May 2024
Vivian Mannheimer | Blog de HCS-Manguinhos
During the past few years, a productive dialogue between historians of science and philosophers of science has been promoted by the Joint Commission of the Division of History of Science and Technology (DHST) and the Division of Logic, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science and Technology (DLMPST). Together they form the International Union for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology (IUHPST) that prove that their works are complementary and can enrich the study of one another.
In this interview with HCS-Manguinhos, Michael A. Osborne, former President of the Division of History of Science and Technology for the period 2017-2021, explains the crucial interaction between philosophy and history of science and how this can be improved.
He is the author of “The Emergence of Tropical Medicine in France” (University of Chicago Press, 2014) and is writing a Global History of Yellow Fever.
Could you give an opinion on the interaction between philosophy and history of science in your university (or region or if possible in the US)?
Interaction is of considerable value not only for nascent and mature scholars, but also for clarity of thought and for our two humanistic disciplines currently experiencing institutional marginalization. We also have allies in the sciences and scientists are very concerned with methodology and in the USA federal granting agencies require statements on societal impacts from grantees. Often scientists at the universities I have taught at lump together philosophy of science and history of science and regard it as part of public outreach activities. A good example of this is a recent editorial in Science Magazine (12 April 2024) titled “Teach Philosophy of Science” where history is linked with philosophy and promoted to enhance trust in science and medicine and explain how science works to non-scientists.
Academe changes at a rapid pace and knowing something of both disciplines may help in riding the waves of institutional change. On a personal level I could not have imagined that after two decades of teaching history of science I would one day be teaching a bioethics course for molecular biology post-doctoral students, or that familiarity with Greek rationalism and medicine would provide a fulcrum for a mass market class on ancient and medieval Western traditions. Familiarity with both history and philosophy of science has been of supreme value to me.
In terms of graduate training in the USA and cultivating encounters between philosophers and historians, the University of Pittsburgh has a department of History and Philosophy of Science (HPS) and Indiana University’s Department of HPS has added Medicine to its title and is now HPSM. Like the Cambridge University Department of History and Philosophy of Science these programs either require or urge students to be familiar with both disciplines, and other programs often allow students to take courses external to their main emphasis, be they in philosophy of science or history of science. France and some other European countries have a strong epistemologue tradition which in some ways integrates historical with philosophical methods and brings the two closer together.
Few American historians of science are now trained in the “Plato to NATO” tradition and if the utility of that generalist tradition has faded it has also pulled us back from larger and more ambitious views of the scientific enterprise. In the five decades or so that I have been active in the history of science, history and philosophy of science have become ever more technical, professionalized, and distant from each other. Yet the two share some things in common; both have experienced linguistic and material turns and share other transformations. So, what has happened to the larger view? Perhaps we are just less ambitious in seeking comprehensive views but certainly for historians some of this change is due to our historiography. Herbert Butterfield counseled historians to avoid the progressive and presentist narratives of “Whig” history. Thomas Kuhn, who famously gained tenure in history but not in philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley, signaled similar warnings about textbook versions of science and viewing science as a progressive and mostly linear accumulation of facts. A brief of philosophers is to argue from propositions and points with the goal of convincing a reader or opponent. I am no logician, but I find the best and most convincing historical arguments contain elements of a string of logic. Both disciplines still struggle to explain scientific creativity and, possibly, scientific “advances” or what was once termed progress.
Michael Osborne is the author of The Emergence of Tropical Medicine in France (University of Chicago Press, 2014) and is currently writing a book on the history of yellow fever.
On balance philosophers of science have been more reluctant than historians to drop their fascination with progress. Philosophers of science can trace their lineage back to Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics, whereas we historians of science are of more recent origin. Yet Aristotle was more than a philosopher, and I still quibble with those who want to divide the Aristotelian corpus into analytical and descriptive works and devalue these latter. Aristotle also investigated subjects dear to the heart of historians of science; natural history, the properties of living organisms, and taxonomy. He advocated for the study nature and revered observation while attending to the structure of explanation and the definition of causation. My point is that we need an ecumenical view of science and a multiplicity of methods to understand the nature and elements of scientific change and explain the wonders of science to a larger audience. I am emphatically not saying we should all become Aristotelians. But the quest for a comprehensive system of knowledge, all the while observing nature, is admirable.
Please describe a publication of yours that might have a philosophical dimension? (if there is not, simply describe your current investigation on history of science).
Much of what I have written on French science and medicine examines philosophically laden topics. Things like social evolutionism, biological transformism, vitalistic and mechanistic conceptions of organisms, disease, and health. Colonialism, imperialism, and conceptions of race run through many of my studies, and these are loaded with philosophical presuppositions, programs, and policies. I was also pleased to contribute a piece on parasitology and social theory to a volume edited by my friends, Scott Lidgard and Lynn K. Nyhart, Biological Individuality: Integrating Scientific, Philosophical, and Historical Perspectives (2017). This integration of perspectives around a single concept or domain of knowledge follows in the tradition of what the International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology has been doing since the 1980s. I think it is productive to include scientists, philosophers, and historians in these topic-based projects.
How might philosophers and historians of science interact more?
The IUHPST has a commission shared by its two divisions, the DHST– DLMPST Joint Commission. This commission brings together philosophically informed historians and historically informed philosophers at the Congresses of the two divisions. It also awards prizes to scholars who combine skills from these two disciplines. Previously chaired by Hasok Chang, whom I have to say facilitated robust exchanges, this tradition is continued by Agnes Bolinska. This is all very good and I want to see it continue. Yet how then might we build on this and enhance sustainable interaction? Although the two Divisions of the Union and their predecessor groups joined together to form what became the IUHPST in 1955, a half century later we still have separate calendars and separate congresses. I will close with a question. Could DHST and its sister Division of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science and Technology have a joint congress or other combined event?
Read More:
Science, culture and society: an interview with Jahnavi Phalkey Phalkey, a prominent historian of science from India, has brought a fresh perspective to a series of topics such as the relationship between Science and Empire and the challenges of transnational histories of sciences.
Marcos Cueto asume la presidencia de la División de Historia de la Ciencia y de la Tecnología de la IUHPST/DHST La ciudad de Dunedin, en Nueva Zelanda, es la sede del próximo Congreso Internacional de Historia de la Ciencia y Tecnología a realizarse en el año 2025.
Marcos Cueto is the new President-Elect of the Division of History of Science and Technology of the IUHPST Cueto was nominated President-Elect by a majority vote of the General Assembly during the 25th ICHST.
Some thoughts on yellow fever Michael Osborne, professor of History of Science at Oregon State University, talks about his current work on yellow fever and his priorities as the new president of DHST.
