HPS&ST · 2020. 9. 23. · hps&stnewsletter september2020 • His active involvement in fostering...

HPS&STNEWSLETTER

hps&stnewsletter

september 2020

The hps&st newsletter is emailed monthly toabout 8,500 individuals who directly or indirectlyhave an interest in the contribution of history andphilosophy of science to theoretical, curricularand pedagogical issues in science teaching, and/orinterests in the promotion of innovative, engagingand effective teaching of the history and philo-sophy of science. The newsletter is sent on todifferent international and national hps lists andinternational and national science teaching lists.In print or electronic form, it has been publishedfor 25+ years.

The newsletter seeks to serve the diverse interna-tional community of hps&st scholars and teach-ers by disseminating information about eventsand publications that connect to concerns of thehps&st community.

Contributions to the newsletter (publications,conferences, opinion pieces, &.) are welcome and

should be sent direct to the editor: Michael R.Matthews, unsw ([email protected]).

The newsletter, along with resources, obitu-aries, opinion pieces and more, are available atthe website: http://www.hpsst.com/

hps&st newsletter staff

Editor Michael Matthews

Assistant Editor(Opinion Page& Formatting) Nathan Oseroff-Spicer

Assistant Editor(Publications& Website) Paulo Maurício

issn: 2652-2837

mailto:[email protected]://www.hpsst.com/

contents

covid-19 teaching materials . . . . 3

2020 Gustav Neuenschwander Prize:Kostas Gavroglu . . . . . . . . . . 3

University of Pittsburgh Fellowships 5

Paul Bunge Prize 2021: History ofScientific Instruments . . . . . . . 5

London School of Economics, Laka-tos Award 2020, Nicholas Shea . . . 5

iuhpst Essay Prize in History andPhilosophy of Science . . . . . . . 6

2021 dhst Dissertation Prize Com-petition, Call for Applications . . . 7

Open Source Physics Text for Ele-mentary and Middle Schools . . . . 8

Science & Education Thematic Issue:Epistemology & stem Education . . 9

Southeast Asian Journal of stemEdu-cation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Peter Slezak, Retirement . . . . . . 9

Opinion Page: Franklin and the kite:What canwe learn from this episode?Breno Arsioli Moura . . . . . . . . 11

Recent hps&st Research Articles . . 18

Recent hps&st Related Books . . . 19

Coming hps&st Related Conferences 24

hps&st Related Organisations andWebsites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

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september 2020 hps&st newsletter

covid-19 teaching materials

covid-19 education materials have been de-veloped, with National Science Foundation (nsf)funding, for use in post-secondary science coursesand are freely available at:

https://storybehindthescience.org/covid19.html

The materials include:

• sars-CoV-2 and covid-19 background in-formation

• covid-19 Pandemic and Science-BasedDecision-Making

• covid-19 Pandemic and Pseudoscience Im-pact on Decision-Making

• covid-19 Case Study: To Mask or Not to Mask

Citizens are largely being asked to judge informa-tion about covid-19 and make crucial decisionsregarding how to respond. However, pervasivemisinformation and pseudoscience exists regard-ing covid-19 that both reflects and promotes pub-lic distrust in science and exacerbates the personaland societal decision-making that places all of so-ciety at greater risk.

The project research and data driven educativematerials will promote both content understand-ing and foster trust in stem professionals and theknowledge they produce to improve personal andpublic decision-making regarding the covid-19pandemic and future pandemics.

Contact the project PI, Dr. Benjamin Herman([email protected]) for further informationregarding the materials and if you are interestedin participating in the project research.

2020 Gustav NeuenschwanderPrize: Kostas Gavroglu

It is with great pleasure to announce that the his-torianKostasGavroglu has been awarded the 2020Gustav Neuenschwander Prize. In awarding theprize, the eshs Scientific Council considered Gav-roglu’s outstanding personal and scientific traject-ory and especially his commitment to the dis-cipline as community builder. In particular, theCouncil acknowledged:

• His contribution to the history of science en-compassing the study of science in the Greek-speaking world during the Enlightenment, thestudy of science in the European Periphery, thehistory of universities, and the investigation ofkey transition in physical sciences, includingthe foundations of quantum chemistry and lowtemperature physics;

• His role in building a community of historiansof science in Greece and in fostering the teach-ing of history of science at various educationallevels;

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https://storybehindthescience.org/covid19.htmlhttps://storybehindthescience.org/pdf/covid19background.pdfhttps://storybehindthescience.org/pdf/covid19background.pdfhttps://storybehindthescience.org/pdf/covid19science.pdfhttps://storybehindthescience.org/pdf/covid19science.pdfhttps://storybehindthescience.org/pdf/covid19pseudoscience.pdfhttps://storybehindthescience.org/pdf/covid19pseudoscience.pdfhttps://storybehindthescience.org/pdf/covid19casestudy.pdfmailto:[email protected]

hps&st newsletter september 2020

• His active involvement in fostering interna-tional collaborations among historians of sci-ence in several countries, especially acrossEurope (and its peripheries);

• His extensive networking activities in otherparts of the world uniting various communitiesof historians, central and peripheral, consolid-ated and emerging, young and senior.

Kostas Gavroglu was born in Istanbul in 1947. Hereceived his bachelor degree in theoretical phys-ics from Lancaster University and completed thePart III of the Mathematical Tripos in CambridgeUniversity at the Department of Applied Math-ematics and Theoretical Physics. He received hisdoctorate from the Department of Physics, at Im-perial College, University of London, with a thesison theoretical aspects of elementary particle phys-ics (Non-leptonic decays of hyperons). He held apost-doctoral appointment at the State Universityof New York in Long Island.

Gavroglu was appointed a Privat dozent in theDe-partments of Physics, first at the University of Pat-ras and then at the National Technical Universityof Athens. In 1994, he became professor of his-tory of science in the Department of History andPhilosophy of Science at the University of Athens.He retired in 2014 and is presently Emeritus Pro-fessor.

Abroad, he was a visiting professor at Imper-ial College, Harvard University, Boston Univer-sity, Cambridge University, and Istanbul Tech-nical University. He was research fellow at theChemical Heritage Foundation, Pennsylvania andthe Dibner Institute for the History of Science andTechnology at mit.

Concerning his research career, Kostas Gavro-glu was scientific coordinator in many research

projects funded by the European Union, theEuropean Science Foundation, the Greek Stateand private foundations. Hewas a foundingmem-ber of the international network Science andTech-nology in the European Periphery (step), createdin 1999. He served as Director of the Laboratoryof the Electronic Processing of Historical Archivesand was President of the Executive Board of theHistorical Archive of the University of Athens.

He was a member of the Executive Board of theJohn S. Latsis Public Benefit Foundation and afounding member and member of the Governingboard of the Research Center for the Humanit-ies, based in Athens, Greece.

Gavroglu’s research fields are the history of phys-ical chemistry, the history of quantum chemistry,the history of artificial cold as well as issues re-lated with the appropriation of the scientific ideasand practices by the European periphery since the18th century. He has been a co-editor of series inhistory and philosophy science by Springer Pub-lishers, by Brill Publishers and editor of the seriesin history of science by Crete University Publish-ers and member of the editorial boards of a num-ber of scientific journals in the history of science.

In September 2015, Kostas Gavroglu was electedMP with syriza. He was simultaneously presid-ent of the Standing Committee on Education ofthe Greek Parliament until November 2016, whenhe becameMinister of Science, Education and Re-ligious Affairs. He stepped down as a minister inJuly 2019 and has resumed his involvement withhistory of science, andmore generally, with highereducation.

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http://www.phs.uoa.gr/dlabhttp://www.phs.uoa.gr/dlabhttp://www.archive.uoa.grhttp://www.latsis-foundation.orghttp://www.rchumanities.grhttp://www.rchumanities.gr


University of Pittsburgh Fellow-ships

The Center for Philosophy of Science at the Uni-versity of Pittsburgh invites applications for Fel-lowships supporting visits in the Center for a termor an academic year during the academic year2021 - 2022.

Applications are due by December 15, 2020,and can be submitted electronically here: https://www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/fellow-application/

The Center has invited Heather Douglas to bethe Senior Visiting Fellow for the academic yearSeptember 2021 – April 2022. We encourage ap-plications for Visiting Fellowships from scholarswhose research intersects with Professor Douglas.

