Jorge Pinto

This may possibly be the first work on Kuhn and Sarton despite the importance of the subject, since Sarton was one of the main representatives of the “old” historiography of science, essential to understanding Kuhn’s critical proposal of a “new historiography of science” and the “historiographic revolution”. The theme has not been explored up until now by Kuhn scholars perhaps due to the vastness of Sarton’s work and the inadequate resource of merely citing excerpts out of context. Seeking to circumvent these problems, in a Koyréan way, we focus here on a case study. It is a peculiar case study and convenient for our purposes because, while it is of great importance for Sarton’s conception regarding the history of science and is in fact present throughout his academic career, it is not very extensive and can therefore be addressed in a more complete manner. We refer to Sarton’s treatment of Leonardo da Vinci and a discovery that he did not make: the discovery of blood circulation in the seventeenth century, attributed to William Harvey. Although Kuhn did not write about Leonardo or Harvey, we aim to show that he clearly positioned himself contrary to Sarton, albeit indirectly, with respect to this particular historical episode, as well.

This book intends to make known, in a detailed but accessible way to the general public, an old idea, but which has had a renewed interest in recent years: the proposal of attributing an unconditional basic income for all. This idea, often discarded and disqualified for allegedly belonging to the mere domain of utopia, understood in a pejorative sense as something unrealizable, has been the target of the interest of many people (academics, politicians, businesspeople, activists and, of course, all citizens concerned with the common good) is presented as being feasible through several concrete experiences and pilot projects.

This paper is intended to be an outline of Kuhn's conception of the relations between the history of science and the history of art and, at the same time, an introduction to Kuhn's philosophy of science. Kuhn considers that his influential book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, is a portrayal of the development of science as a succession of periods dominated by tradition and punctuated by non-cumulative ruptures. He borrows this idea of development from other fields, including the history of art. Thus, I follow here the footsteps of the Austrian historian of art, Ernst Gombrich, whose name is suggested by Kuhn himself. And I strive to show what Kuhn has in mind when he speaks of a transposition of the idea of non-cumulative development, found in the history of art, to the realm of science. This allows us to introduce some of Kuhn's fundamental notions of the philosophy of science, such as the concepts of "paradigm" and "incommensurability", understanding them beforehand, more intuitively, within the context of the history of art.

The scientific work of Leonardo da Vinci may have served as the main inspiration for the historical research of George Sarton. Although he never produced a work he felt was worthy of its subject, the little that he did write about Leonardo reveals the importance he attributed to him in the history of science. This is especially clear in Sarton´s treatment of Leonardo and a discovery he did not make: William Harvey´s discovery of blood circulation in the 17th Century. In this article, we refer to this particular episode to trace Sarton´s conception of the development of science. It is a conception that illustrates well the traditional historiographic perspective that is the target of Thomas Kuhn´s criticisms. Although Kuhn never wrote about Leonardo or Harvey, we aim to show that he clearly positioned himself contrary to Sarton, albeit indirectly, with respect to this particular historical episode, as well.

This paper discusses creativity, continuity and discontinuity in science and in art by drawing parallels between Kuhn and Gombrich. It seeks to show that, while the idea of strict cumulative progress in the history of science, as well as in the history of art, was abandoned as a new historiography emerged that was sensitive to ruptures, this does not imply denial of all continuity. However, continuity in this context is not a mere logical continuity, but rather a more complex theoretical and historical relation.

The objective of this article is to sketch an historical analysis of the change in the philosophy of science that took place in the 1950s and 1960s around the time of the publication of Structure by Thomas Kuhn. I offer an alternative to the revisionist interpretation that this change is marked by ignorance or neglect, on the part of Kuhn and others, of logical positivism in its more mature form, in this way serving the revolutionary strategy. Countering this conception, I present good reasons for the philosophy of science community, in that historical context, to have used the logical positivist project as their reference and target of criticism rather than the later work of Carnap. I suggest that, faced with the original version of the project, the critics saw Carnap’s “liberalizations” as degenerative. I hold that the revisionists, in turn, neglected the historical context surrounding the philosophical change in question, and touched up the image of positivism from a contemporary perspective.

