标签：Kuhn

The Structure of the Historiographical Revolution — An Introduction to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

History of Science & Scholarship2023.03.01
The Structure of the Historiographical Revolution — An Introduction to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
I’ve recorded another introductory lecture for Chaoxing. The video course should already have been published on Chaoxing, and here I am posting the verbatim script I prepared when recording the program. I Hello everyone, I’m Hu Yilin, a teacher in the Department of History of Science at Tsinghua University. Today I’m giving you an introductory guide to Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. II This book’s influence is enormous. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy puts it this way: “Thomas Kuhn (1922–1996) was one of the most influential philosophers of science of the 20th century (perhaps the most influential). His 1962 book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions is one of…
history of science book reading science philosophy of science
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2023年3月1日
From the Altar to the Forum: The Practical Significance of the History of Science (A Review of Modern History of Science)

Culture & Public Commentary2022.01.27
From the Altar to the Forum: The Practical Significance of the History of Science (A Review of Modern History of Science)
This article was published in the April 2021 issue of Book City Magazine. It was a review from last year, but I forgot to repost it then. Since the magazine allows me to republish my own articles on my blog, I might as well put it here too. Making Science—An Over-the-Syllabus Title When Chinese publishers introduce foreign academic works, they often have the habit of changing the title. For example, A Short History of Modern Science: From the Steam Engine to Grebe Courtship, published by the Electronics Industry Press in 2018, had the original title “The Making of Modern Science: The Making of Modern Science: Science, Technology, Medicine and Modernity:…
history of science book reading science history
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2022年1月27日
Elevating the Enemy, or a Narrative Bigger Than the Grand

Culture & Public Commentary2020.02.17
Elevating the Enemy, or a Narrative Bigger Than the Grand
Forcibly rushing to exonerate Nurse Liu Fan has stirred anger. The so-called rumor enraged some people; they furiously denounced how terrifying rumors can be, and then produced the so-called refutation. Yet this “forceful, well-grounded” refutation seemed instead to confirm that she was indeed a nurse, that she was indeed fighting the epidemic, that she indeed died of the disease, and that her whole family indeed fell ill as well… So what exactly was wrong? The rumor-refuters emphasized that protective suits were not in short supply. The implication was that she had ample protective conditions, and was not infected because resources were tight; she could only have been infected because she…
philosophy history of science history Aristotle
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2020年2月17日
Review of The Meaning of Science

History of Science & Scholarship2018.10.19
Review of The Meaning of Science
This is a commissioned review. My original title was “The Meaning of Philosophy of Science”; when it was published in the China Science Daily, it was changed to “Thinking at the Edge of Science.” I actually didn’t like either title all that much, so I won’t put a title here. In any case, this is just a review of the book. Commissioned reviews always tend to lean a little toward saying nice things; in fact, this book is just so-so, and I’m not particularly recommending it. Still, what I say in the text below about an introduction to philosophy of science positioned as “non-academic” is worth writing about. Shanghai…
book reading philosophy of science book review Scientific Revolution
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2018年10月19日
History of Science as a Nature Reserve—A Darwinian View of Science

History of Science & Scholarship2018.04.05
History of Science as a Nature Reserve—A Darwinian View of Science
Last Friday (March 30), I was invited to Shanghai Natural History Museum to take part in a “reading session,” where I introduced my own Outdated Wisdom. Although it was an internal event, there were quite a few listeners—more than 50 friends from museums and publishing houses took part. The title I set for my talk was “Outdated Wisdom and Its Contemporary Significance.” I heard that Liu Su was going as well, so I especially strengthened the Darwinian evolutionary logic in it, and won myself a remark: “Thought-provoking; I hadn’t expected it could be used that way.” I was pretty satisfied with that~ This talk was rather unusual for me, because…
history of science science philosophy of science Scientific Revolution
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2018年4月5日
Selected Readings in Original Works of Philosophy of Science: “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” (Post-class Notes by the Lecturer, by Yiduo Xiong)

Teaching & Courses2017.11.03
Selected Readings in Original Works of Philosophy of Science: “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” (Post-class Notes by the Lecturer, by Yiduo Xiong)
Note: See the explanation in the previous post; this was handed to me almost at the same time. This one feels stylistically completely different, and in fact a bit too scattered. It might be better to sketch, a little, the particularly interesting or controversial issues that came up in the actual classroom discussion, especially where the discussion was most concentrated. Although I said that all that was needed was to do a light editing of the lecture notes, they still do need some editing after all; it should nevertheless reflect a bit of the fruits of the classroom discussion. Of course, the speaker may also annotate and supplement it here…
history of science course Scientific Revolution discussion
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2017年11月3日
Selected Readings in Classics of Philosophy of Science: Sample In-Class Questions

Teaching & Courses2017.11.01
Selected Readings in Classics of Philosophy of Science: Sample In-Class Questions
We’ve now finished reading two books in the course. Overall, the students have all done fairly well: basically everyone was able to complete the reading and actively participate in discussion. Of course, compared with the format of Mr. Wu’s class, my course still has far too little of a sense of pressure overall. Mr. Wu’s reading class is entirely led by him: he sprays questions at random, asking all kinds of incisive questions. His questions are all tightly keyed to the text, yet none of them can be answered by just skimming it casually. Every class has to be approached with trepidation; after class, you dare not fail to read…
philosophy of science course Scientific Revolution Kuhn
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2017年11月1日
Selected Readings from Classic Works in Philosophy of Science: Introduction

Teaching & Courses2017.09.26
Selected Readings from Classic Works in Philosophy of Science: Introduction
This class, as planned, was supposed to be me giving a general introductory lecture, but in fact it still mainly took the form of student discussion. I didn’t prepare a script, so I’m just putting the PPT content directly here. The PPT itself is fairly brief, meant only as a reference for the students in class when they review later. When I feel like it, I’ll add some connective commentary in the margins: What Is Philosophy of Science? SP or PS Scientific Philosophy Philosophy of Science “Scientific” philosophy —unscientific philosophy (“metaphysics”) “Philosophy “about science” —philosophy that discusses other objects (political philosophy, moral philosophy…) —other disciplines that discuss science (sociology of…
philosophy of science course Aristotle Kuhn
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2017年9月26日
What Does the Mobile Phone Have to Do with Cooking? — The One and the Many of Technology

AI & the Future of Technology2015.11.12
What Does the Mobile Phone Have to Do with Cooking? — The One and the Many of Technology
The previous post mentioned one of Wu’s core objections, namely, his view that science is singular, whereas technology is plural. At the time he gave an example: branches of science such as physics, chemistry, and biology ultimately promise that they can be reduced to a unified foundation, and therefore their historical development is also interconnected. But what about the relations among various technologies, such as between mobile phones and cooking technology? If various concrete technologies are mutually independent, then where does their unity in history come from? My brief reply at the time was this: the reason various technologies can be “unified” is that “life” is unified. And I also…
technology everyday life history of science media
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2015年11月12日
The Structure of the Technological Revolution (Draft)

AI & the Future of Technology2015.11.10
The Structure of the Technological Revolution (Draft)
This is the article I presented at last week’s Wumen seminar. The article itself is very incomplete—not only has it not been finished in form, but the key problem is the lack of basic literature: in academia, the issues related to “technological revolution” seem to lack discussions worth citing. Of course, this gives reason to suspect that there may be problems with the very legitimacy of my topic; Teacher Wu also questioned it quite strongly. But I myself still think this question is legitimate, and that the concept of “technological revolution” is indeed worth probing in depth. My article itself merely makes a superficial correspondence with Kuhn; this correspondence is…
technology history of science philosophy of science history of technology
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2015年11月10日