For more details see here.

Paul Bunge Prize 2021: History ofScientific Instruments

The German Chemical Society (GesellschaftDeutscher Chemiker – gdch) and the GermanBunsen Society for Physical Chemistry (DeutscheBunsen-Gesellschaft für Physikalische Chemie)invite proposals for the Paul Bunge Prize 2021.

The prize is awarded annually by the Hans R.Jenemann-Foundation. It is named after PaulBunge (1839 – 1888), themost importantmaker ofprecision balances in the second half of the nine-teenth century.

The Paul Bunge Prize honours outstanding re-search publications on all aspects of the history ofscientific instruments. The prize is endowed with

AC7.500. It is awarded for either individual booksor papers published within the last five years or forlifetime achievements. Submitted works may bepublished in English, German or French.

Applications and proposals should include thepublications to be considered (in printed or elec-tronic form), a curriculum vitae and a full list ofpublications. The Advisory Board of the HansR. Jenemann Foundation will decide on the prizewinner.

The award ceremony is expected to take place atthemeeting of the gdchHistoryDivision inKarls-ruhe on 25/26 March 2021 – circumstances per-mitting.

Applications and nominations may be submittedby September 30, 2020, to

Gesellschaft Deutscher ChemikerPreise und Auszeichnungenc/o Jasmin HerrVarrentrappstraße 40–4260486 Frankfurt a.M.Germany

For additional information see here.

LondonSchool of Economics, Laka-tos Award 2020, Nicholas Shea

The London School of Economics and PoliticalScience (lse) is pleased to announce the winnerof the 2020 Lakatos Award, which goes to Nich-olas Shea for his book Representation in CognitiveScience (Oxford University Press, 2018).

Representation in Cognitive Science is praised byselectors as ‘a blockbuster of a book’ and ‘a land-

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https://www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/fellow-application/https://www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/fellow-application/https://www.centerphilsci.pitt.edu/https://www.gdch.de/gdch/stiftungen/jenemann-stiftung.htmlhttps://global.oup.com/academic/product/representation-in-cognitive-science-9780198812883https://global.oup.com/academic/product/representation-in-cognitive-science-9780198812883


mark study’. Its argument is acclaimed to be ‘ori-ginal in interesting ways, without losing touchwith the existing literature’ and the book is repor-ted to be ‘well-written and convincingly argued’.

This is all themore important given that ‘the prob-lem is a really difficult one, that is arguably thekey problem in the philosophy of psychology andcognitive science’ and ‘making a novel contribu-tion in this area, as Shea has done, is no smallfeat: it requires mastery of a massive and com-plex philosophical literature, and a deep familiar-ity with cognitive science, both of which Shea has’.

The book is open access and the pdf can be down-loaded for free from Oxford University Press’swebsite here.

iuhpst Essay Prize in History andPhilosophy of Science

The International Union of History and Philo-sophy of Science and Technology (iuhpst) invitessubmissions for the 2021 iuhpst Essay Prize inHistory and Philosophy of Science. This biennialprize competition seeks to encourage fresh meth-odological thinking on the history and philosophyof science and related areas.

Entries in the form of an essay of 5,000–10,000words in English are invited, addressing this year’sprize question:

What can history and philosophy of science, techno-logy and medicine contribute to our current globalchallenges?

What constitutes a current global challenge is leftto the judgment of the authors, but examples in-clude the coronavirus pandemic, climate change,socioeconomic inequality, racism, the refugeecrisis, and science denialism.

All entries should consist of original work thathas not previously been published. Entries writ-ten originally in another language should be sub-mitted in English translation, along with the nameand contact details of the translator. Entries willbe judged on the following criteria, in addition togeneral academic quality: direct engagement withthe prize question, effective integration of histor-ical and philosophical perspectives, and potentialto provide methodological guidance for other re-searchers in the field.

The author of the winning entry will be invitedto present the work at the 26th InternationalCongress of History of Science and Technology(ichst) to be held in Prague, Czechia, 25–31 July

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http://bit.ly/RepnCognSci


2021. Presenting at the Congress will be a condi-tion of the award.

The award will carry a cash prize of $1,000 and awaiver of the Congress registration fee.

Other strong entries will also be considered forpresentation at the Congress. In order to en-sure this consideration, entrants should submitthe entry also as a standalone paper abstract forthe Congress by the deadline for that, followingthe standard instructions indicated on the Con-gress website here.

Entries are invited from anyone, without restric-tion of age, nationality or academic status. Co-authored work will be considered; if the winningentry is a co-authored work the cash prize will beshared out among the authors.

This prize is administered by the Joint Commis-sion of the iuhpst, whose remit is to make linksbetween the work of the two Divisions of theiuhpst: the dhst (Division of History of Sci-ence and Technology) and the dlmpst (Divisionof Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Scienceand Technology). For further information aboutiuhpst, see: http://iuhps.net

Entries for the prize competition should be sub-mitted in pdf format by e-mail to the Chair of theJoint Commission, Prof. Hasok Chang, Depart-ment of History and Philosophy of Science, Uni-versity of Cambridge ([email protected]). Anyqueries should also be directed to him.

The deadline for submission is 15 January 2021.

2021 dhst Dissertation Prize Com-petition, Call for Applications

The International Union of the History and Philo-sophy of Science and Technology, Division of His-tory of Science and Technology (iuhpst/dhst),invites submissions for the sixth dhst Disserta-tion Prize to be presented in July 2021. Initi-ated at the 22nd International Congress of Historyof Science in 2005 held in Beijing, iuhpst/dhstnow awards the prize every two years. Up tothree awards for recent Ph.D. historians of scienceand technology will recognise outstanding doc-toral dissertations completed and filed between 1September 2018 and 1 September 2020.

The Prize does not specify distinct categories, butsubmissions must be on the history of science,technology, or medicine. The Award Commit-tee endeavours to maintain the broadest cover-age of subjects, geographical areas, chronologyand civilisations (African, North American, SouthAmerican, Asian, Islamic, Western and AncientCivilisations, and others not included in this list).Prizes consist of a certificate, waiver of registra-tion fees, assistance with travel and accommoda-tion expenditures to the iuhpst/dhstCongress inPrague in July 2021.

The winner of a prize whose dissertation engagessubstantially Islamic science and culture (overcompetitions five (2016-2018) and six (2018-2020), is also awarded the İhsanoğlu Prize fundedby the Istanbul Foundation for Research and Edu-cation (isar). The Turkish Society of History ofScience has graciously funded the İhsanoğlu Prizefor the Congress following Prague 2021.

award committee: The Award Committee in-cludes dhst Council members and distinguishedsubject specialists.

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https://www.ichst2021.org/call-for-stand-alone-abstracts/http://iuhps.netmailto:[email protected]


competition calendar: Applications open 10July 2020 and close 1 October 2020 (22:00, gmt). Announcement of prize winners for the sixthcompetition in early 2021.

Award ceremony for winners of competitions 5and 6: July 2021 in Prague.

application parameters: Submission in anylanguage is welcome. All dissertations must be ac-companied by a detailed summary in English of nomore than 20 double-spaced pages. A list of pre-vious winners and their projects may be found onthe dhstweb page at: http://dhstweb.org/awards/dhst-dissertation-prize

application procedure: There are three ele-ments. All three must be submitted in pdfformat. Candidates should email one copy of thedissertation and the English language summaryto ([email protected]). Applicantsshould request that their dissertation supervisorwrite a separate confidential letter (to the sameemail address) of three pages or less assessing thedissertation and its historiographical significance.

The email header for all three elements should spe-cify in the subject line dhst Dissertation Prize-2021- followed by the last name of the candidateas in this format: dhst Dissertation Prize-2021-Last Name.

Michael A. OsbornePresident, iuhpst/dhstProfessor of History of Science EmeritusOregon State University

Open Source Physics Text for Ele-mentary and Middle Schools

Exploring Physical Phenomena: What HappensWhen Light from the Sun Shines on the Earth? byEmily van Zee and Elizabeth Gire

This open source textbook is intended for use inlaboratory-centred physics courses for elementaryand middle school teachers. Emphasis is uponquestioning, predicting, exploring, observing, dis-cussing, reading, and writing about what onethinks and why. This textbook also is appro-priate for use in general science courses that ex-plore some of the physical phenomena underly-ing global climate change. Organisations such asmuseums, youth groups, or senior citizen pro-grams may find portions feasible for workshops,special events or on-going exhibits. Explora-tions mostly use everyday equipment available inhomes, schools and offices. Supplementary ma-terials include an equipment list suitable for re-

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http://dhstweb.org/awards/dhst-dissertation-prizehttp://dhstweb.org/awards/dhst-dissertation-prizemailto:[email protected]://open.oregonstate.education/physicsforteachers/


mote learning contexts.

