Reply to John D. North, ‘On Making History’

Abstract

I guess there are many points in Prof. North’s Comment I should try to deal with. However, for brevity’s sake I shall concentrate on two of them only, viz the question of history’s uniqueness and the objection that the kind of logical reconstruction I am advocating considers scientific theories as finished products only — something which apparently is of no much interest to the historian of science. These two points seem to me to summarize best North’s doubts about the possible relevance of the philosophy of science to the history of science. But before saying something concrete about them I would like to make a general comment on the issue of the interaction between philosophy of science and history of science.