Constellations and Conjectures PDF
Preview Constellations and Conjectures
CONSTELLA TIONS AND CONJECTURES SYNTHESE LIBRARY MONOGRAPHS ON EPISTEMOLOGY, LOGIC, METHODOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE, SOCIOLOGY OF SCIENCE AND OF KNOWLEDGE, AND ON THE MATHEMATICAL METHODS OF SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES Editors: DONALD DAVIDSON, Rockefeller University and Princeton University JAAKKO HINTIKKA, Academy of Finland and Stanford University GABRIEL NUCHELMANS, University of Leyden WESLEY C. SALMON, Indiana University NORWOOD RUSSELL HANSON CONSTELLATIONS AND CONJECTURES Edited by WILLARD C. HUMPHREYS, JR. Evergreen State College, Olympia, Washington D. REIDEL PUBLISHING COMPANY DORDRECHT-HOLLAND / BOSTON-U.S.A. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 70-159654 ISBN-13: 978-94-010-2500-3 e-ISBN-13: 978-94-0 I 0-2498-3 DOl: 10.1007/978-94-010-2498-3 Published by D. Reidel Publishing Company, P.O. Box 17, Dordrecht, Holland Sold and distributed in the U.S.A., Canada, and Mexico by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Inc. 306 Dartmouth Street, Boston, Mass. 02116, U.S.A. All Rights Reserved Copyright © 1973 by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publisher Dare sound Authority confess That one may err his way to riches Win glory by mistake, his dear Through sheer wrong-headedness? W. H. AUDEN The History of Science PREFATORY NOTE This is the final volume of Norwood Russell Hanson's posthumous works to reach publication, and it forms a companion to the collection of papers, What I do not Believe, and other Essays, prepared for the Synthese Library by Harry Woolf and myself. A word of explanation is necessary about the date and condition of the MSS from which this text has been prepared. Originally, Hanson planned a substantially longer book, which would have brought the story he tells here at least up to the late 19th century, and would have incorporated (e.g.) his well-known paper on the theories of Leverrier. The preliminary work on this larger book was largely completed by 1964, but it was then set aside. Between 1964 and the time of his death in 1967, Hanson worked over the material from the Greeks up to Kepler, and cast it into the new shape it has here. This involved a great deal of revision, and the typescript on which he was working bears very exten sive manuscript amendations throughout all but the last few pages. So far as it is possible to tell, accordingly, the book in its present form represents Hanson's final views. None the less, it is important to point out that the historical material on which the present text was based is substantially that available to the author in the early 1960's. Since the central argument of the book is a philosophical one about the nature of explanation, Professor Humphreys and I decided that it was preferable to leave the text as it stands, with occasional Editor's footnotes (see, e.g., page 5), rather than chop and change Hanson's work in order to bring it into line with the results of the most recent historical scholarship. The original MS lacked any definitive title, and we have taken the liberty of inventing one, with the concurrence of the General Editor of the Synthese Library, Professor Hintikka. In conclusion, let me add a personal word of appreciation about the vast amount of patient hard work that Professor Willard C. Humphreys Jr., who was formerly one of Hanson's own students, has devoted to the task of preparing this complex manuscript for the publisher. Santa Cruz, California STEPHEN E. TOULMIN October, 1972 CONTENTS PREFATORY NOTE VII BOOK ONE - PART I COSMOLOGICAL EXPLANATION, B.C. T-HE CONCEPTUAL CONTENT OF BOOK ONE, PART I 3 INTRODUCTION 5 THE HISTORICAL CONTENT OF BOOK ONE, PART I 7 PLATO 33 EUDOXOS AND 'PLATO'S PROBLEM' 41 ARISTOTLE 61 BOOK ONE - PART II PTOLEMY AND PREDICTION 89 PRE-PTOLEMAIC ANTICIPATIONS 99 APPENDIX 113 THREE DIMENSIONAL VARIA TIONS OF PTOLEMY'S 135 TECHNIQUE BOOK TWO - PART I THE MEDIEVAL REDISCOVER Y OF PTOLEMY'S TOOL BOX 141 'THE PTOLEMAIC SYSTEM' 143 SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL FOR BOOK TWO, SECTION A 166 x CONTENTS BOOK TWO - PART II COPERNICUS' SYSTEMATIC ASTRONOMY 173 FURTHER ASPECTS OF COPERNICAN ASTRONOMY IN CONTRAST TO ALL THA T HAD GONE BEFORE 200 SUPPLEMENT TO SECTION ON COPERNICAN THEOR Y 236 BOOK THREE - PART I KEPLER AND THE 'CLEAN' IDEA 251 SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL FOR BOOK THREE, PART I 277 BOOK ONE PART I Cosmological Explanation, B.C. THE CONCEPTUAL CONTENT OF BOOK ONE, PART I 'Hempel's Hypothesis' Concerning Explanation and Prediction Prediction of x is explaining x before it happens Explanation of x is predicting x after it happens: there is a special logical symmetry between the concepts of explanation and prediction Objections: There are predictions without corresponding explanations There are explanations without corresponding predictions The History of Planetary Theory is an Interplay Between Predictions sans Explanation and Explanations sans Prediction Hempel's hypothesis is realized only briefly in the 17th century
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