PHIL 202 Lecture Notes - Lecture 18: Émilie Du Châtelet, General Scholium, Equant
4 May 2018
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History of Modern Philosophy
3.23.18 Lecture Notes – Emilie Du Chatelet
- Newton in his General Scholium had stated that hypotheses had no place in science and
that only conclusions from experiments and observations were valid
- EDC states that hypotheses are necessary in the pursuit of truth
- Helped advance knowledge in astronomy
- We cannot know anything for certain – we can only be certain to the extent of the
probability involved
- Ptolemy – geocentric
- Backed up by the Christian scriptures
- This view gets mixed up with Aristotelian view about celestial motion
o Ude Aistotle’s ie, oits ee pefetl iula ad thee is a uifo
velocity
- Ptolemy said that the earth is center and the orbit is circular around the earth
- Velocity is uniform around a point called the equant
- Posited that Mars moved in mini orbits (epicycles) called deferents that orbited in the
larger orbit
- Copernicus – heliocentric view
o Still had epicycles
o Got rid of the equant
- Osiander, Lutheran theologian
o Was put off by the heliocentric view of the universe
o Added the pefae to the e egiig of Copeius’s ook
o “aig that Copeius’s sste as ot to e take as epesetatie of ealit,
it just makes the calculations simpler
o Astronomer will take the hypothesis that is easiest to grasp, the philosopher will
take the hypothesis that resembles reality
o Neithe of the ill udestad o state athig etai, uless it has ee
diiel eealed to hi
o Osiander is presenting a view called instrumentalism
▪ Our theories and models are devices for calculations
▪ Are not actually true
▪ There are not really atoms
▪ Advantages of instrumentalism?
• More freedom in using various models, not bound by committing
yourself to the existence of things that you suppose in your
calculations
• For scientific realism, if something were outside of our epistemic
reach, then science would be stagnant
• sae the pheoeo – it’s epiiall adeuate
o Accounts in some way for the observations we make
• No need for cross-theoretical consistency (quantum and relativity)
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