Rethinking Feyerabend The “Worst Enemy of Science” 英文参考文献.docVIP

BookReview/ScienceintheMedia RethinkingFeyerabend:The‘‘WorstEnemyofScience’’? IanJamesKidd* DepartmentofPhilosophy,DurhamUniversity,Durham,UnitedKingdom The relationship between science and the philosophy of science is likely to be judged a contested one. Certainly many philosophicaldebatesmayseemobliqueto the uninitiated (and even then, perhaps still!), whilst recent intellectual debacles have tended to portray philosophers of scienceinapoorlight.Duringthe1990s, for example, the ‘‘Science Wars’’ erupted over the question of whether scientific theories provided true, objective descrip- tions of reality, or whether they were simply arbitrary ‘‘constructions,’’ mere mythologies on a par with ancient Greek theogonyormedievalmagic[1].Thereis some truth to such charges, some of it certainly attributable to an unhealthy certain intoxication with trendy theories (like ‘‘relativism’’ and ‘‘constructionism’’). Yet even if those charges are not always justified, and even if the majority of the philosophy of science is informed and responsible, it remains true that philoso- phers of science who pitch into debates about the sciences beyond their own professional boundaries must take extra carebeforelettingloosetheirideas. culturalcritics,butwiththedangerswhich arosewhenpeoplefailtounderstandand appreciatescience.Backinthe1960sand early 1970s, Feyerabend urged philoso- phersofsciencetotakeseriouslyboththe historyofscienceandscientificpractice— he was a trained physicist himself—and warned his peers that mere abstract reflection on the sciences would produce only idealised fantasies of science, rather than workable models of it. Although subsequent generations ofphilosophers of science took him seriously, many at the timetookhisclaimasapersonalattack— hencethe‘‘badreputation.’’ Into the 1980s, Feyerabend began to expand the scope of his ideas. By the beginningofthe1980s,thephilosophyof science was a richer discipline, so Feyer- abend moved onto new issues. It struck himth