Extending the Dynamics of Reason:
Abstract:
The dynamics of reason is an approach to the history and philosophy of science developed as an essentially historical philosophical response to Kuhn's theory of scientific revolutions. It aims to present a neo-Kantian conception of the distinctive intersubjective rationality of the modern physical sciences by embedding Kuhn's account of the development of these science from the Copernican revolution to Einsteinian relativity in a wider historical narrative depicting the interplay between these developments and the parallel developments in modern scientific philosophy leading through Kant up to the early twentieth century. The talk discusses two generalizations of this approach: (i) an explanation of the sense in which the neo-Kantian conception in question represents a drastically historicized version of scientific rationality; (ii) an attempt to extend the historical narrative from purely intellectual to social, technological, and institutional history as well. John Heilbron's recent work on cathedrals as solar observatories furnishes the main example for such an extension.