Kostas Gavroglu

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY IN THE EUROPEAN PERIPHERY: SOME HISTORIOGRAPHICAL REFLECTIONS

In less than twenty years a number of developments have dramatically reshaped much of what was considered as common (historiographical) values among members of the established communities of historians of science and technology. The intense discussions concerning a number of theoretical issues, and the subsequent re-thinking of foundational historiographical problems, took place within a context characterized by the impressive scholarship produced by a continual increase in the number of scholars working in the history of science and technology, and also in the expanded range of themes to be studied. Relevant to this was an increase in funding, the establishment of new research centres, the availability of new academic positions, the consolidation of professional bodies, and the launching of many well-funded programs. Concomitantly, the proliferation of book series together with the access to a variety of new sources, and the implementation of a multitude of projects involving the digitalization of standard archival and bibliographical collections, all played a major role in defining the contours of the professional community of historians of science and the scope of the discipline. During the same period major transformations took place in both the actual study and the institutional contexts of the history of science and technology in a number of countries of the European periphery. On the whole, the developments which took place within the more established communities of historians of science and technology Hist. Sci., xlvi (2008)

Trends in the historiography of science

I Methodological Issues in the Historiography of Science.- Charting the Scientific Community.- Theory and Practice in Early Modern Physics.- Styles of Scientific Thinking or Reasoning: A New Analytical Tool for Historians and Philosophers of the Sciences.- Kinds and (In)commensurability.- Types of Discourse and the Reading of the History of the Physical Sciences.- On Demarcations between Science in Context and the Context of Science.- On the Harmful Effects of Excessive Anti-Whiggism.- Issues in the Historiography of Post-Byzantine Science.- Social Environment, Foundations of Science, and the Possible Histories of Science.- Scientific Discoveries as Historical Artifacts.- Selection, System and Historiography.- Can the History of Instrumentation Tell Us Anything about Scientific Practice?.- The One in the Philosophy of Proclus: Logic versus Metaphysics.- Rational versus Sociological Reductionism: Imre Lakatos and the Edinburgh School.- Sociocultural Factors and the Historiography of Science.- II Historiography of Mathematics.- Is Mathematics Ahistorical? An Attempt to an Answer Motivated by Greek Mathematics.- The Story of the Discovery of Incommensurability, Revisited.- On the History of Indeterminate Problems of the First Degree in Greek Mathematics.- On the Justification of the Method of Historical Interpretation.- The Infinite in Leibnizs Mathematics - The Historiographical Method of Comprehension in Context.- John Landen: First Attempt for the Algebrization of the Infinitesimal Calculus.- Historiographical Trends in the Social History of Mathematics and Science.- The Conception of the Scientific Research Programs and the Real History of Mathematics.- III Historiography of the Sciences.- Scientists and the State: The Legacy of World War II.- Unification, Geometry and Ambivalence: Hilbert, Weyl and the Gottingen Community.- The Two-Dimensional View of the History of Chemistry.- The Problem of Method in the Study of the Influence a Philosophy Has on Scientific Practice. The Case of Thermoelectricity.- Reopening the Texts of Romantic Science: The Language of Experience in J. W. Ritters Beweis.- Problems and Methodology of Exploring the Scientific Thought during the Greek Enlightenment (1750-1821).- History of Science and History of Mathematization: The Example the Science of Motion at the Turn of the 17th and 18th Centuries.- The Artistic Culture of the Renaissance and the Genesis of Modern European Science.- Archaeoastronomy in Greece: Data, Problems and Perspectives.- Index of Names.

Some methodological and historical considerations in low temperature physics: The case of superconductivity 1911–57

Summary In this paper we study some methodological problems associated with the development of one of the major theories in low temperature physics, that of superconductivity. The first experimental results of 1911 were interpreted within a framework that hindered the paradoxical aspects of the new phenomenon. Various research programmes degenerated until new experimental results forced a reappraisal of the existing theoretical framework making possible a different formulation of the problem that had to be solved. This led to a progressive research programme, whose positive heuristic we also study.

Quantum Chemistry qua Applied Mathematics. The Contributions of Charles Alfred Coulson (1910-1974)

Charles Alfred Coulson est un chercheur britannique qui a largement contribue au developpement de la chimie quantique au XX e siecle et a au developpement des mathematiques appliquees

