This book builds on the path-breaking work of George E. Smith and further explores the notions of evidence and confirmation in the exact sciences from two perspectives: conceptual and historical. Contributions in this volume investigate the philosophical presuppositions, explanatory scope, and historical precursors of evidence in mathematical physics and related disciplines. The papers are written by and of interest to philosophers and historians of science.
Table of Content
1. Smith, Smith and Seth, and Newton on “Taking to be True” (Jody Azzouni).- 2. ‘To Witness Facts with the Eyes of Reason’: Herschel on Physical Astronomy and the Method of Residual Phenomena (Teru Miyake).- 3. Newton on the Relativity of Motion and the Method of Mathematical Physics (Robert Di Salle).- 4. Henry Cavendish and the Density of the Earth (Allan Franklin).- 5. Does the Present Overdetermine the Past? (Craig W. Fox).- 6. Newton’s Example of the Two Globes (Monica Solomon).- 7. On Metaphysics and Method in Newton (Howard Stein).- 8. Working Hypotheses, Mathematical Representation, and the Logic of Theory-Mediation (Zvi Biener, Mary Domski).- 9. Newton’s Principia and Philosophical Mechanics (Katherine Brading).- 10. Newton on Quadratures: a Brief Outline (Niccolò Guicciardini).- 11. A tale of Two Forces: Metaphysics and its Avoidance in Newton’s Principia (Andrew Janiak).- 12. Theory-Mediated Measurement and Newtonian Methodology (Michael Friedman).- 13. Immediacy of Attraction and Equality of Interaction in Kant’s ‘Dynamics’ (Katherine Dunlop).- 14. Remarks on J. L. Lagrange’s Méchanique Analitique (Sandro Caparrini).- 15. Ptolemy’s Scientific Cosmology (N.M. Swerdlow).- 16. Revisiting Accepted Science: the Indispensability of the History of Science (George E. Smith).
About the author
Marius Stan is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Boston College. He works in history and philosophy of science, with an emphasis on classical physics. He is co-author, with Katherine Brading, of Philosophical Mechanics in the Age of Reason (Oxford), and author of Kant’s Natural Philosophy (Cambridge).
Christopher Smeenk is Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Rotman Institute at Western University, Ontario. He works in general philosophy of science, philosophy of cosmology, and history of physics. In addition to numerous articles, he is co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of Newton (with Eric Schliesser) and co-author of The Aim and Structure of Cosmological Theory (with James Owen Weatherall).
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