Standard philosophy of science courses tells us that philosophy of science emerged in the US as a result of the arrival of the Logical Positivists in the 1930s. These immigrants brought with them a view of science that combined verificationism, scientific reductionism, and inductivism. This view was later challenged in a number of ways. Karl Popper, for example, challenged inductivism and offered a falsificationist view of science. Willard V. Quine challenged verificationism with the help of meaning holism. Thomas Kuhn challenged both logical positivist and Popperian views of science by recognizing an ineliminable historical and sociological dimension to scientific knowledge. The heroes of this history are all men.
In reality, American speculative philosophers of science were already developing sophisticated views of science before logical positivism arrived in the US. Verificationism had already been introduced by Edgar A. Singer at the turn of the twentieth century, and it had been criticized by other philosophers of science, including Grace and Theodore de Laguna. This pair appealed, already in 1910, to meaning holism to reject verificationism and developed an anti-inductivist philosophy of science, one that recognized the historical and sociological dimensions of theory choice. There were many other philosophers of science active in America during the early twentieth century, including other women such as Marie Collins Swabey. All the topics that are familiar mainstays of philosophy of science courses were already tackled by early twentieth-century speculative philosophers of science (see here).
The syllabus offered below can be used to supplement standard philosophy of science courses in a way that provides students with a more realistic understanding of the history of American philosophy of science, one that recognizes that women played an important role in it. Alternatively, this syllabus can be used as a basis for a course in the philosophy of science that covers standard topics using speculative authors. Such a course would introduce philosophy of science to students and would help recover forgotten perspectives on it. The topics covered by the syllabus are verificationism, scientific inference, falsificationism, the methodology of research programs, scientific explanation, scientific reductionism, non-epistemic values in science, the methodology of psychology, and scientific laws.
The Syllabus Showcase of the APA blog is designed to share insights into the syllabi of philosophy educators. We include syllabi in their original, unedited format that showcase a wide variety of philosophy classes. We would love for you to be a part of this project. Please contact Series Editors, Dr. Brynn Welch via bwelch@uab.edu or Dr. Smrutipriya Pattnaik via smrutipriya23@gmail.com or Series Editor, Alexis LaBar via labaralexis06@gmail.com with potential submissions.
Joel Katzav
Joel Katzav is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Queensland. He has published primarily in metaphysics, the philosophy of science, argumentation theory and the history of philosophy. His main research foci at the moment are the philosophy of climate science and the history of twentieth century philosophy.
