what is really the difference
between a scientist trying to discover and prove a correct model and a
scientist trying to create and validate a provisonally better model?

The scientist needs to assume some basic things such as that the universe
has order to it that can be discovered, we can gain information about the
universe through our senses, and that a scientific theory should be
connected to and tested by observable things. I think very little beyond
that is actually needed.

--
"Then they placed the ark of the Lord on the cart; along with the box
containing the golden mice and the images of the hemorrhoids."
-- 1 Samuel 6:11

"Gregory L. Hansen" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Bill Hobba wrote:

"Robert Cohen" wrote in message
roups.com...
the accepting/rejecting of ideas

Personally, while I do not think philosophy is silly, irrelevant or
anything
like that, (although some philosophers like Hegel make you wonder - but
that
is another story) I believe some rather simple philosophical ideas are
all
that is necessary to do good science - but to each his/her own. It is

Simpler than you might think. Modern thinking is that a theory might be
validated but not verified, while earlier scientist tried to verify their
theories. But in terms of the end product, what is really the difference
between a scientist trying to discover and prove a correct model and a
scientist trying to create and validate a provisonally better model?

The scientist needs to assume some basic things such as that the universe
has order to it that can be discovered, we can gain information about the
universe through our senses, and that a scientific theory should be
connected to and tested by observable things. I think very little beyond
that is actually needed.

I agree with maybe a caveat or two. That would be things like why we prefer
SR to LET. SR makes more sense IMHO because it places the emphasis on what
I think is important - symmetry - and does away with an inherently
unobservable aether. That preference is purely philosophical. Others who
have been exposed to it such as Ilja came away with a different but AFAICS
equally valid view preferring LET.

Thanks
Bill


--
"Then they placed the ark of the Lord on the cart; along with the box
containing the golden mice and the images of the hemorrhoids."
-- 1 Samuel 6:11