Michael Heidelberger

In 1874, the French philosopher Émile Boutroux wrote a dissertationon the contingency of the laws of nature that highly influenced academic philosophy during the French Third Republic and led to a more hypothetical view of the natural sciences and mathematics. Boutroux took over the concept of contingency from the neo-Kantian philosopher Eduard Zeller who had insisted against Hegel on the role of contingency in history, and carried it over to nature. From this he tried to show that the sciences are hierarchically structured such that each layer is irreducible to its more basic predecessor. He also distinguished between two kinds of natural laws in a way very similar to Nancy Cartwright in the1980s. It is finally shown that Boutroux’s view on the nature of mathematics as a hypothetical science had a strong impact on Poincaré.

Im Rahmen der vorjährigen "Third International History of Philosophy of Science Conference” (HOPOS 2000) an der Universität Wien wurden die politische Bedeutung und der kulturelle Kontext der aus Wien stammenden, jedoch vertriebenen Wissenschaftsphilosophie in einem eigenen Programmschwerpunkt thematisiert. In je vier deutschsprachigen und englischsprachigen Beiträgen werden im vorliegenden Band die historische und politische Bedingtheit und Relevanz des Wiener Kreises bis zur Philosophy of Science im angloamerikanischen Raum behandelt. Somit wird die Entwicklung der Wissenschaftsphilosophie in Österreich (mit einem Blick auf Deutschland) von der Ersten zur Zweiten Republik bzw. die Wirkungsgeschichte dieser Emigrationswissenschaft vor allem in den USA aus gegenwärtiger Perspektive kritisch beleuchtet. Die Beiträge von u.a. Hans Joachim Dahms, Gernot Heiss, Don A. Howard und Alan Richardson zeigen, dass "Reine" Wissenschaftstheorie Teil eines gesellschaftlichen Systems ist und von dessen Pluralität und Toleranz lebt, aber auch immer einen Seismografen des kulturellen Klimas darstellt.

The term “historical epistemology” can be read in two different ways: (1) as referring to a program of ‘historicizing’ epistemology, in the sense of a critique of traditional epistemology’s tendency to gloss over historical context, or (2) as a manifesto of ‘epistemologizing’ history, i.e. as a critique of radical historicist and relativist approaches. In this paper I will defend a position in this second sense. I show that one can account for the historical development and diversity of science without disavowing the relevance of a (normatively understood) epistemology and without denying the existence of human cognitive universals across historical and cultural differences. In support of my thesis, I draw on cognitive scientific research on causal and symbolic cognition, arguing that causal understanding constitutes a basic part of science, which, in the course of its development, becomes more and more superimposed by a culturally and historically variable symbolic superstructure

In the foundations of Fechner's psychophysics, the concept of “functional relation” plays a highly relevant role in three different respects: (1) in respect to the principles of measurement, (2) in respect to the mind-body problem, and (3) in respect to the concept of a law of nature. In all three cases, it is important to explain the difference between a functional dependency of a variable upon another and a causal relationship between two (or more) variables. In all three respects, Ernst Mach developed Fechner's ideas further and tried to extend the lessons he had learned from using the concept of a functional relation in psychophysics to the whole of science. For all three cases, I explain why they are still relevant for psychophysics and philosophy today

In philosophischen wie nichtphilosophischen Darstellungen wird heutzutage der Ursprung des Leib-Seele-Problems überwiegend mit dem kartesischen Dualismus in Verbindung gebracht. Es wird die Meinung vertreten, daß erst durch Descartes’ Aufteilung des Menschen (und damit der Welt) in die beiden einander ausschließenden Substanzen der res extensa und der res cogitans das philosophische Grundübel in die Leib-Seele-Philosophie gekommen sei.1 Folgerichtig ist man fest davon überzeugt, daß sich das Problem nur lösen läßt, wenn man es an der Wurzel packt und konsequent Descartes’ ontologischen Dualismus verwirft. Ein Herumdoktern an den Symptomen nach Art des Okkasionalismus oder der Leibnizschen Lehre von der prästabilierten Harmonie wird demgegenüber als metaphysisch suspekt und aussichtslos angesehen. Zwar ist inzwischen die Hoffnung, durch bloßen Anti-Cartesianismus ans Ziel zu kommen, etwas geschwunden, nachdem man feststellen mußte, daß die anfänglich so vielversprechende Kritik des Behaviourismus an Descartes nicht zum Ziel führte. Und auch mit der nächsten, von der Identitätstheorie hervorgerufenen großen Welle der Descartes-Kritik sind die Lösungen bis heute nicht so befriedigend ausgefallen, wie man sie gerne hätte. Die Überzeugung ist aber weiterhin stark, daß eine Lösung für das Leib-Seele-Problem zuallererst die Verwerfung des kartesischen Dualismus erfordert.

Ludwig Büchner wrote one of the most popular and polemical books of the strong materialist movement in the later nineteenth-century Germany, his Kraft und Stoff (Force and Matter) (1855). He tried to develop a comprehensive worldview, which was based solely on the findings of empirical science and did not take refuge in religion or any other transcendent categories in explaining nature and its development, including human beings. When Büchner tried to expose the backwardness of traditional philosophical and religious views in scientific matters, his arguments had some force, but the positive part of his programme was not free of superficiality and naivety. Büchner’s writings helped to strengthen progressive and rational traditions inside and outside philosophy, but they can also serve as the prime example of the uncritical nineteenth- century belief in science’s capacity to redeem humankind from all evil.