After exploring light and thermal phenomena inunits 1 and 2, participants consider the influenceof these phenomena on local weather in unit 3 andon global climate change in unit 4. In unit 5, theyobserve the sun, moon, and stars and develop ex-planatory models for day and night, the phasesof the moon, and the earth’s seasons. Each unitends by making connections to the Next Genera-tion Science Standards (ngss Lead States, 2013).

If interested, please contact Emily van Zee, [email protected] (note the three e’s)

Science & Education Thematic Is-sue: Epistemology & stem Educa-tion

A special issue of the journal Science & Educa-tion with the title “Epistemic Underpinnings ofIntegrated Science, Technology, Engineering, andMathematics in Education” has been publishedand is available here.

Southeast Asian Journal of stemEducation

The inaugural issue of the Southeast Asian Journalof stem Education has been published (Vol. 1, No.1, Sep-Dec 2020). Youmay access the journal con-tents here.

The next issue will be January 2021. We are nowaccepting manuscripts for the January issue un-til 1 November 2020. Manuscripts are acceptedfrom all parts of the world. Please read the author

guidelines before submitting.

John Stiles, Editor

Peter Slezak, Retirement

After 40+ years of teaching, Peter Slezak, Univer-sity of New South Wales, has retired. He, and somany others, have been caught up in the sector-wide forced redundancies that have seen nearly500 staff retired at unsw alone, and many timesthat number across all Australian universities.

Peter was appointed in 1981 to the School ofHistory and Philosophy of Science (hps) aftercompleting his PhD in philosophy at ColumbiaUniversity whose faculty included Ernest Nagel,Arthur Danto, and Sidney Morgenbesser, all ofwhom Peter says he is indebted to for his ownphilosophical education.

The unsw hps School became dominated by thesocial constructivist enthusiasm of the time, andthereafter never appointed a single philosopher ofscience. Its name was, for some years, changed

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mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]://link.springer.com/journal/11191/29/4http://journal.seameo-stemed.org/index.php/stemed


to the School of Science and Technology Studies(sts) but with falling numbers, it was eventuallydisbanded.

Peter moved to the philosophy department. Hisenergies and enthusiasm for teaching and promot-ing philosophy of science never dimmed.

Peter’s career has been spent in the promotionand defence of good philosophy, hps, cognitivescience, science education and numerous liberalcauses including, for the past two decades, that ofthe Palestinian people.

He has been a public intellectual. In 1996 he wasJoint Coordinator with East Timor Relief Asso-ciation of Noam Chomsky’s visit and lectures inAustralia. During the 1999 Timor Independencecrisis he organised the largest political rally held atunsw since the end of the Vietnam war. In 2002and again in 2013 he supported atheism in largepublic debates with US religious philosopher Wil-liam Craig. In 2007 he was co-founder of the pub-lic advocacy group Independent Australian JewishVoices (iajv). He has supported the Palestiniancause at many Australian, and overseas, meetingsand rallies.

In 1989 he established, with considerable finan-cial support from Apple, Australia’s first Centreand Graduate degree program in Cognitive Sci-ence. Being directed by a philosopher made it adistinctive Centre. In 1990 he was Founder andInaugural President, Australasian Society for Cog-nitive Science. In 2003 hewas Chair, joint interna-tional conference of ascs with International Con-ference on Cognitive Science iccs. The Keynotespeaker was Nobel Laureate Daniel Kahneman.

In 2010, following some years of his annualclassroom mock re-trials of Galileo with studentsand faculty in his Galileo course, he directed and

performed in a public ‘Retrial of Galileo’ with acelebrity cast of public figures, and with MauriceFinocchiaro one of the world’s leading Galileoscholars. This was done in the unsw auditoriumbefore an audience of one thousand people andfilmed by the Australian Broadcasting Commis-sion for a one-hour national television program.

The idea of a dramatic re-enactment of Galileo’strial for educational purposes came from Peterseeing just such a performance at the first inter-national hps&st Group conference held at FloridaState University in 1989. There, the cast includedMichael Ruse, Joseph Pitt, Fabio Bevilacqua, JoanSolomon, Arthur Lucas and David Gruender. Al-though 100 or more good papers were given, it isthe Trial that 30 years later is remembered by at-tendees.

He has been an important contributor to and sup-porter of all hps&st projects including confer-ences, teacher workshops, journal articles, hand-book chapters, reviewing, and editing. The drift,tenor, trajectory, scholarship, and lucidity of hiscontributions to hps&st are all well seen in thefirst of his many publications in Science & Educa-tion journal:

Slezak, P.: 1994a, ‘Sociology of Science and Sci-ence Education: Part I’, Science & Education3(3), 265-294.

Slezak, P.: 1994b, ‘Sociology of Science and Sci-ence Education. Part II: Laboratory Life Un-der the Microscope’, Science & Education 3(4),329-356.

Peter writes in the first:

This article is the first of two that will examinethe claims of contemporary sociology of scientificknowledge (ssk) and the bearing of these claims

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https://thebox.unsw.edu.au/E9EBC490-CBE8-11E2-9B6D0050568336DChttps://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00540157https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00540157https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00488451https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00488451https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00488451


upon the rationale and practice of science teaching.It is maintained that if the claims of ssk are truethen there are serious, and educationally and cul-turally deleterious, implications which follow. Thetwo articles will argue that, fortunately, the claimsof ssk for the external causation of scientific beliefare baseless. And thus science teachers should resistadmonitions to accept the findings of the sociologyof science.

And in the second:

In the present article the celebratedwork LaboratoryLife of Latour and Woolgar is critically examined.Its radical, iconoclastic view of science is shown tobe not merely without foundation but an extravag-ant deconstructionist nihilism according to whichall science is fiction and the world is said to be so-cially constructed by negotiation. On this view, thesuccess of a theory is not due to its intellectual mer-its or explanatory plausibility but to the capacity ofits proponents to “extract compliance” from oth-ers. If warranted, such views pose a revolutionarychallenge to the entire Western tradition of scienceand the goals of science education which must bemisguided and unrealizable in principle. Fortu-nately, there is little reason to take these views ser-iously, though their widespread popularity is causefor concern among science educators.

A selection of Peter’s publications across manyfields can be seen here.

Peter has maintained to the very end a classroomenergy and engaged interest in students that is ascommendable as it is rare. He has repeatedly saidthat the classroom and engagement with studentswill be the greatest downside of his retirement.This lament is not commonly heard, especially byacademics who have been teaching for 40 years.

Peter has recently drafted an essay – ‘Relevanceof the Humanities?’ in response to the Australian

government’s just-announced policy of chargingmore for university humanities degrees than pro-fessional and technical degrees.

The essay captures a number of perennial themesin Peter’s writing. It concludes:

we need to ensure that the primary task of univer-sity education is not tomake students job-ready, butto create critical, informed, and humane citizens,and a society in which the ideals of free inquiry arethemselves the main measure of relevance.

The essay is available here.

