讲座预告 | 亨克·W ·德雷格特：理解科学理解

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中国科学院哲学研究所（CASIP）将于2021年11月5日邀请荷兰拉德堡德大学亨克·W·德雷格特（Henk W. de Regt）教授做关于科学理解的报告，通过哲学分析和历史案例研究，研究科学理解的本质。

众所周知，科学的一个核心目的是理解我们周围的世界，而拥有这种理解对我们当今的社会非常重要。但是达到这种理解意味着什么呢？究竟科学理解是什么？这些都是尚未得到满意答案的哲学问题。自从卡尔·亨普尔在1948年提出覆盖律模型以来，关于科学解释的本质一直存在争议，但有关理解的概念在很大程度上被忽视了，因为大多数哲学家认为理解只是客观解释的主观性附带产生的结果。相比之下，亨克·W ·德雷格特（Henk W. de Regt）将科学理解置于核心立场。他的著作『理解科学理解』主要是一项哲学研究，但也包含科学实践的历史案例研究。与该领域的大多数现有研究相比，它考虑了科学家的观点并分析了他们在科学争议和科学发展中的作用。其中，『理解科学理解』的目的是发展和捍卫科学理解的哲学理论，该理论可以描述和解释科学家实际采用的理解标准的历史性演变。该理论为著名物理学家维尔纳·海森堡（Werner Heisenberg）和理查德·费曼（Richard Feynman）的立场辩护，同时对物理学家诉诸直觉的方式引入严谨的概念。在这里所主张理解的解释语境为自然科学：虽然具体的案例研究来自于物理学，但也会引用其它科学的案例说明“理解”广泛的有效性和应用性。

CASIP系列讲座四

理解科学理解

主讲人：亨克·W ·德雷格特（拉德堡德大学）

主持人：王彦晶（北京大学）

评论人：

王巍（清华大学）

周理乾（上海交通大学）

滕璐（上海纽约大学）

吴东颖（CASIP）

时间：2021年11月5日16:30-18:30（北京时间）

ZOOM线上会议

会议号：489 550 5875

讲座工作语言为英语

主办单位：中国科学院哲学研究所

讲座摘要

进入新千禧年后，科学哲学中出现了关于科学理解的激烈争论。在这场讲座中，我将简述这个争论的发展，回顾目前对于科学理解的最重要的观点。接着，我将阐述我提出的科学理解的语境理论，并且利用物理学史中的一个案例来说明它。最后，我将论述目前这个哲学争论中一个核心的议题，就是理解与知识的关系，以及真理是否是理解的必要条件这个问题。

主讲人简介

亨克·W ·德雷格特（Henk W. de Regt）为荷兰拉德堡德大学（又译奈梅亨大学）科学院社会科学研究所自然科学哲学全职教授。其专业领域为一般科学哲学、物理学基础以及近代物理学史。他的研究领域围绕“理解”这一主题展开，试图通过哲学分析和历史案例研究，研究科学理解的本质。出版专著Understanding Scientific Understanding (Oxford University Press, 2017)，并在2019年获得拉卡托斯奖。

CASIP International Lectures #4

Understanding Scientific Understanding

It is widely acknowledged that a central aim of science is to achieve understanding of the world around us, and that possessing such understanding is highly important in our present-day society. But what does it mean to achieve this understanding? What precisely is scientific understanding? These are philosophical questions that have not yet received satisfactory answers. While there has been an ongoing debate about the nature of scientific explanation since Carl Hempel advanced his covering-law model in 1948, the related notion of understanding has been largely neglected, because most philosophers regarded understanding as merely a subjective by-product of objective explanations. By contrast, his book Understanding Scientific Understanding puts scientific understanding center stage. It is primarily a philosophical study, but also contains detailed historical case studies of scientific practice. In contrast to most existing studies in this area, it takes into account scientists' views and analyzes their role in scientific debate and development. The aim of Understanding Scientific Understanding is to develop and defend a philosophical theory of scientific understanding that can describe and explain the historical variation of criteria for understanding actually employed by scientists. The theory does justice to the insights of such famous physicists as Werner Heisenberg and Richard Feynman, while bringing much-needed conceptual rigor to their intuitions. The scope of the proposed account of understanding is the natural sciences: while the detailed case studies derive from physics, examples from other sciences are presented to illustrate its wider validity.

Speaker: Henk W. de Regt (Radboud University)

Chair: Yanjing Wang (Peking University)

Commentators:

Wei Wang (Tsinghua University)

Liqian Zhou (Shanghai Jiao Tong University)

Lu Teng (NYU Shanghai)

Tung-Ying Wu (CASIP)

Time: Friday, 5th November 2021 4:30PM—6:30PM(UTC+8)

Online Platform: Zoom

Meeting ID: 489 550 5875

Zoom Address: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/4895505875

Language: English

Organizer: Institute of Philosophy, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CASIP)

Abstract

Since the turn of the millennium a lively debate on scientific understanding has emerged in the philosophy of science. In my talk, I will sketch this development and review the most important current views on scientific understanding. Next, I will outline my own contextual theory of scientific understanding, and illustrate it with a case study from the history of physics. Finally, I will address an issue that is central in the current philosophical debate, namely the relation between understanding and knowledge, and the question of whether truth is a necessary condition for understanding.

Biography

Hendrik Willem De Regt is a Full Professor of Philosophy of Natural Sciences at the  Institute of Science in Society, Faculty of Science, Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands. His areas of specialization are general philosophy of science, foundations of physics, and history of modern physics. His research centers around the theme of 'understanding': he has investigated the nature of scientific understanding, as it is produced by expert scientists, via philosophical analysis and historical case studies. This has led to the development of a contextual theory of scientific understanding that acknowledges the historical and disciplinary variation in criteria for understanding. His work on scientific understanding has culminated in the monograph 'Understanding Scientific Understanding' (Oxford University Press, 2017), which received the Lakatos Award in 2019. In his future research, he wants to extend the analysis of understanding to questions regarding the interaction between science and society, such as public understanding of science, the nature of expertise, and inter- and transdisciplinary communication and understanding.

往期回顾：

编辑 / 张晏梁、姚文丽

海报 / 刘灿威

审核 / 吴东颖