Haṡok Chang
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Author Swipe
Feyerabend and Kuhn on Monism and Pluralism Open
Feyerabend had many interlocutors in his controversial career, and one of them was Kuhn. One key point of contention in their interaction was the divergence between the monism inherent in Kuhnian normal science and Feyerabend’s pluralism a…
Přemýšlet o věcech různými způsoby: Rozhovor s Hasokem Changem Open
An interview with Hasok Chang, Professor of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge, on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the publication of his book Is Water H2O?, which won the Fernando Gil International Pr…
View article: Realism for Realistic People
Realism for Realistic People Open
In this innovative book, Hasok Chang constructs a philosophy of science for 'realistic people' interested in understanding and promoting the actual practices of inquiry in science and other knowledge-focused areas of life. Inspired by prag…
Active Knowledge Open
I propose to understand knowledge in the context of action, refocusing epistemology in order to make it more suitable for engaging with actual practices in science and other realms of life. What I call ‘active knowledge’ is a matter of abi…
View article: PSA volume 88 issue 5 Cover and Front matter
PSA volume 88 issue 5 Cover and Front matter Open
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Dead or “undead”? The curious and untidy history of Volta’s concept of “contact potential” Open
Argument Much of the long controversy concerning the workings of electric batteries revolved around the concept of the contact potential (especially between different types of metals), originated by Alessandro Volta in the late eighteenth …
View article: PSA volume 87 issue 4 Cover and Front matter
PSA volume 87 issue 4 Cover and Front matter Open
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.
Electrolysis: What textbooks don’t tell us Open
We present a critical discussion of how chemistry textbooks treat the electrolysis of water and aqueous salt solutions, based on a survey of general chemistry textbooks in English and Korean at secondary and tertiary levels, also informed …
Galvanometers and the Many Lives of Scientific Instruments Open
Electrical measuring tools now epitomise ‘black-boxed’ technologies. Since the second half of the nineteenth century, ammeters and voltmeters have been developed that the user could apparently simply connect up to their electrical circuitr…
Pragmatism, Perspectivism, and the Historicity of Science Open
The affinity between perspectivism and pragmatism is easily recognized if we take a humanist view on science, seeing it as a pursuit of knowledge that human agents engage in. As I interpret it, pragmatism is deep empiricism: a full realiza…
Why science needs philosophy Open
A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is—in my opinion—the ma…
Why science needs philosophy Open
Despite the tight historical links between science and philosophy, present-day scientists often perceive philosophy as completely different from, and even antagonistic to, science. We argue here that, to the contrary, philosophy can have a…
Realism for realistic people Open
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No evidence amalgamation without evidence measurement Open
In this paper we consider the problem of how to measure the strength of statistical evidence from the perspective of evidence amalgamation operations. We begin with a fundamental measurement amalgamation principle (MAP): for any measuremen…
Operational Coherence as the Source of Truth Open
In this paper I seek to defend an epistemology that does not confine itself to the knowledge of propositions. The first section motivates this move, especially from the standpoint of the philosophy of science. The second section presents t…
Who cares about the history of science? Open
The history of science has many functions. Historians should consider how their work contributes to various functions, going beyond a simple desire to understand the past correctly. There are both internal and external functions of the his…