The Philosophy of Chemistry
| Abstract | It would seem that philosophy of chemistry emerged only recently. Since the early 1990s philosophers and chemists began to meet in many different countries to discuss philosophical issues of chemistry – at first in isolated national groups but soon cultivating international exchange through regular meetings and the publications of two journals (Hyle and Foundations of Chemistry) devoted to the philosophy of chemistry. While the social formation is indeed a recent phenomenon that is still in progress, the philosophical topics have a much longer history that in some cases predates chemistry. One could even argue that ancient Greek natural philosophy started with profoundly chemical questions about the elemental constitution of the world and about how to provide reason to the sheer unlimited material variety and its wondrous changes in which, for instance, water becomes solid or gaseous; wood turns into fire, smoke, and ashes; stones change into metals; food transforms into the human body; or certain materials convert a sick body into a healthy body. In fact there is an almost continuous philosophical tradition focused on such questions. Because Aristotle’s natural philosophy, which was centered on his theory of elements, was influential far into the 18th century, it provided the basis for much of chemical philosophy | |||||||||
| Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Categories | No categories specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,875 |
| External links |
  Try with proxy. Try with proxy. |
| Through your library | Only published papers are available at libraries |
Similar books and articlesJoachim Schummer (2003). The Notion of Nature in Chemistry. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 34 (4):705-736.
S. H. Vollmer (2003). The Philosophy of Chemistry Reformulating Itself: Nalni Bhushan and Stuart Rosenfeld's of Minds and Molecules: New Philosophical Perspectives on Chemistry. Philosophy of Science 70 (2):383-390.
A. T. Balaban (2005). Reflections About Mathematical Chemistry. Foundations of Chemistry 7 (3).
Alan Rocke (2013). What Did “Theory” Mean to Nineteenth-Century Chemists? Foundations of Chemistry 15 (2):145-156.
Olimpia Lombardi & Martín Labarca (2005). The Ontological Autonomy of the Chemical World. Foundations of Chemistry 7 (2).
Olimpia Lombardi & Martín Labarca (2005). The Ontological Autonomy of the Chemical World. Foundations of Chemistry 7 (2).
Lee McIntyre (1999). The Emergence of the Philosophy of Chemistry. Foundations of Chemistry 1 (1):57-63.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2010-12-22Total downloads4 ( #180,507 of 556,898 )Recent downloads (6 months)1 ( #64,931 of 556,898 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
