Describe the person, the approach, and the significance to epistemology (just one is sufficient--if you want to respond but someone has already posted the basics, you'll have to find something new to add):
Larry Laudan
Thomas Kuhn
W. V. O. Quine
Evelyn Fox Keller
Alison Jaggar
Donna Haraway
Karl Popper
Lorraine Code
Michael Polanyi
Vandana Shiva
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W.V.O. Quine:
ReplyDeleteHe was associated with the rebirth of naturalism in epistemology. Discussed this in his work titled "Epistemology Naturalized."
Quine believes that epistemology and all of philosophy is ineveitably continuous with the sciences.
Larry Laudan:
ReplyDeleteIs a philosopher of science and epistemology. He criticizes the traditions of realism, relativism, and positivism. He is attempting to come up with his own way to maintain science as a privileged and progressive institution.
Karl Popper was an Australian and British philosopher of science in the 20th century who wrote extensively on social and political philosophy. He is known for his attempt to repudiate the classical observationist account of scientific method by advancing empiriacal falsification.
ReplyDeleteAlison Jagger:
ReplyDeleteIs a philosopher of women and gender studies. Her areas of interest are Contemporary social, moral and political philosophy, often from a feminist perspective. She is also interested in moral epistemology, especially in how to justify social criticism in contexts of inequality and cultural difference.
Thomas Kuhn made his most significant contribution in 1962 when he released The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. In this piece he introduced his Paradigm Concept. He broke several key Positivist doctrines while setting out his own style of Philosophy of Science that brought it much closer to Science History
ReplyDeleteDonna Haraway is a postmodern feminist who lends creedence to situated knowledge and asserts the need for a feminist science.
ReplyDeleteEvelyn Fox Keller is an American theoretical physicist, author, feminist, and a philosopher of history & philosophy of modern biology. She studies the manner in which gender and science are related. She uses a psychoanalytical approach to explore the construction of terms like: man, woman, science, nature, gender and sex. Her work is significant for epistemology because it has opened the door for the questioning of scientific process and has questioned our fundamental understanding of science within Western culture and civilization.
ReplyDeleteFYI: While earning her Ph.D. in theoretical physics at Harvard University (1963) she was constantly being made fun of for being a woman. Until that time there had been no women theoretical physicists. As a result, people doubted her abilities and mistook her own writings for plagiarism. Perhaps it was this sexist treatment which inspired the direction of her future career. .
Vandana Shiva was a philosopher and an enviromentalist. Shiva participated in the nonviolent Chipko movement,which involved people forming human circles around trees to prevent their falling. She is also really dedicated to women's rights, paricularly in 3rd world countries.
ReplyDeleteW.V.O Quine (Replacement Naturalism)
ReplyDeleteEssay: Epistemology Naturalized
Quine's proposal: We study the psychological processes that take us from sensory stimulations of beliefs about the world.
Quinean View: Abandon epistemology for psychology. ( not widely accepted by contemporary naturalist)
-Quinean replacement naturalism finds relatively few supporters.
Michael Polanyi (1891-1976), a medical doctor, physical chemist, social thinker, and philosopher, made his most important contribution in the area of humanizing scientific inquiry. He proposed a new theory of knowledge based on an appreciation of the role of the individual and the individual's and society's values in the seeking and finding of truth.
ReplyDeleteIn 1951 and 1952 Polanyi gave the Gifford Lectures that became his magnum opus, Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy (1958). In a comprehensive treatment of human knowing he proposed overturning the last three centuries' habit of thinking that our most genuine knowledge is found by a method that separates the observer from the subject of study and proceeds by neutrally collecting data and drawing conclusions from it. Instead, Polanyi showed from the practice of science that discovery of scientific reality is guided by a passionate dedication nurtured by a conscientious community of inquirers. He upheld objective knowledge as "personal knowledge" because it involved human participation in strategic and significant ways. Polanyi's view meant that the most exact facts could not be separated from the values of the knower and the traditions that guided them.