Opinion Page: Franklin and thekite: What can we learn from thisepisode? Breno Arsioli Moura

Center of Natural Sciences and HumanitiesFederal University of abcSanto André – spBrazilhttp://www.brenoam.com

In January of 2020, to commemorate the “Inter-national Kite Day” (14th January), the Royal Soci-ety published in its official account on Instagrama post with an engraving from the 1860s show-ing Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) flying a kiteamidst a storm with the following paragraph:

Benjamin Franklin’s most famous contribution toscience is the Philadelphia kite experiment. Inthe 1750s, the nature of electricity was not yetclearly understood & harnessing its power was ascientific ambition rather than reality. His exper-iment showed the connection between electricityand lightning. #InternationalKiteDay

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https://research.unsw.edu.au/people/associate-professor-peter-paul-slezak/publicationshttps://www.hpsst.com/uploads/6/2/9/3/62931075/slezak__2020__relevance_of_humanities.pdfhttp://www.brenoam.comhttps://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/internationalkiteday/


I have been working with Franklin’s studies onelectricity for some years. Recently, I have pub-lished the book, A Filosofia Natural de BenjaminFranklin: traduções de cartas e ensaios sobre aeletricidade e a luz [Benjamin Franklin’s NaturalPhilosophy: translations of letters and essays onelectricity and light] (EdUFABC, São Bernardo doCampo, 2019), with – as the title indicates – trans-lations to Portuguese of some of his writings onelectricity and light, along with commentary. Theresearch took around five years and I cannot sayenough how much I have learned about electri-city and optics in the eighteenth century – the lat-ter, my main field of study – and about Frank-lin himself. He is without a doubt an interestingand relevant figure of history of science. There-fore, when I read the publication of the Royal So-ciety on Instagram, a mixture of happiness andsadness reached me. Happiness because is alwaysgood to see a name such as Franklin being re-membered, studied and discussed. Sadness, onthe other hand, because his kite experiment con-tinues to emerge as his greatest, if not only, con-tribution to the history of science.

Figure 1 – Engraving showing Franklin perform-ing his kite experiment in Royal Society’s post onInstagram.

The historiography on Franklin shows a multipli-city of contributions that goes far beyond the kiteexperiment. It is true that Franklin never playeda central role in the modern historiography ofscience, in a way such as Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), Isaac Newton (1642-1727) or Albert Ein-stein (1879-1955). There is not a “Franklin in-dustry” in historiography as we have for Newton,for instance. This may be a controversial opin-ion, but I could not identify a long-term histori-ography on his life and works, even though he isthe subject of many books and papers. Notwith-standing, the studies of Franklin portray a morecomplex figure, not only the ingenious man thatone happy day decided to fly a kite during a severestorm.

Firstly, Franklin did not publish a treatise on elec-tricity, as many may think, nor did he publish areport on the kite experiment – I will discuss thismatter later. We know Franklin’s ideas on elec-

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tricity mainly due to the efforts of Peter Collin-son (1694-1768), a British botanist who kept incontact with eminent natural philosophers in thecolony in the first half of the eighteenth century.From 1747 to 1751, Franklin and Collinson ex-changed letters on electrical matters, following agift of an “electrical tube” from the latter to theformer in order to test some electrical phenomena.In the 1750s, studies on electricity were trending,which led many natural philosophers to investig-ate its main properties. Stephen Gray (1666-1736)had shown that electricity could be transmitted,Charles Du Fay (1698-1739) had proposed twokinds of electricity – vitreous and resinous – andJean-Antoine Nollet (1700-1770) wrote on the af-fluent and effluent flows of electrical fluid, as wellas many other contributions from other authors.Therefore, when Franklin began to study electri-city, there was not a dark path.

Figure 2 – Cover of my book on Franklin, recentlypublished in Brazil.

Franklin’s first letter on electricity was written onMarch 28 of 1747. It contains only one paragraph,where Franklin acknowledgedCollinson for send-ing him “an electric tube” to perform experimentson electricity. Almost four months later, Franklinsent another letter, with a more detailed descrip-tion of his endeavours. In this second letter, wecan find two of the main concepts of the Frank-linian theories for electricity: the power of pointsand the idea of positive and negative electricity.He observed that the electrical firewas “drawnoff”a charged phial when a sharp object approached.Conversely, if a sharp needle was fixed to the endof a gun-barrel, the latter could not be electrified,since the point of the needle would “throw off” allthe electric fluid transmitted to it.

The idea of positive or negative electricity was dis-cussed by an interesting experiment involving twopersons standing in separated wax supports andanother one standing on the floor. If one of thepersons standing on the wax rubbed a glass tubewith the other person standing on the wax ap-proaching his knuckle to the tube (without touch-ing the tube or the person), Franklin assumed thatthe person rubbing the tube lost his/her electri-city to the tube, which transferred this electri-city to the second person. Therefore, in this con-figuration, the person who rubbed the tube waselectrified “negatively” and the one who collectedthe electricity from the tube was electrified “posit-ively”. Although we do not accept Franklin’s ideasnowadays, it is remarkable how his concept stillpersists, even with the adoption of new concep-tions after the nineteenth century.

Other letters from Franklin also revealed moreinteresting ideas. In an undated letter to John

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Mitchell (1711-1768), he discussed how thunder-storms were formed. I will give a very short de-scription of Franklin’s explanations, but the readershould be advised to consult the original mater-ial, in order to see his curious arguments on thenature of matter. According to him, the oceanswere constituted essentially by two things: water– a non-electric substance – and salt – an elec-tric substance. The friction in the surface of theocean made the water electrified. In vaporising, itcarried this excess of electricity and very electri-fied clouds were formed. When these clouds ap-proached mountains or less electrified clouds, theelectric firewas transmitted through lightning andthen came the rain. This would explain the forma-tion of great rivers, such as theAmazon, near greatmountains, such as the Andes. Again, his ideas areoutdated, but it is impressive how Franklin man-aged to combine his conceptions to explain suchphenomena.

The most important of his papers and letters wasthe “Opinions and conjectures concerning theproperties and effects of the electrical matter”, sentto Collinson on July 29, 1749. In this essay, Frank-lin resumed his previous concepts – mainly thepower of points and the positive and negative elec-trification – and presented some new and im-proved ideas. One of them was the model of elec-trical atmospheres. He believed that, when a bodywas electrified positively, i.e. a body which con-tained more electricity than its natural capacity,this excess surrounded it like an atmosphere, withthe same shape of the body. Although this was nota new model if we consider Franklin’s contempor-aries, he seemed to be the first to apply it to elec-trical phenomena. His other major contributionwas the description of the sentry-box experiment.Here we reach a crucial moment in this opinionpiece, which deserves a very detailed discussion.

The sentry-box experiment is sometimes associ-ated with the lightning-rod, but they are not thesame. Nonetheless, both were cited in the “Opin-ions and conjectures” – the latter, however, notwith this name. Commenting on the power ofpoints to “draw off” electricity, Franklin suggestedthat “upright rods of iron” should be placed on thetop of buildings to prevent the damages caused bythe striking of lightning. In this case, the rod wasgrounded, in order to make electric matter flowfrom the clouds to the ground. The sentry-box ex-periment had another purpose.

Figure 3 – The sentry-box experiment, as inFranklin’s book.

Franklin’s idea was to examine if the electricityof the clouds was the same as those produced in

14


Leiden jars. There was no intention to verify theelectricity of lightning, as we may suppose ini-tially. In this experiment, a sentry-box should bebuilt on the top of a tower, with an iron rod of 20or 30 feet very sharp at the end rising from it. Theother end would be connected with a wax sup-port, where a person should stand over. There-fore, the rod was not grounded. According toFranklin, when a cloud approached the rod, thelatterwould “drawoff” the electricity of the formerand, if the person approached his/her knuckle, asparkle could be obtained. Franklin seemed topresume that, in this situation, lightning wouldnot be produced and the personwould be safe (theexperiment is not safe, by the way).

Two things must be said regarding the light-ning rod and the sentry-box experiment. Firstly,Franklin was not the first experimental philo-sopher to propose an association with the light-ning and the electricity produced with Leiden jarsor other electrical apparatus. Nollet, for example,had already discussed some similarities betweenthem in 1748. Even Franklin suggested this con-nection in the letter to Mitchel concerning theformation of thunderstorms and other prior writ-ings. Secondly, Franklin did not perform this ex-periment when he sent the essay to Collinson. Itwas, however, reproduced successfully in France,in 1752, one year after Collinson decided to pub-lish Franklin’s letters in the form of a book, the Ex-periments and observations on electricity, made atPhiladelphia, soon translated into French by theincentive of George-Louis Leclerc (1707-1788),the Comte of Buffon.

