"Exploratory experimentation" as a probe into the relation between historiography and philosophy of science

Studies in History and Philosophy of Science
Jutta Schickore

Abstract

This essay utilizes the concept "exploratory experimentation" as a probe into the relation between historiography and philosophy of science. The essay traces the emergence of the historiographical concept "exploratory experimentation" in the late 1990s. The reconstruction of the early discussions about exploratory experimentation shows that the introduction of the concept had unintended consequences: Initially designed to debunk philosophical ideas about theory testing, the concept "exploratory experimentation" quickly exposed the poverty of our conceptual tools for the analysis of experimental practice. Looking back at a number of detailed analyses of experimental research, we can now appreciate that the concept of exploratory experimentation is too vague and too elusive to fill the desideratum whose existence it revealed.

References

Jun 1, 1987·Isis; an International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences·F L Holmes
Feb 3, 2005·Studies in History and Philosophy of Science·C Kenneth Waters
Feb 14, 2012·Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences·Ulrich Krohs

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