How reasonable and rational can science be when its practitioners speak of "revolutions" in their thinking and extol certain theories for their "beauty"?...
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How reasonable and rational can science be when its practitioners speak of "revolutions" in their thinking and extol certain theories for their "beauty"? James W. McAllister addresses this question with the first systematic study of the aesthetic evaluations that scientists pass on their theories.
Sommaire
Two challenges to rationalism
Abstract entities and aesthetic evaluations
The aesthetic properties of scientific theories
Two erroneous views of scientist's aesthetic judgments
The inductive construction of aesthetic preference
The relation of beauty to truth
A study of simplicity
Revolution as aesthetic rupture
Induction and revolution in the applied arts
Circles and ellipses in astronomy
Continuity and revolution in twentieth-century physics