Aarhus University Seal

Brad Wray publishes review of Eric Scerri’s: A tale of seven scientists and a new philosophy of science (OUP, 2016)

"A new philosophy of science from the history of arcane natural science", Foundations of Chemistry 19(3): 281–285

"Scerri’s new book, A tale of seven scientists and a new philosophy of science, is his first book-length foray into the general philosophy of science. The premise of the book is straightforward. By examining the contributions of seven quite obscure scientists who contributed to our understanding of chemistry and physics, we will see the development of scientific knowledge differently, which will in turn require us to radically rethink our understanding of the philosophy of science. The seven scientists whose tales he tells are the sorts of figures that most philosophers of science would not know much about if they did not also work in the history of chemistry or the history of physics. Scerri wants us to take a serious and careful look at the contributions of these seven relatively obscure figures, and see how their work played an underappreciated but integral role in advances in chemistry and physics that are widely regarded as very significant, advances that are associated with more familiar names like Niels Bohr and Ernest Rutherford."

Read the entire review in Foundations of Chemistry (requires subscription)