Abstract
There are in principle two ways of elucidating the conditions under which a branch of science is pursued. One way is to examine the structures to which this science has given rise; by »structures« I mean the products of scientific discovery which find their expression in hypotheses, models and theories about our world. The other way is to analyze the scientific process itself, the process represented in the activity of an individual scientist, in that of a group of scientists, and ultimately in the overall development of the branch of science in question.
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Notes and References
This paper was read in Bielefeld on May 31st, 1988, as a lecture in the series »Philosophy of Science«.
T.S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, second edition, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970.
The term »static« refers here to the picture of Nature behind traditional physics. Quite obviously, a single movement, for example as described in classical mechanics, cannot be called static. However, the basic laws of mechanics are symmetric with respect to time, so that the historicity of Nature is not subsumed under the concepts of traditional physics.
Particularly revealing in this connection is F.W.J. Schelling, »Von der Weltseele, eine Hypothese der höheren Physik zur Erklärung des allgemeinen Organismus«, in K.FA. Schelling (ed.), Fr.WJ. v. Schellings sämmtliche Werke, I. Abt., Bd. 2, Stuttgart: Cotta, 1857.
For the effect of the German natural philosophy upon the development of the natural sciences, see D. von Engelhardt, »Prinzipien und Ziele der Naturphilosophie Schellings - Situation um 1800 und spätere Wirkungsgeschichte«, in L. Hasler (ed.), Schelling. Seine Bedeutung für eine Philosophie der Natur, Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Fromman Holzboog, 1981.
F.W.J. von Schelling, »Ideen zu einer Philosophie der Natur als Einleitung in das Studium dieser Wissenschaft«, in K.FA. Schelling (ed.), Fr.W.J. v. Schellings sämmtliche Werke, I. Abt. Bd. 2, Stuttgart: Cotta, 1857.
Compare B.-0. Köppers (ed.), Leben = Physik + Chemie? Das Lebendige aus der Sicht bedeutender Physiker, Munich: Piper, 1987.
M. Polanyi, »Life’s Irreducible Structure«, Science 160 (1968), 1308–1312.
A sequence consisting of n nucleotides, where there are B classes of nucleotide, possesses B° combinatorially possible sequences. For the sequence of a bacterial genome: B = 4 and n = 4 x 106.
It is worth noting that this definition would fit exactly for the so-called chaotic systems that are currently the object of intensive research effort in physics, and which we may regard as complex systems par excellence.
Kuhn, op. cit. 1970, note 1.
C.G. Hempel, P. Oppenheim, »Studies in the Logic of Explanation«, Philosophy of Science 15, (1948), 135–175.
C.F. von Weizsäcker, Die Einheit der Natur, Munich: Hansen, 1971 English translation The Unity of Nature, New York: Farrar, Straus and Girous, 1980.
Compare E. Scheibe, »Gibt es eine Annäherung der Naturwissenschaften an die Geisteswissenschaften?«, Universitas 42 (1987), 5–18.
These considerations, which are highly speculative and have not yet been made available in published form, were initiated by H.-J. Queisser. Further details will be found in M. Eigen, »The Physics of Molecular Evolution«, Chemica Scripta 26B (1986), 13–26.
W. Windelband, Präludien,Tübingen: Mohr, ’1924.
H. Rickert, Kulturwissenschaft und Naturwissenschaft,Tübingen: Mohr, 21910.
Weizsäcker, op. cit. 1971, note 12.
Weizsäcker, op. cit. 1971, note 12.
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Küppers, BO. (1990). On a Fundamental Paradigm Shift in the Natural Sciences. In: Krohn, W., Küppers, G., Nowotny, H. (eds) Selforganization. Sociology of the Sciences, vol 14. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-2975-8_4
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