Online research in philosophy

Summary Opinion is divided as to whether chemistry is reducible to physics. The problem can be given a satisfactory solution provided three conditions are met: that a science not be identified with its theories; that several notions of theory dependence be distinguished; and that quantum chemistry, rather than classical chemistry, be compared with physics. This paper proposes to perform all three tasks. It does so by analyzing the methodological concepts concerned as well as by examining the way a chemical rate constant is derivable with the help of the quantum atomic theory. The conclusion is that chemistry, and in particular quantum chemistry, is not a part of physics although it is certainly based on the latter.

As supposed in the last Editorial (HYLE, 5-1, p. 78), our special topic ‘Models in Chemistry’ has attracted new attention to the philosophy of chemistry. Only during the past couple of month, the number of visitors of the HYLE website has nearly doubled to some 1,600 per month. There is nothing comparable in the whole field of philosophy of science, as there is no other science having such a lot to catch up on philosophical work. At the same time, this means a great challenge to meet the expectation of such a large and heterogeneous readership.

Chemistry is by far the most productive science concerning the number of publications. A closer look at chemical papers reveals that most papers deal with new substances. The rapid growth of chemical knowledge seriously challenges all institutions and individuals concerned with chemistry. Chemistry documentation following the principle of completeness is required to schematize chemical information, which in turn induces a schematization of chemical research. Chemistry education is forced to seek reasonable principles of selectivity, although nobody can have an overview any more. Philosophical evaluation of the growth of chemical knowledge proves that at the same time chemical ‘nonknowledge’ increases more rapidly. An analysis of reasons, why chemists are making new substances at all, shows that the proliferation of new substances is for the most part an end in itself. The present paper finally argues for the need of a rational discourse among chemists on the aims of chemistry.

This note is intended to address one particular issue in the relative status of Quantum Chemistry in comparison to both Chemistry and Physics. It has been suggested, in the context of the question of the reduction relations between Chemistry and Physics that Quantum Chemistry as a research programme is incapable of furnishing useful guidance to practising chemists. If true, this claim will let us qualify Quantum Chemistry as a degenerating research programme, which, due to its complexity has difficulty to be applied to Chemistry. This claim is shown to be false. The replacement claim I wish to make is that Quantum Chemistry is perfectly capable of furnishing such guidance, but renders the ontological status of many models favored by chemists problematic. Quantum Chemistry, however, validates these models in an instrumental fashion. I will argue that Quantum Chemistry is a progressive research programme.

A systems theory for chemistry is proposed in order to provide a general framework, which covers different theoretical approaches used in the molecular sciences.The basic elements of systems theory are introduced and discussed.By construction, this systems chemistry offers classification and categorizationschemes that will help to identify the range of applicability of certain theoretical approachesas well as to find yet unanswered fundamental questions. Consequently, it will be of value not only to thosewho want to understand and study the structure of chemistry, but it might also be of importance to daily research in chemistry.

After a long period of neglect, the philosophy of chemistry is slowly being recognized as a newly emerging branch of the philosophy of science. This paper endorses and defends this emergence given the difficulty of reducing all of the philosophical problems raised by chemistry to those already being considered within the philosophy of physics, and recognition that many of the phenomena in chemistry are epistemologically emergent.

This paper suggests that the cases made for atoms and the aether in nineteenth-century physical science were analogous, with the implication that the case for the atom was less than compelling, since there is no aether. It is argued that atoms did not play a productive role in nineteenth-century chemistry any more than the aether did in physics. Atoms and molecules did eventually find an indispensable home in chemistry but by the time that they did so they were different kinds of entities to those figuring in the speculations of those natural philosophers who were atomists. Advances in nineteenth-century chemistry were a precondition for rather than the result of the productive introduction of atoms into chemistry.

A personal account is presented for the present status of mathematical chemistry, with emphasis on non-numerical applications. These use mainly graph-theoretical concepts. Most computational chemical applications involve quantum chemistry and are therefore largely reducible to physics, while discrete mathematical applications often do not. A survey is provided for opinions and definitions of mathematical chemistry, and then for journals, books and book series, as well as symposia of mathematical chemistry.