The successful reproduction of the sentry-box ex-periment in France has a close, but not very of-ten alluded to, connection with the kite episode.The French experiment was performed in May1752. As expected, the news took some time to

reach Franklin’s ears. In October of the sameyear, Franklin sent a letter to Collinson – laterpublished in the Philosophical Transactions – re-porting an experiment similar to the sentry-box,“though made in a different and more easy [sic]manner”. This was the kite experiment. However,against all possible commonsense ideas, Franklindid not report howhemade the experiments, whatwere the weather conditions, what he obtained,etc. Instead, he simply gave instructions on howto build the kite, including a special detail: “a verysharp pointed wire” at the top of the upright stick.This detail is often neglected in the many engrav-ings picturing Franklin’s kite experiment. It seemsthat, for Franklin, the kite experiment was noth-ingmore than a variation of the sentry-box. This iscorroborated in hisAutobiography, where hemen-tions that the latter was a “capital” experiment,while the kite was only a “similar” way to verifythe electricity in thunderstorms.

If the kite experiment was not important to Frank-lin, how did it become a defining event in the his-toriography on him? The answer probably relieson Joseph Priestley (1733-1804), a British poly-math whose best-known contribution to the his-tory of science was the discovery of oxygen. In1767, Priestley published his widely famous TheHistory and Present State Discoveries on Electri-city, a very “Franklinian” book. On commentingon Franklin’s contributions to this area of study,Priestley reported the execution of the kite exper-imentwithmanydetails, for example, the presenceof one of Franklin’s sons. This report – never con-firmed elsewhere – was probably the vector to thefamous anecdote on the kite. It is not a coincid-ence that many of the engravings portraying thekite experiment show Franklin with a young man.

A less known aspect of Franklin’s works was hisopinions on the nature of light. In a letter to

15


Cadwallader Colden on April 23, 1752, he ex-pressed his dissatisfaction with the projectile the-ory. Franklin claimed that, if light was com-posed of small particles, then the Sun would van-ish sometime in the future. This was a very com-mon argument against the projectile theory inthe eighteenth-century. Almost two decades later,Samuel Horsley (1733-1806) responded to Frank-lin’s objections. In two papers published in thePhilosophical Transactions, he described a seriesof (feeble) calculations showing that the loss ofmass was irrelevant, considering the huge amountof matter of the Sun. Franklin never respondedto Horsley. In his letter to Colden, he knew inwhich scenario he was – a Newtonian one – andhe was relieved he was not in times of “philosoph-ical heresy”, as Galileo.

Franklin showed some interest in a vibration the-ory of light. At the end of his life, hewrote again onthe subject, in an essay published posthumouslyby the American Philosophical Society in 1793,but, as before, he did not advance any new ideas. Icould mention other areas in which Franklin act-ively worked, but I feel that the previous discus-sion in sufficient to evidence that he was involvedinmany subjects anddid not simply fly a kite in themiddle of a thunderstorm and discover the elec-trical nature of lightning.

What canwe learn from this discussion? One pos-sible first answer is: in science, there is no “cru-cial experiment” without a background. Crucialexperiments do not emerge unexpectedly and, inmost cases, they are not as crucial as we thoughtthey were. Besides Franklin and the kite, I couldmention Newton and the apple, Archimedes andthe crown, Oersted and the compass, amongmanyothers. There is an extensive literature on thesehistorical episodes showing they were not singleevents without a previous history. Therefore, sci-

ence does not usually offer magical and instantan-eous solutions to problems and doubts. The sci-entific enterprise develops gradually and is con-nected with other elements that are not always sci-entific. In the case of the kite experiment, it wasa variation of a more famous experiment – thesentry-box – but its veracity cannot be demon-strated due to the lack of historical evidence.

Secondly, we must not idealise historical scientificfigures. By placing Franklin as a sole and bravescientist trying to prove his theory in a risky situ-ation, we are creating amythical picture of sciencewhich is far from reality. If we want to understandFranklin’s contribution, we should turn our atten-tion to who he was, what he had experienced be-fore and in which context he was living, to men-tion just three elements. Franklinwas not a scient-ist or a physicist, in our current standards. He wasa natural philosopher, in a broad sense, just as hiscorrespondents and colleagues in the eighteenthcentury. Franklin was born in one of the colon-ies of Great Britain. The United States of Amer-ica did not exist, neither did its scientific power.To the eyes of the British community, Franklinwas an outsider, which explains why his first let-ters to Collinson were not published by the RoyalSociety. Franklin’s experience with typographyand the publication of his journals and pamph-lets put him in contact with several authors andtheir books and papers, including natural philo-sophers. In the eighteenth century, electricity be-came one of the most studied topics, so many sav-ants were involved with the subject; Franklin wasnot the only one. Many of his ideas were later de-veloped, altered or rejected, even by himself.

Thirdly, this episode also teaches us about thecollective character of science. Although wemay be familiar with Franklin’s name, he hadmany colleagues whom he collaborated with, such

16


as Philip Syng (1703-1789), Thomas Hopkin-son (1709-1751) and Ebenezer Kinnersley (1711-1778). The latter was particularly known for hav-ing advanced the experiments with the kite. In ad-dition, Collinson was essential to making Frank-lin’s works known among the British, otherwisenone of his letters would have reached the RoyalSociety. Buffon also played an important role,since, without his incentive, the translation of hisbook to French would have taken longer and per-haps the reproduction of the sentry-box experi-ment may have never occurred in France.

These three suggestions are just a few amongmanyother possibilities that may arise from the historyof Franklin’s natural philosophy. Getting to knowsuch a fascinating person and such a fascinatingtime for the history of science can bring manycontributions to a better introduction of histor-ical content in science teaching. In these troubledtimes, we certainly need to improve our compre-hension of the many factors involved in the sci-entific enterprise. Although anecdotes such as thisone may at first be amusing, they do not alwaysbring the message we desire for science. The bet-ter we understand the history of science, the betterwe will be prepared for the future that lies ahead.

Invitation to Submit Opinion Piece

In order to make better educational use of thewide geographical and disciplinary reach of thishps&st newsletter, invitations are extended forreaders to contribute opinion or position pieces orsuggestions about any aspect of the past, presentor future of hps&st studies.

Contributions can be sent direct to MichaelMatthews or Nathan Oseroff-Spicer.

Ideally, they might be pieces that are already onthe web, in which case a few paragraphs introduc-tion, with link to web site can be sent, or else thepieces will be put on the web with a link given inthe newsletter.

They will be archived in the opinion folder at thehps&st web site: http://www.hpsst.com/.

PhD Theses in hps&st Domain

The hps&st newsletter is the ideal medium forpublicising and making known submitted andawarded doctoral theses in the hps&st domain.

The following details should be submitted to theeditor at [email protected]:

• Candidate’s name and email

• Institution

• Supervisor

• Thesis title

• Abstract of 100-300 words

• Web link when theses are required to be sub-mitted for open search on web.

Recent hps&st Research Articles

Science & Education (Volume 29, Issue 4, August2020)Topic: Nature of stem (14 articles in thisissue)

Centaurus (Volume 62, Issue 3) Special Issue: Thecreative power of experimentation: Bacon andDella Porta Issue Edited by: Doina‐CristinaRusu and Dana Jalobeanu

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mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.hpsst.com/mailto:[email protected]://link.springer.com/journal/11191/volumes-and-issues/29-4https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/16000498/2020/62/3


Akbayrak, M., & Kaya, E. (2020) Fifth-grade students’ understanding of social-institutional aspects of science. Interna-tional Journal of Science Education, 1-29.doi:10.1080/09500693.2020.1790054 onlinefirst

Alisir, Z.N., Irez, S. (2020) The Effect of Replic-ating Historical Scientific Apparatus on HighSchool Students’ Attitudes Towards ScienceandTheir Understanding of Nature of Science.Science & Education. doi:10.1007/s11191-020-00148-0 online first

Bruckermann, T., Fiedler, D., & Harms, U. (2020)Identifying precursory concepts in evolutionduring early childhood – a systematic literat-ure review. Studies in Science Education, 1-44. doi:10.1080/03057267.2020.1792678 on-line fist

Dent, R. (2020). Subject 01: Exemplary Indigen-ous masculinity in Cold War genetics. TheBritish Journal for the History of Science, 1-22.doi:10.1017/S000708742000031X online first

Erduran, S., Kaya, E., Cilekrenkli, A. et al.(2020) Perceptions of Nature of Science Emer-ging in Group Discussions: a ComparativeAccount of Pre-service Teachers from Tur-key and England. International Journal ofScience and Mathematics Education, 1-22.doi:10.1007/s10763-020-10110-9 online first

