PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE

Content

Weeks	Topics
1. Weeks	What is science? What is philosophy of sciences and what is the philosophy of science? What is the problem of scientificity? The Problem of scientificity as a problem of knowledge. / Positivism in the 19th century. Techniques, theories and methodology of science.
2. Weeks	Bacon and Novum Organum. Do Aristoteles' and Bacon's epagoge mean the same?/Hume and the problem of epagoge/The logic behind using epagoge in science.
3. Weeks	The usage of model in scientific explanation. The mutual way in the philosophy of Logical Positivism: Deductive-nomological model (T-Y in Turkish abbreviation) or suitable law model. Hempel's model in scientific explanation. Popper-Hempel model of explanation. What is an explanative natural law? What is the use of an explanative law in the history and historical sciences?
4. Weeks	Neo-positivism and its scientific aproach to philosophy. Rudolf Carnap and his “Elimination of Metaphysics through logical analysis of language”. The ideal of the Vienna Circle: unified science and progress in sciences. Theory-testing through probabilistic verification.
5. Weeks	Theories of probability, various perspectives on probability, probability in science-scientific research
6. Weeks	Epistemological holism and Quine-Duhem thesis: “Two Dogmas of Empiricism”. Duhem’s criticism. Is it possible to confirm a scientific proposition as isolated from other theories related with itself? Can a single scientific theory be tested in isolation, or does a test of one theory always depend on other theories and hypotheses?
7. Weeks	Karl R. Popper and his criterion: Theory-testing through falsification. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. Popper’s solution for the problem of induction.
8. Weeks	A new approach for the History of Science: Alexandre Koyré and his studies on the history of science. Reading some of Alexandre Koyré’s articles: Galileo and his Pisa Experiment; Galileo and Plato; Is Galilean Science Platonic Science? Galileo and Modern scientific understanding: Mathematical idea of nature. Difference between the Aristotelian concept of kinesis and Galilean concept of motion.
9. Weeks	Thomas Kuhn and his The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Normal science and its solving puzzle. Reading some divisions of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
10. Weeks	Revolutionary science. Crisis and the necessity of scientific revolutions. Progress through revolutions in the sciences. Reading some divisions of The Structure of Scientific Revolution. Some criticisms to Kuhn’s view and his reply.
11. Weeks	Paul K. Feyerabend and his anarchist theory of science. The principle “Anything goes”. Reading some divisions of Farewell to Reason, Three Dialogs on Knowledge, and Against Method
12. Weeks	“How to be a good empiricist?”. Feyerabend’s criticism on two conditions of contemporary empricism.
13. Weeks	Imre Lakatos and his criticism of Feyerabend. Imre Lakatos’ criticism of Popper’s falcificationism and his sophisticated falsificationism. Progressive and degenerative research programmes. Reading some divisions of The Methodology of Research Programmes.
14. Weeks	Evaluation.