The Center for Philosophy of Science is an academic center located at the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The university is composed of seventeen undergraduate and graduate schools and colle ...

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, second-most populous city in Pennsylvania (after Philadelphia) and the List of Un ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...

, dedicated to research in the

philosophy of science Philosophy of science is the branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and implications of science. Amongst its central questions are the difference between science and non-science, the reliability of scientific theories, ...

. The center was founded by

Adolf Grünbaum Adolf Grünbaum (; ; May 15, 1923 – November 15, 2018) was a German-American philosopher of science and a critic of both psychoanalysis and Karl Popper's philosophy of science. He was the first Andrew Mellon Professor of Philosophy at the Unive ...

in 1960. The current director of the center is Edouard Machery.

Overview

Currently, the center hosts the Visiting Fellows Program, the Postdoctoral Fellowship Program, the Senior Visiting Fellows program, and the Annual Lecture Series. Additionally, every four years the center hosts the International Fellows Conference for current and former fellows. In 2001, in conjunction with the University Library System, the Center created and operates PhilSci-Archive (philsci-archive.pitt.edu), a preprint server for professional work in philosophy of science. The center has international partnerships with the

University of Konstanz The University of Konstanz () is a university in the city of Konstanz in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Its main campus was opened on the Gießberg in 1972 after being founded in 1966. The university is Germany's southernmost university and is ...

, the

University of Athens The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA; , ''Ethnikó kai Kapodistriakó Panepistímio Athinón''), usually referred to simply as the University of Athens (UoA), is a public university in Athens, Greece, with various campuses alo ...

, the

National Technical University of Athens The National (Metsovian) Technical University of Athens (NTUA; , ''National Metsovian Polytechnic''), sometimes known as Athens Polytechnic, a university in Athens, Greece. It is named in honor of its benefactors Nikolaos Stournaris, Eleni Tosi ...

, the

University of A Coruña The University of A Coruña () is a Spanish public university located in the city of A Coruña, Galicia. Established in 1989, university departments are divided between two primary campuses in A Coruña and nearby Ferrol. The A Coruña campus i ...

, the

University of Catania The University of Catania () is a university located in Catania, Sicily. Founded in 1434, it is the oldest university in Sicily, the 13th oldest in Italy, and the 29th oldest in the world. With over 38,000 enrolled students, it is the largest uni ...

, and

Tsinghua University Tsinghua University (THU) is a public university in Haidian, Beijing, China. It is affiliated with and funded by the Ministry of Education of China. The university is part of Project 211, Project 985, and the Double First-Class Constructio ...

. In 2016, John D. Norton stepped down after a ten-year tenure as the director of the center. The current director is Edouard Machery.

History

Throughout its history, the center has been associated with a number of notable individuals from philosophy of science, including nearly 300 visiting professors from more than 30 countries. The center's inaugural Annual Lecture Series included lectures from the noted philosophers Paul K. Feyerabend,

Carl Gustav Hempel Carl Gustav "Peter" Hempel (; ; January 8, 1905 – November 9, 1997) was a German writer, philosopher, logician, and epistemologist. He was a major figure in Logical positivism, logical empiricism, a 20th-century movement in the philosophy ...

Ernest Nagel Ernest Nagel (; ; November 16, 1901 – September 20, 1985) was an American philosopher of science. Suppes, Patrick (1999)Biographical memoir of Ernest Nagel In '' American National Biograph''y (Vol. 16, pp. 216-218). New York: Oxford University ...

, Michael Scriven, and

Wilfrid Sellars Wilfrid Stalker Sellars (; May 20, 1912 – July 2, 1989) was an American philosopher and prominent developer of critical realism who "revolutionized both the content and the method of philosophy in the United States". His work has had a profou ...

. Later Annual Lecture Series participants include

Herbert Feigl Herbert Feigl (; ; December 14, 1902 – June 1, 1988) was an Austrian- American philosopher and an early member of the Vienna Circle. He coined the term " nomological danglers". Biography The son of a trained weaver who became a textile designer ...

Norwood Russell Hanson Norwood Russell Hanson (August 17, 1924 – April 18, 1967) was an American philosopher of science. Hanson was a pioneer in advancing the argument that observation is theory-laden — that observation language and theory language are deeply in ...

Philip Morrison Philip Morrison (November 7, 1915 – April 22, 2005) was a professor of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is known for his work on the Manhattan Project during World War II, and for his later work in quantum physic ...

Hilary Putnam Hilary Whitehall Putnam (; July 31, 1926 – March 13, 2016) was an American philosopher, mathematician, computer scientist, and figure in analytic philosophy in the second half of the 20th century. He contributed to the studies of philosophy of ...

, and

George Wald George Wald (November 18, 1906 – April 12, 1997) was an American scientist and activist who studied pigments in the retina. He won a share of the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Haldan Keffer Hartline and Ragnar Granit. In ...

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...

–winning economist

Alvin E. Roth Alvin Eliot Roth (born December 18, 1951) is an American academic. He is the Craig and Susan McCaw professor of economics at Stanford University and the George Gund (philanthropist), Gund professor of economics and business administration emeri ...

once served as a fellow in the center.

Associated people

Alan Ross Anderson Alan Ross Anderson (1925–1973) was an American logician and professor of philosophy at Yale University and the University of Pittsburgh. A frequent collaborator with Nuel Belnap, Anderson was instrumental in the development of relevance ...

Robert Brandom Robert Boyce Brandom (; born March 13, 1950) is an American philosopher who teaches at the University of Pittsburgh. He works primarily in philosophy of language, philosophy of mind and philosophical logic, and his academic output manifests both s ...

John Earman John Earman (born 1942) is an American philosopher of physics. He is an emeritus professor in the History and Philosophy of Science department at the University of Pittsburgh. He has also taught at the University of California, Los Angeles, Ro ...

Associate Director (1 July 1988 – 31 Aug 1997); Interim Director (1 Sept 2005 – 31 Dec 2005) *

Director (1 Sept 1960 – 30 June 1978) *

James G. Lennox James G. Lennox (born January 11, 1948) is an emeritus professor in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh, United States, with secondary appointments in the departments of Classics and Philosophy. He i ...

Director (1 Sept 1997 – 31 Aug 2005)
John D. Norton
Director (1 Jan 2006 – 31 Aug 2016) * Sandra Mitchell *

Nicholas Rescher Nicholas Rescher (; ; 15 July 1928 – 5 January 2024) was a German-born American philosopher, polymath, and author, who was a professor of philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh from 1961. He was chairman of the Center for Philosophy of Sc ...

Associate Director (1 Sept 1961 – 31 Aug 1981); Director (1 Sep 1981 – 31 Aug 1988) *

Fellow; Awarded the

Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, officially the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (), commonly referred to as the Nobel Prize in Economics(), is an award in the field of economic sciences adminis ...

(2012) *

References

External links

*
PhilSci-Archive
{{Authority control

Center for Philosophy of Science The Center for Philosophy of Science is an academic center located at the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, dedicated to research in the philosophy of science. The center was founded by Adolf Grünbaum in 1960. The current dire ...

Research institutes established in 1960 Philosophy of science Philosophy academics 1960 establishments in Pennsylvania