Fuertes-Prieto, M.Á., Andrés-Sánchez, S.,Corrochano-Fernández, D. et al. (2020) Pre-service Teachers’ False Beliefs in Supersti-tions and Pseudosciences in Relation to Sci-ence and Technology. Science & Education,doi:10.1007/s11191-020-00140-8 online first

Hansson, S.O. (2020) Social constructionism and

climate science denial. Euro J. Phil Sci, 10(37),1-27. doi:10.1007/s13194-020-00305-w on-line first

Hesketh, I. (2020) The making of John Tyn-dall’s Darwinian Revolution. Annals ofScience. doi:10.1080/00033790.2020.1808243online first

Jiménez-Liso, M.R., López-Banet, L. & Dillon,J. (2020) Changing How We Teach Acid-Base Chemistry. Science & Education, 1-25.doi:10.1007/s11191-020-00142-6 online first

Lampert, Y. (2020) Teaching the Nature of Sci-ence from a Philosophical Perspective. Science& Education, 1-23. doi:10.1007/s11191-020-00149-z online first

Landa, I., Westbroek, H., Janssen, F. et al. (2020)Scientific Perspectivism in Secondary-SchoolChemistry Education. Science & Education,1-28. doi:10.1007/s11191-020-00145-3 onlinefirst

Lessl, T.M. (2020) Demarcation as a classroomresponse to creationism: a critical examin-ation of the National Academy of Sciences’Science, Evolution, and Creationism (2008).Cultural Studies of Science Education, 1-13.doi:10.1007/s11422-020-09977-5 online first

Palomo, M. (2020) New insight into the ori-gins of the calculus war. Annals of Sci-ence. doi:10.1080/00033790.2020.1794038online first

Shaw, J. (2020)The Problem of the Empirical Basisin the Popperian Tradition: Popper, Bartley,and Feyerabend. hopos: The Journal of the In-ternational Society for theHistory of Philosophyof Science. doi:10.1086/710183 [just accepted]

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https://doi.org/10.1080/09500693.2020.1790054https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-020-00148-0https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-020-00148-0https://doi.org/10.1080/03057267.2020.1792678https://doi.org/10.1017/S000708742000031Xhttps://doi.org/10.1007/s10763-020-10110-9https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-020-00140-8https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-020-00305-whttps://doi.org/10.1080/00033790.2020.1808243https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-020-00142-6https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-020-00149-zhttps://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-020-00149-zhttps://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-020-00145-3https://doi.org/10.1007/s11422-020-09977-5https://doi.org/10.1080/00033790.2020.1794038https://doi.org/10.1086/710183


Taşkin, Özgür: 2020, ‘Teaching Evolution inMuslim Countries: Is Constructivism a Solu-tion or a Threat?’, Journal of Education forLife 34(2), 561-578. http://journals.iku.edu.tr/yed/index.php/yed/article/view/202/139

Zummo, L., Donovan, B., & Busch, K.C. (2020)Complex influences of mechanistic know-ledge, worldview, and quantitative reason-ing on climate change discourse: Evidencefor ideologically motivated reasoning amongyouth. Journal of Research in Science Teaching.doi:10.1002/tea.21648 online first

Recent hps&st Related Books

Alexander, Denis R. (2020). Are We Slaves to ourGenes? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.isbn: 978-1-108-56652-0

‘Denis Alexander has a rare skill. A first-rate sci-entist, working on fascinating problems of both in-tellectual and moral importance, he is able to speakto the general public in ways that are clear, withoutthe slightest hint of condescension. At the cutting-edge of the science of genetics, Alexander takesus through the implications for nearly everything,from putting on weight to church attendance! Readand learn from his book. Wonder at this incredibleworld in which we live and which we are now start-ing to understand.’ – Prof. Michael Ruse, Lucyle T.Werkmeister Professor of Philosophy, Florida StateUniversity

‘Genetics is generally considered the most signific-ant field in contemporary science for addressing,not only the most important questions in medicalscience bearing on the treatment of disease, but alsoour attempts, more widely, to understand humanbehaviour. It is no surprise, therefore, that it shouldalso pose profound questions for how we under-stand human identity and agency. This superb bookis, quite simply, the most scientifically informed

and deep-thinking discussion of the key questionsposed by genetics on the market. It is also lucid andaccessible. Not only is this an invaluable resourcefor students and academics, it is essential readingfor all those who have found themselves wondering,‘Did my genes make me do it?’, ‘How far is my per-sonality, the challenges I face and my orientation toothers determined bymy genes?’ and ‘What does allthis mean for who I am?’ It is unusual for a book onscience to be quite such an absorbing and informat-ive read and I could not recommend itmore highly!’– Prof. Alan Torrance, Emeritus Professor of Sys-tematic Theology, St. Andrews University

‘This book is lucid and erudite, humorous and illu-minating, sensitive to history and brilliantly up-to-date. It is also timely – on hand at the right mo-ment to include seriously impressive results fromgenome-wide association studies (gwas) that stresshow myriad genes each make tiny contributions toforming us as persons. Searches for single gene-behaviour links have been abandoned. Genes, en-vironments andminds interact inseparably to influ-ence the course of our lives. Dr Alexander reallyhelps us to understandmore about ourselves, to cel-ebrate our genetics and to wonder at the sheer rich-ness of being a multi-faceted human.’ – GraemeFinlay, The University of Aukland

‘We hear constantly about genes and their im-portance in making us who we are, in body andmind. But between our genes and ourselves stretchchains of cause and effect whose intertwining, witheach other and our many environments, can beextraordinarily complex. In this wonderful book,Denis Alexander explains lucidly and engaginglyhow this complexity comes about and why, once weunderstand it, we seewhy claims for the determinat-ive power of genes should be handled with extremecaution.’ – Prof. Gregory Radick, Professor of His-tory and Philosophy of Science, University of Leeds

Banchetti-Robino, Marina Paola (2020) TheChemical Philosophy of Robert Boyle: Mechan-

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http://journals.iku.edu.tr/yed/index.php/yed/article/view/202/139http://journals.iku.edu.tr/yed/index.php/yed/article/view/202/139https://doi.org/10.1002/tea.21648


icism, Chymical Atoms, and Emergence. Oxford,UK: Oxford University Press. [Harback]isbn: 978-0-197-50250-1

‘Robert Boyle (1627-1691) believed that a reduc-tionist conception of the mechanical philosophythreatened the heuristic power and autonomy ofchemistry as an experimental science. Whilesome historical and philosophical scholars have ex-amined his nuanced position, understanding thechemical philosophy he developed through his ownexperimental work is incredibly difficult even forexperts in the field.

In The Chemical Philosophy of Robert Boyle, Mar-ina Paola Banchetti-Robino energetically explainsBoyle’s ideas in a whole new light and proposes thatBoyle regarded chemical qualities as non-reducibledispositional and relational properties that emergefrom, and supervene upon, the mechanistic struc-ture of chymical atoms. Banchetti-Robino demon-strates that these ideas are implicit in Boyle’s writ-ing, making his philosophical contributions crucialto the fields of both philosophy and chemistry.

‘The arguments presented are further strengthenedby a detailed mereological analysis of Boyleanchymical atoms as chemically elementary entities,which establishes the theory of wholes and partsthat is most consistent with an emergentist con-ception of chemical properties. More generally,this book examines the way in which Boyle soughtto accommodate his complex chemical philosophywithin the framework of the 17th century mechan-istic theory of matter. Banchetti-Robino conceptu-alises Boyle’s experimental work as a scientific re-search programme, in the Lakatosian sense, to bet-ter explain the positive and negative heuristic func-tion of the mechanistic theory of matter within hischemical philosophy.

‘The Chemical Philosophy of Robert Boyle activelyengages with the contemporary and lively debatesover the nature of Boyle’s ideas about structuralchemistry, fundamental mechanistic particles and

properties, the explanatory power of subordin-ate causes, the complex relation between funda-mental particles, natural kinds, and unified chem-ical wholes. The book is a rich historical accountthat begins with the dominant paradigms of 16thand 17th Century chemical philosophy and takesreaders all the way through to the 21st Century.’(From the Publisher)

More information available here.

