Humboldt University of Berlin Philosophy Term Paper Winter Term 2008/09 Newton’s Experimentum Crucis from a Constructivist Point of View Author: Philipp Kanschik Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Olaf Müller Student No.: 522919 Institute for Philosophy Address: Jonasstraße 28 Humboldt University 12053 Berlin of Berlin Germany Phone: 0049 30 29045786 E-mail:
[email protected] Date of completion: April 3rd, 2009 Table of Content 1. Introduction: Science and Reality 4 2. Simon Schaffer's Constructivist Approach 7 2.1 Realism and Constructivism 7 2.2 Leviathan and the Air-Pump 10 3. Facts and Theory in Newton's Letter from 1672 17 3.1 Facts 17 3.2 Theory 20 3.3 What Does the Experimentum Crucis Prove? 21 4. Newton's Experimentum Crucis from a Constructivist 25 Point of View 4.1 Evaluating Experimental Matters of Fact 25 4.2 Material Technology: Prisms as an Experimental 27 Instrument 4.3 Literary Technology: Newton's Overconfidence 31 4.4 Social Technology: Newton's Authority 35 5. Conclusion and Outlook: What Schaffer Should 40 Have Done Appendix 43 References 46 2 I, Philipp Kanschik, hereby declare this work to be my own, that I have acknowledged all the sources I have consulted in the paper itself and not only in the bibliography, that all wording unaccompanied by a reference is my own, and that no part of this essay can be found on the internet. I acknowledge that this paper has not been handed in at another university in order to obtain an academic degree. Signature 3 1. Introduction: Science and Reality Being skeptical about reality has become easy.