Listing of Sessions and Abstracts of Papers - History of Science ...

E-mail Address: jjames@fas.harvard.edu
Naturalizing the Odd-electron Bond
Chemists and historians of chemistry alike have cited the use of odd-electron bonds as a prominent
weak point in valence bond theory when compared to the rival molecular orbital theory. They have
characterized odd-electron bonds as ad hoc solutions to the problems presented by a handful of chemical
compounds and as poorly supported addenda to a theoretical edifice founded on the electron pair bond.
The depth and prevalence of the unease these criticisms reflect suggest that more may be driving them
than a minor point in a two-sided theory debate. Indeed closer examination of both published and
unpublished sources related to the construction and presentation of odd-electron bond theory by Linus
Pauling and his collaborators at Caltech suggests a very different characterization. Pauling et al developed
accounts of odd-electron bonds and electron pair bonds not only concurrently but conjointly. Oddelectron
bonds were hardly an afterthought. Later separation of odd-electron bonds from electron pair
bonds was a multi-step process, completed to differing degrees by Pauling and his detractors, and was
conditioned by a network of distinct but interconnected disputes that ranged over several sub-fields of
chemistry and predated much of valence bond theory. Opposition to the use of odd-electron bonds in
valence bond theory originated in this pre-existing network of commitments and disagreements, and fits
poorly with common models that portray theoretical disputes as developing around a single dichotomous
split.
Jamison, Andrew
E-mail Address: andy@i4.auc.dk
Hybrid Identities in the Making of Western Science
One of the central features of the dominant mode of scientific knowledge production which emerged
in Europe was the development of what might be termed hybrid identities. As opposed to the situation in
other parts of the world, there were opportunities in Europe for scholars and craftsmen, for artists and
engineers and, perhaps most importantly, for philosophers and technicians, to interact and forge social
identities that combined characteristics from what had been previously separated spheres of human
activity. The construction of these hybrid proto-scientific identities played an important part in shaping
new experimental ways of life, as well as in instituting the forms of organization and formulating the
discursive frameworks that have proved so powerful in relation to other, non-Western modes of knowledge
production. While much attention in recent years has been focused on the actual practices and sites
of constructing, or, as Jan Golinksi has put it, ral knowledgeghts have only rarely been connected to
work on the sociological roots of science of e.g. Edgar Zilsel and Christopher Hill. By focusing on the
process of hybridization, and providing examples of several hybrid identities in the 16th and 17th centuries
(e.g. Paracelsus, Tycho Brahe, Gerrard Winstanley), I try to link the new croglected broader historical
concerns. The paper is a draft chapter of an ongoing ence
Janssen, Michael
E-mail Address: janss011@tc.umn.edu
The role of unexplained coincidences in theory construction and theory choice
In developing both special and general relativity, Einstein was guided not by experimental anomalies
facing existing theories but by certain striking coincidences left unexplained by these theories. Think of
the magnet-conductor example with which he opened the 1905 paper on special relativity and of the
equality of inertial and gravitational mass that formed the starting point for the development of general
relativity. For Einstein and others, the explanation of such coincidences was an important virtue of the
new theories. In my talk I want to explore what philosophers of science have to offer (inferences to
common causes and best explanations spring to mind) for a general account of this virtue.