Berman, Jonathan M. (2020). Anti-vaxxers: Howto Challenge a Misinformed Movement. Cam-bridge, MA: The MIT Press. [Paperback]isbn: 978-0-262-53932-6

‘Vaccines are a documented success story, one ofthe most successful public health interventions inhistory. Yet there is a vocal anti-vaccination move-ment, featuring celebrity activists (including actressJenny McCarthy and British rapper M.I.A., who at-tracted attention for tweeting during the pandemic“If I have to choose the vaccine or chip I’m gonnachoose death”) and the propagation of anti-vaxclaims through books, documentaries, and socialmedia. In Anti-vaxxers, Jonathan Berman exploresthe phenomenon of the anti-vaccination move-ment, recounting its history from its nineteenth-century antecedents to today’s activism, examiningits claims, and suggesting a strategy for counteringthem.

‘After providing background information on vac-cines and how they work, Berman describes res-istance to Britain’s Vaccination Act of 1853, show-ing that the arguments anticipate those made bytoday’s anti-vaxxers. He discusses the develop-ment of new vaccines in the twentieth century, in-cluding those protecting against polio and MMR(measles, mumps, rubella), and the debunked pa-per that linked the MMR vaccine to autism; thecdc conspiracy theory promoted in the document-ary Vaxxed; recommendations for an alternative

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vaccination schedule; Kennedy’smisinformed cam-paign against thimerosal; and the much-abused re-ligious exemption to vaccination.

‘Anti-vaxxers have changed their minds, but rarelybecause someone has given them a list of facts. Ber-man argues that anti-vaccination activism is tiedclosely to how people see themselves as parents andcommunity members. Effective pro-vaccination ef-forts should emphasise these cultural aspects ratherthan battling social media posts.” (From the Pub-lisher)


Blair, Ann, & von Greyerz, Kaspar (Eds.) (2020)Physico-theology: Religion and Science in Europe,1650–1750. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins Uni-versity. isbn: 978-1-421-43846-7

Beginning around 1650, the emergence of a num-ber of new scientific concepts, methods, and instru-ments challenged existing syntheses of science andreligion. Physico-theology, which embraced thevalues of personal, empirical observation, was aninternational movement of the early Enlightenmentthat focused on the new science to make argumentsabout divine creation and providence. By reconcil-ing the new science with Christianity across manydenominations, physico-theology played a crucialrole in diffusing new scientific ideas, assumptions,and interest in the study of nature to a broad pub-lic. In this book, sixteen leading scholars contrib-ute a rich array of essays on the terms and scopeof the movement, its scientific and religious argu-ments, and its aesthetic sensibilities.’


Coelho, R. Lopes, Faria, Cláudia, Valente, Bianor,& Maurício, Paulo (Eds.) (2020) History and

Philosophy of Science and Science Teaching Pro-ceedings. Lisbon 2019. Shaker Verlag.isbn: 978-3-844-07443-7

‘The volume now presented, with texts in Englishand Portuguese, has a double purpose: to frame theuse of History and Philosophy of Science in scienceteaching; and to provide Portuguese teachers withmaterials fromwhich to enrich their science classes.To this end, contributions have been gathered fromauthors who have researched the use of History andPhilosophy of Science in the promotion of bettereducation in an international context.

‘Since its first meeting in 1989, the InternationalHistory Philosophy and Science Teaching Group(ihpst) has organised biannual conferences. In re-cent years, it has also promoted regional confer-ences. In these conferences, teachers, students andscholars of education, history, philosophy and so-ciology of science contribute to broaden the fieldof research and strengthen the contribution of theGroup in practical and theoretical issues. It is inthis tradition that this volume appears. Most of theauthors have been actively involved in the ihpstGroup.

‘As has been recognised, science education bene-fits if teachers and students get to know better thepast of science and how science works. This con-cerns what the authors of the past have said anddone – which usually differs from what our text-books tell us; it concerns themethods of science; thelimitations of scientific theories; the impacts of sci-ence and technology and the recognition of emer-ging ethical issues. From all this, the editors hopethat the present volume can benefit the teaching andlearning of science in Portugal.’ (From the Pub-lisher)


de Courtenay, Nadine, Darrigol, Olivier, & Sch-laudt, Oliver (2020) The Reform of the Interna-

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tional System of Units (SI): Philosophical, Historicaland Sociological Issues. Abington, UK: Routledge.isbn: 978-0-367-66260-8

‘Systems of units still fail to attract the philosoph-ical attention they deserve, but this could changewith the current reform of the International Sys-tem of Units (SI). Most of the SI base units willhenceforth be based on certain laws of nature and achoice of fundamental constants whose values willbe frozen. The theoretical, experimental and in-stitutional work required to implement the reformhighlights the entanglement of scientific, techno-logical and social features in scientific enterprise,while it also invites a philosophical inquiry thatpromises to overcome the tensions that have longobstructed science studies” (From the Publisher)


Deer, Brian (2020) The Doctor Who Fooled theWorld: Science, Deception, and the War on Vac-cines. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University.isbn: 978-1-421-43800-9

‘From San Francisco to Shanghai, from Vancouverto Venice, controversy over vaccines is eruptingaround the globe. Fear is spreading. Banisheddiseases have returned. And a militant “anti-vax”movement has surfaced to campaign against chil-dren’s shots. But why?

‘In The Doctor Who Fooled the World, award-winning investigative reporter Brian Deer exposesthe truth behind the crisis. Writing with the page-turning tension of a detective story, he unmasksthe players and unearths the facts. Where it began.Who was responsible. How they pulled it off. Whopaid.

‘At the heart of this dark narrative is the rise of theso-called “father of the anti-vaccine movement”: aBritish-born doctor, Andrew Wakefield. Banned

from medicine, thanks to Deer’s discoveries, he fledto the United States to pursue his ambitions, andnow claims to be winning a “war”.

‘In an epic investigation spread across fifteen years,Deer battles medical secrecy and insider cover-ups,smear campaigns and gagging lawsuits, to uncoverrigged research and moneymaking schemes, theheartbreaking plight of families struggling with dis-ability, and the scientific scandal of our time.’ (Fromthe Editor)


El-Hani, C. N., Nunes-Neto, N. F. & Rocha, P.L. B. (2020) Using a participatory problem-basedmethodology to teach about nos. In: McComas,W. F. (Ed.). The Nature of Science in Science In-struction: Rationales and Strategies (pp. 451-483).Cham: Springer.

Lindee, M. Susan (2020) Rational Fog: Science andTechnology inModernWar. Cambridge, MA:Har-vard University Press. isbn: 978-0-674-91918-1

‘There is a voluminous literature on science, techno-logy, and warfare, but most of it focuses on a partic-ular science, a particular technology, or a particularwar. In this ambitious, synthetic work, M. SusanLindee explores the relationship between technicalknowledge and violence across a wide historical ex-panse. A highly original and fascinating book.’ –Naomi Oreskes, author of Why Trust Science?

‘This book brilliantly illuminates how the ‘‘fog ofwar’’ creeps beyond the battlefield, engulfing thecollaborative and analytical systems of scientistsand engineers in the production of weapon systemsfor the modern age.’ – Robert Jacobs, HiroshimaPeace Institute

‘This fascinating book compels us to reckon withhow science has been developed and directed by the

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military – and how scientific knowledge and tech-nology underlie the ghastly deadliness of modernwarfare, from gunshot wounds to the atomic bomb.M. Susan Lindee presents the coupling of science tothe defence state as integral and systemic, not amat-ter of a few bad actors or the corruption of research.Vital reading.’ – Angela N. H. Creager, author ofLife Atomic: A History of Radioisotopes in Scienceand Medicine


Melville,Wayne&Kerr, Donald (Eds.) (2020)Vir-tues as Integral to Science Education: Understand-ing the Intellectual, Moral, and Civic Value of Sci-ence and Scientific Inquiry. Abington, UK: Rout-ledge.isbn: 978-0-367-42139-7

‘By investigating the re-emergence of intellectual,moral, and civic virtues in the practice and teachingof science, this text challenges the increasing profes-sionalisation of science; questions the view of sci-entific knowledge as objective; and highlights therelationship between democracy and science.

‘Written by a range of experts in science, the historyof science, education and philosophy, the text es-tablishes the historical relationship between naturalphilosophy and the Aristotelian virtues beforemov-ing to the challenges that the relationship faces, withthe emergence, and increasing hegemony, broughtabout by the professionalisation of science. Explor-ing how virtues relate to citizenship, technology,and politics, the chapters in this work illustrate theways in which virtues are integral to understand-ing the values and limitations of science, and its rolein informing democratic engagement. The text alsodemonstrates how the guiding virtues of scientificinquiry can be communicated in the classroom tothe benefit of both individuals and wider societies.

