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How the Models of Chemistry Vie

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 January 2023

James R. Hofmann
James R. Hofmann*
Affiliation:
California State University
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Extract

Recent work by historians and philosophers has called attention to the complexity of modern experimental physics and its intricate relation to interpretive and explanatory theory (Franklin 1987, Hacking 1983, Galison 1987 and 1989, Pickering 1984 and 1987). One point of general agreement has been that the contexts of discovery and justification often significantly overlap and do not uniformly correlate with experiment and theory. Instead, intended applications, instrumentation, experiment, phenomenological description, explicative models, and explanatory theory all act both as incentives and as constraints during the production of scientific knowledge. The present paper investigates how one node of this network operates in the domain of solid state physics and chemistry. In particular, a case study analysis of how models function in transition metal oxide research provides ample support for several conclusions.

First, it must be emphasized that the term “theory” can have misleading connotations in this domain if it is allowed to imply a single and foundational level of explanatory generality.

Type
Part VII. Realism
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1990 , Issue 1: Volume One: Contributed Papers 1990 , 1990 , pp. 405 - 419
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1990

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