Positioning the history of science

Introduction: Positioning the History of Science, Kostas Gavroglu and Jurgen Renn Big History?, Babak Ashrafi Suggestions for the Study of Science, Stephen G. Brush Will Einstein Still be the Super-Hero of Physics History in 2050?, Tian Yu Cao For a History of Knowledge, Olivier Darrigol Working in Parallel, Working Together, Lorraine Daston Challenges in Writing of Twentieth Century East Asian Physicists, Dong-Won Kim Why Should Scientists Become Historians?, Raphael Falk and Ruma O. Falk From the Social to the Moral to the Spiritual: The Postmodern Exaltation of the History of Science, Paul Forman Between Science and History, Evelyn Fox Keller The Search for Autonomy in History of Science, Yves Gingras Without Parallels?: Averting a Schweberian Dystopia, Michael D. Gordin The Intellectual Strengths of Pluralism and Diversity, Loren Graham On Connoisseurship, John Heilbron Concerning Energy, Steve Joshua Heims Reflections on a Discipline, Erwin N. Hiebert The Woman in Einsteins Shadow, Gerald Holton The Mutual Embrace: Institutions and Epistemology, David Kaiser History, Science, and History of Science, , Helge Kragh Parallel Lives and the History of Science, Mary Jo Nye Discarding Dichotomies, Creating Community: Sam Schweber and Darwin Studies Diane B. Paul and John Beatty Public participation and Industrial Technoscience Today: The difficult question of accountability,Dominique Pestre The Character of Truth Joan Richards SCweber, Physicist, Historian and Moral Example, Jose Manuel Sanchez Ron Whats new in Science?, Terry Shinn On the Road, SKULI SIGURDSSON Plutarchian versus Socratic Scientific Biography, Thomas Soderqvist Problems not Disciplines, John Stachel Physicist-Historians, Roger H. Stuewer Letting the Scientists Back In, Stephen J. Weininger Science as History, M. Norton Wise POSTSCRIPT, Sam Schweber

Preparing the ground for quantum chemistry in Great Britain: the work of the physicist R. H. Fowler and the chemist N. V. Sidgwick

In this paper we will discuss some of the issues related to the attempts of Ralph Howard Fowler and Nevil Vincent Sidgwick to create a legitimizing space for quantum and theoretical chemistry in Britain. Although neither Fowler nor Sidgwick made original contributions to quantum chemistry, they followed closely the developments in the discipline, participated in meetings and discussions and delivered lectures, talks and addresses, where methodological topics, ontological questions and implicity the problem of autonomy of the new discipline vis-a-vis both physics and chemistry were taken to be pressing issues. In particular, they encouraged young people to work within the nascent discipline. Viewing quantum chemistry as a branch of applied mathematics became an emblematic characteristic of the practice of the new discipline in Great Britain.

Heike Kamerlingh Onnes' researches at Leiden and their methodological implications

Abstract The various directions of research pursued by Heike Kamerlingh Onnes while at Leiden are systematically presented, and their methodological implications discussed. We concentrate on the researches on the equation of state which, in effect, led to the liquefaction of helium; on the electrical researches which mainly involved investigations about superconductivity; and the magnetic researches which examined magnetization processes in low temperatures. Onnes developed an approach we call “sophisticated phenomenology” which, while remaining within the strict bounds of the positivist tradition, presents some interesting and distinctive features.

From the history of low temperature physics: Prejudicial attitudes that hindered the initial development of superconductivity theory

In this paper we primarily study the difficulties in the application of the thermodynamical approach to the phenomenon of superconductivity, resulting from a specific interpretation of the low temperature behavior of the Maxwell equations. An attempt is made to elucidate the situation during the first period of the development of superconductivity theory and to render explicit prejudiced attitudes reminiscent of Feyerabends “natural interpretations”.

Understanding macroscopic quantum phenomena: The history of superfluidity 1941–1955

Summary In this paper we attempt to investigate the historical and methodological aspects of the developments related to superfluid helium, concentrating on the period between 1941 and 1955. During this period, the various developments constituted a series of steps towards redefining and refining the two-fluid concept devised to explain the unexpected macroscopic behaviour of superfluid helium. The idea that superfluids are essentially ‘quantum structures on a macroscopic scale’ functioned as a heuristic principle which guided the theoretical physicists engaged in the above research programme.

Popper's tetradic schema, progressive research programs, and the case of parity violation in elementary particle physics 1953–1958

ZusammenfassungDie Frage der Erhaltung der Parität bei der Wechselwirkung von Elementarteilchen, der Vorschlag ihrer Verletzung, die experimentelle Bestätigung dieses Vorschlags und die daraus sich ergebenden Folgerungen, die zur Formulierung der mathematischen Struktur der schwachen Wechselwirkungen führten, sind die wichtigsten Entwicklungen in der Elementarteilchenphysik während der Periode von 1953 bis 1958.Vorliegender Aufsatz versucht die rationale Rekonstruktion dieser Periode und des Forschungsprogrammes, welches als eines der progressivsten Programme der modernen Physik angesehen wird. Hierzu benutzen wir eine modifizierte Fassung von Poppers tetradischem Schema als auch die Bemerkungen von Lakatos über gewisse Aspekte der Methodologie von Forschungsprogrammen. Es wird unterstrichen, daß die Dynamik der positiven Heuristik derart war, daß die theoretische Forschung fortgeführt werden konnte, trotz experimenteller Resultate, die nur als Gegenbeweise gegen die vorgeschlagene Struktur der schwachen Wechselwirkungen angesehen werden konnten.