In this paper I identify a tension between the two sets of works by Kuhn regarding the genesis of the “new historiography” of science. In the first, it could be said that the change from the traditional to the new historiography is strictly endogenous. In the second, the change is predominantly exogenous. To address this question, I draw on a text that is considered to be less important among Kuhn’s works, but which, as shall be argued, allows some contact between Kuhn’s two approaches via Koyré. I seek to point out and differentiate the roles of Koyré and Kuhn – from Kuhn’s point of view – in the development of the historiography of science and, as a complement, present some reflections regarding the justification of the new historiography

The Greens are the political group in which the support for the implementation of a basic income is stronger. Nevertheless, the reasons for that support are not always clear and quite often not related to environmental issues. For this reason, two different approaches to a green BI – environmental and ecological – are discussed in this article. The first could be part of a green growth strategy, whereas the second would require structural changes to the economic model, in support of a post-productivist economy. Although showing some overlaps, these models are in conflict in some central aspects, such as the role of economic growth in promoting sustainability. For this reason, it might be incorrect to assume that an environmental BI is a step toward an ecological BI. We will focus on the green aspects as a consequence of implementing a BI and independently of its sources of funding – namely by looking into the amount a BI needs to be in order to support shifting activities from the market to the autonomous sphere – and on the green potential of its sources of financing.

Despite the importance of the “historiographical revolution” in Kuhn’s work, he did not carry out a specific study about it. Without a systematic investigation into it, he even affirms that the “old” historiography of science (OHS) is unhistorical, suggesting its summary disqualification in the face of his “new historiography” of science (NHS). My wider project, of which this paper is a part, is to better discuss the issue of the justification of the NHS. In this paper, I discuss the justification (and the genesis) of the OHS, focusing on Condorcet and Comte and resorting especially to Koyré. This will allow us to understand that the relation between the OHS and the NHS is a new instance of inter-theoretical incommensurability. And, indeed, that the NHS is not stricto senso a new historiography. It is the same historiography used for other disciplines (art, philosophy), which in the twentieth century begins to be applied to science as well.

Green republicanism can be described as a subset of republican political theory that aims at promoting human flourishing by ensuring a non-dominating and ecologically sustainable republic. An essential aspect of green republicanism is the promotion of post-productivism while preserving or expanding republican freedom as non-domination. Post-productivism implies the promotion of personal autonomy rather than the pursuit of permanent economic growth and the promotion of labour as an intrinsically positive human activity, which for green republicans will have three positive aspects: reduced ecological impact, more time available for civic participation, and the extension of democratic decision-making and norms to the sphere of production. An important aspect in the definition of a post-productivist society is the way welfare schemes are designed. In this article, I will thus compare the existing welfare regimes with a participation income and with an unconditional basic income, and analyse how they promote green republican goals. I conclude that the current systems are one of the elements of the productivist society and that would not answer the green republican conditions. A green participation income could have a positive ecological impact and contribute to a shift to post-productivism but would face serious challenges from a republican perspective, namely in terms of the non-arbitrariness of its attribution. Finally, I conclude that depending on how it is defined, an unconditional basic income could contribute to post-productivism while being non-arbitrary thus obeying the green republican conditions.

The Greens are the political group in which the support for the implementation of a basic income is stronger. Nevertheless, the reasons for that support are not always clear and quite often not related to environmental issues. For this reason, two different approaches to a green BI – environmental and ecological – are discussed in this article. The first could be part of a green growth strategy, whereas the second would require structural changes to the economic model, in support of a post-productivist economy. Although showing some overlaps, these models are in conflict in some central aspects, such as the role of economic growth in promoting sustainability. For this reason, it might be incorrect to assume that an environmental BI is a step towards an ecological BI. We will focus on the green aspects as a consequence of implementing a BI and independently of its sources of funding – namely by looking into the amount a BI needs to be set up in order to support shifting activities from the market to the autonomous sphere – and on the green potential of its sources of financing.