Since the late 1950s one of the most important and influential views of post-positivist philosophy of science has been the theory-ladenness of observation. It comes in at least two forms: either as a psychological law pertaining to human perception (whether scientific or not) or as conceptual insight concerning the nature and functioning of scientific language and its meaning. According to its psychological form, perceptions of scientists, as perceptions of humans generally, are guided by prior beliefs and expectations, and perception has a peculiar holist character. In its conceptual form it maintains that scientists’ observations rest on the theories they accept and that the meaning of the observational terms involved depends upon the theoretical context in which they occur. Frequently, these two versions are combined with each other and give rise to a constructivist view of scientific knowledge (I shall use the term “constructivism” roughly in the same way as Golinski [1998, chap. 1]). According to this outlook, our experience is categorized and preconditioned by prior belief since the process of gaining knowledge through science always involves the use of concepts from some theory or other. This view can easily be strengthened to serve as the cornerstone of a constructivist and anti-empiricist account of science: The categories in terms of which we carve up our experience are not read off from the external world but follow from prior theoretical commitments.

Alan Richardson, one of the editors of the present volume, dryly remarks in a footnote to the introduction: “Logical empiricism remains alive in philosophical memory chiefly by the significance of its death.” I think that this pertinent paradox can be enlarged to generally characterise the relation of present-day philosophy of science to logical empiricism : the more philosophy of science has struggled in the past to distance itself from central tenets of the movement of LE, the more it had to realise how close and how indebted it remains to LE and how much “post-positivism” itself willy-nilly keeps its spirit alive. Thus, there is the growing feeling that the identity of today’s philosophy of science is much more closely tied to LE, many manifestations to the contrary notwithstanding. The renewed interest in LE that has resulted from this insight must necessarily have lead to repercussions also on the appraisal of LE as a philosophical position. The once almost unanimous and rash condemnation of LE in the sixties and seventies is today followed by a prudent and broad-minded second look that tries to do fuller justice to the historical background and development. One can understand that for some of those who take the foregoing considerations seriously the news of LE’s death seems to be a little premature

Um die Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts tritt die Sinnesphysiologie in eine neue Phase ein. Sie löst sich allmählich von der akademischen Philosophie und bildet sich zu einer professionellen experimentellen Disziplin aus. Trotzdem ist die Philosophie aber nicht völlig aus dem Spiel; es kommt vielmehr zu einem Wettstreit physiologischer Schulen innerhalb der Physiologie selbst um ihre impliziten philosophischen Anschauungen. Außerdem liefern sich die längst etablierte Disziplinen der Physik, Physiologie und Psychologie so etwas wie einen Machtkampf um das Anrecht, die Sinnesphysiologie als Teil ihres Gebiets ansehen zu können. Die einzelnen Wahrnehmungstheorien unterscheiden sich also sowohl durch die Rolle, die sie den einzelnen Wissenschaften bei der Erklärung der Wahrnehmung zuweisen, als auch durch die ihnen zugrundeliegenden philosophischen Anschauungen. (Vgl. Heidelberger 1993, 1997).

Preface to Volumes 1 and 2 Lorenz Krüger xv Introduction to Volume 1 Lorraine J. Daston 1 I Revolution 1 What Are Scientific Revolutions? Thomas S. Kuhn 7 2 Scientific Revolutions, Revolutions in Science, and a Probabilistic Revolution 1800-1930 I. Bernard Cohen 23 3 Was There a Probabilistic Revolution 1800-1930? Ian Hacking 45 II Concepts 4 The Slow Rise of Probabilism: Philosophical Arguments in the Nineteenth Century Lorenz Krüger 59 5 The Decline of the Laplacian Theory of Probability: A Study of Stumpf, von Kries, and Meinong Andreas Kamlah 91 6 Fechner’s Indeterminism: From Freedom to Laws of Chance Michael Heidelberger 117 7 The Saint Petersburg Paradox 1713-1937 Gerard Jorland 157 8 Laplace and Thereafter: The Status of Probability Calculus in the Nineteenth Century Ivo Schneider 191 9 Emile Borel as a Probabilist Eberhard Knobloch 215 III Uncertainty 10 The Domestication of Risk: Mathematical Probability and Insurance 1650-1830 237 11 The Objectification of Observation: Measurement and Statistical Methods in the Nineteenth Century Zeno G. Swijtink 261 12 The Measurement of Uncertainty in Nineteenth-Century Social Science Stephen M. Stigler 287 IV Society 13 Rational Individuals versus Laws of Society: From Probability to Statistics Lorraine J. Daston 295 14 Decrire, Compter, Calculer: The Debate over Statistics during the Napoleonic Period Marie-Noelle Bourguet 305 15 Probability in Vital and Social Statistics: Quetelet, Farr, and the Bertillons Bernard-Pierre Lécuyer 317 16 Paupers and Numbers: The Statistical Argument for Social Reform in Britain during the Period of Industrialization Karl H. Metz 337 17 Lawless Society: Social Science and the Reinterpretation of Statistics in Germany, 1850-1880 Theodore M. Porter 351 18 Prussian Numbers 1860-1882 Ian Hacking 377 19 How Do Sums Count? On the Cultural Origins of Statistical Causality M. Norton Wise 395.