‘Scholars in the fields of Philosophy of Science, Eth-

ics and Philosophy of Education, as well as ScienceEducation, will find this book to be highly useful.’(From the Publishers)


Mondschein, Ken (2020) On Time: A History ofWestern Timekeeping. Baltimore, MD: JohnsHop-kins University Press. isbn: 978-1-421-43827-6

‘Western culture has been obsessed with regulat-ing society by the precise, accurate measurementof time since the Middle Ages. In On Time, KenMondschein explores the paired development ofconcepts and technologies of timekeeping with hu-man thought. Without clocks, he argues, the mod-ern world as we know it would not exist. From theastronomical timekeeping of the ancient world tothe tower clocks of the Middle Ages to the seago-ing chronometer, the quartz watch, and the atomicclock, greater precision and accuracy have had pro-found effects on human society–which, in turn, hasdriven the quest for further precision and accuracy.This quest toward automation–which gave rise tothe Gregorian calendar, the factory clock, and eventhe near-disastrous Y2K bug–has led to profoundsocial repercussions and driven the creation of themodern scientific mindset.

‘Surveying the evolution of the clock from prehis-tory to the twenty-first century, Mondschein ex-plains how both the technology and the philo-sophy behind Western timekeeping regimes cameto take over the entire world. On Time is a storyof thinkers, philosophers, and scientists, and of thethousand decisions that continue to shape our dailylives.’ (From the Publisher)


Scerri, E. R., Ghibaudi, E. (2020) What is a Chem-ical Element? Oxford, UK: Oxford University

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https://tinyurl.com/y2txjgjrhttps://tinyurl.com/yywc82oyhttps://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/title/time


Press.isbn: 978-0-190-93378-4

‘The concept of a chemical element is foundationalwithin the field of chemistry, but there is widedisagreement over its definition. Even the Inter-national Union for Pure and Applied Chemistry(iupac) claims two distinct definitions: a speciesof atoms versus one which identifies chemical ele-ments with the simple substances bearing theirnames. The double definition of elements proposedby the International Union for Pure and AppliedChemistry contrasts an abstract meaning and anoperational one. Nevertheless, the philosophical as-pects of this notion are not fully captured by theIUPAC definitions, despite the fact that they werecrucial for the construction of the Periodic Table.Although rich scientific literature on the elementand the periodic table exists as well as a recentgrowth in the philosophy of chemistry, scholars arestill searching for a definitive answer to this import-ant question: What is an element?

‘Eric Scerri and Elena Ghibaudi have teamed up toassemble a group of scholars to provide readers anoverview of the current state of the debate on chem-ical elements from epistemological, historical, andeducational perspectives. What Is A Chemical Ele-ment? fills a gap for the benefit of the whole chem-istry community-experimental researchers, philo-sophers, chemistry educators, and anyone lookingto learn more about the elements of the periodictable.’ (From the Publishers)


Authors of hps&st-related papers and booksare invited to bring them to attention ofPaulo Maurício or Nathan Oseroff-Spicer forinclusion in these sections.

Coming hps&st Related Confer-ences

October 8-9, 2020 Conference on Science & Tech-nology Education, Porto, PortugalDetails available here.

October 8-11, 2020, History of Science SocietyAnnual Conference, New OrleansDetails available here.

November 19-22, 2020, Twenty-Seventh BiennialMeeting of the psa. Baltimore, MarylandDetails available here.

December 11-12, 2020, ‘History, Philosophy andSociology of School Biology’, on-line and in-person ishpssb symposium, Dublin City Univer-sityDetails available here.

July 4-8, 2021, ihpst 16th International Confer-ence, University of Calgary, CanadaDetails from Glenn Dolphin:[email protected].

July 11-16, 2021, Biennial meeting of the Interna-tional Society for the History, Philosophy, and So-cial Studies of Biology, Milwaukee, WIDetails available here.

July 19-23, 2021 ’Objects of Understanding: His-torical Perspectives on Material Artefacts in Sci-ence Education’ will take place at the Europa-Universität Flensburg (Germany)Details: Roland Wittje, [email protected] here.

July 25-31, 2021, 26th International Congress ofHistory of Science andTechnology (dhst), PragueInformation: https://www.ichst2021.org/

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https://tinyurl.com/y3hbp6xzmailto:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.fe.up.pt/ste2020https://hssonline.org/2020/01/06/call-for-papers-hss-2020/https://psa2020.philsci.org/https://sites.google.com/dcu.ie/ishpssb2020/homemailto:[email protected]://www.ishpssb.org/meetingsmailto:[email protected]://www.uni-flensburg.de/physik/oou/https://www.ichst2021.org/


September 20-22, 2021, ‘Developing MarioBunge’s Scientific-Philosophical Programme’,Huaguang Academy of Information Science,Wuhan, ChinaDetails from Zongrong LI [email protected].

July 24-29, 2023, 17th dlmpst Congress, Univer-sity of Buenos Aires Information: Pablo Loren-zano, [email protected].

hps&st Related Organisations andWebsites

iuhpst – International Union of History, Philo-sophy, Science, and Technology

dlmpst – Division of Logic, Mathematics, Philo-sophy, Science, and Technology

dhst – Division of History, Science, and Techno-logy

ihpst – International History, Philosophy, andScience Teaching Group

narst – National Association for Research in Sci-ence Teaching

esera – European Science Education ResearchAssociation

asera – Australasian Science Education ResearchAssociation

icase – International Council of Associations forScience Education

unesco – Education

hss – History of Science Society

eshs – European Society for theHistory of Science

aha – American History Association

isheastme – International Society for the Historyof East Asian History of Science Technology andMedicine

bshs – British Society for History of Science

epsa – European Philosophy of Science Associ-ation

aahpsss - The Australasian Association for theHistory, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Science

hopos – International Society for the History ofPhilosophy of Science

psa – Philosophy of Science Association

bsps – The British Society for the Philosophy ofScience

spsp – The Society for Philosophy of Science inPractice

ishpsb – The International Society for the His-tory, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology

pes – The Philosophy of Education Society (USA)

The above list is updated and kept on the hps&stwebsite here.

hps&st-related organisations wishing their webpage to be added to the list should contact assistanteditor Paulo Maurício ([email protected])

The newsletter is typeset in XeLaTeX.The font is Minion Pro.The cover image is used with permission fromhttps://pixabay.com/, free for commercial use.

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mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.iuhps.nethttps://www.dlmpst.org/https://www.dhstweb.org/https://www.ihpst.net/https://www.narst.org/https://www.esera.org/https://www.asera.org.au/http://www.icaseonline.net/index.htmlhttps://en.unesco.org/themes/educationhttps://hssonline.org/https://www.eshs.org/?lang=enhttps://www.historians.org/https://www.isheastm.org/https://www.bshs.org.uk/https://www.philsci.eu/https://aahpsss.net.au/https://www.hopos.org/https://www.philsci.org/https://www.thebsps.org/https://www.philosophy-science-practice.org/https://www.ishpssb.org/https://www.philosophyofeducation.org/https://www.hpsst.com/hpsst-websites.htmlmailto:[email protected]://pixabay.com/

covid-19 teaching materials2020 Gustav Neuenschwander Prize: Kostas GavrogluUniversity of Pittsburgh FellowshipsPaul Bunge Prize 2021: History of Scientific InstrumentsLondon School of Economics, Lakatos Award 2020, Nicholas Shea iuhpst Essay Prize in History and Philosophy of Science2021 dhst Dissertation Prize Competition, Call for ApplicationsOpen Source Physics Text for Elementary and Middle SchoolsScience & Education Thematic Issue: Epistemology & stem EducationSoutheast Asian Journal of stem EducationPeter Slezak, RetirementOpinion Page: Franklin and the kite: What can we learn from this episode? Breno Arsioli MouraRecent hps&st Research ArticlesRecent hps&st Related BooksComing hps&st Related Conferenceshps&st Related Organisations and Websites

HPS&ST · 2020. 9. 23. · hps&stnewsletter september2020 • His active involvement in fostering...

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