Ideas For A Hermeneutic Phenomenology Of The Natural Sciences

This book is a methodical and systematic presentation of basic ontological issues that must be raised with respect to the meaning and function of natural science. The ontological issues are discussed from a hermeneutico-phenomenological point of view. In addition, the book contains critical discussions of basic themes raised by Carnap, Hempel, Stegmüller, Kuhn, Lakatos, Hübner, Popper, van Fraassen, Heelan and Kisiel. One of the basic theses developed in the book is that logical, epistemological and methodological issues pertinent to the natural sciences should be complemented by ontological issues that focus mainly on meaning and truth. The book also contains one chapter on the implications of the ontological ideas presented for the history of the natural sciences.

Ideas for Hermeneutic Phenomenology of Natural Sciences (published in 1993 as volume 15 of this series) comprised mainly ontological reflections on the natural sciences. That book explained why the natural sciences must be considered inherently interpretive in character, and clarified the conditions under which scientific interpretations are "legitimate" and may be called "true". This companion volume focuses on methodological issues. Its first part elucidates the methodical hermeneutics developed in the 19th century by Boeckh, Birt, Dilthey, and others. Its second part, through the use of concrete examples drawn from modern physics as it unfolded from Copernicus to Maxwell, clarifies and "proves" the main points of the ontologico-hermeneutical conception of the sciences elaborated in the earlier volume. It thereby both illuminates the most important problems confronting an ontologico-phenomenological approach to the natural sciences and offers an alternative to Kuhn's conception of the historical development of the natural sciences.

Ideas for Hermeneutic Phenomenology of Natural Sciences (published in 1993 as volume 15 of this series) comprised mainly ontological reflections on the natural sciences. That book explained why the natural sciences must be considered inherently interpretive in character, and clarified the conditions under which scientific interpretations are "legitimate" and may be called "true". This companion volume focuses on methodological issues. Its first part elucidates the methodical hermeneutics developed in the 19th century by Boeckh, Birt, Dilthey, and others. Its second part, through the use of concrete examples drawn from modern physics as it unfolded from Copernicus to Maxwell, clarifies and "proves" the main points of the ontologico-hermeneutical conception of the sciences elaborated in the earlier volume. It thereby both illuminates the most important problems confronting an ontologico-phenomenological approach to the natural sciences and offers an alternative to Kuhn's conception of the historical development of the natural sciences.

This remarkable volume attests to the world-wide development of a hermeneutical approach to the natural sciences. Questions raised by the essays include: What is a phenomenology of 'scientific' perception? How does meaning arise out of laboratory situations? How do individuals or groups come to terms with the particular problem situations in which they find themselves by drawing on the available conceptual and practical resources which structure these situations? The essays are organized around three central themes. One group of authors (Heelan, Kockelmans, and Gremmen/Jacobs) recalls and applies existing historical resources of hermeneutical phenomenology to current scientific and social issues. A second group (Kisiel, Eger) considers the differences between a specifically hermeneutical approach to science and related approaches such as cultural studies and social constructivism. A third group (Ihde, Gendlin) seeks to forge new directions and tools for understanding natural scientific practice. As Crease's introductory essay makes plain, the authors share the commitment of hermeneutical philosophy to the priority of meaning over technique, the primacy of the practical over the theoretical, and the priority of situation over abstract formulation. In the process, the authors revive and transform the ancient Greek idea that the key to living well, to being fully and authentically human, resides primarily in the exercise of the practical not the theoretical virtues, in the art of doing well in the workworld and acting well in the polis.

In this book the author has brought together his long-standing interests in theory of scientific rationality and hermeneutic ontology by developing a hermeneutic alternative to analytic (and naturalist) epistemology of science. The hermeneutic philosophy of science is less the name of a new field of philosophical than a demand for a repetition of the basic philosophical questions of science from hermeneutic point of view. The book addresses chiefly two subjects: (I) The hermeneutic response to the models of rational reconstruction of scientific knowledge; (II) The specificity of hermeneutico-ontological approach to the cognitive pluralism in science.