Faculty of Arts & Science 2011-2012 Calendar

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History and Philosophy of Science and Technology

Faculty

The History and Philosophy of Science and Technology (HPST) is committed to the study of science and tech-nology (including mathematics and medicine) as historically significant in themselves, as integral components of the general development of knowledge, and as conceptually and theoretically rich domains for philosophical analysis. The programs of study offered by IHPST reflect the Institute’s commitment to interdisciplinarity. These programs require of their students a first-hand knowledge of scientific practice, but also require them to engage in the study of philosophy, history and the important place of science in both. HPS courses in Philosophy of Science engage with the structure of science, its methods, its special claims to the production of knowledge. HPS courses specifically in the History of Science and Technology seek to synthesise the study of science, its history and its place in history. Advanced students in the Major undertake a directed research project into the history or philosophy of science.

Students pursuing a program of study in the history and philosophy of science will find themselves ideally suited to any professional or academic context that requires an understanding of the relation between the sciences and the humanities. These may include, but are not restricted to, medicine, law, journalism, and education. Fur-thermore, the study of the history and philosophy of science furnishes students with a battery of analytic and critical tools with which to approach a wide range of interdisciplinary endeavours.

Director of Undergraduate Studies:
Professor D. Walsh, Victoria College, Room 316A (416-978-5847)
Email: denis.walsh@utoronto.ca

Enquiries:
Victoria College, Room 316 (416-978-5397)

History and Philosophy of Science and Technology Programs

Enrolment in this program requires the completion of 4.0 courses.

(7.5 FCEs, including at least 2.0 FCEs at the 300+level, 0.5 of which must be at the 400-level)

First year:
1. HPS100H1
2. 1.0 100+level FCE in any natural or social science (including MAT and STA courses), excluding courses for non science students.

Higher years:
3. HPS200H1, HPS210H1, HPS211H1, HPS250H1, HPS201H1 or HPS202H1
4.  0.5 FCE from: PHL245H1, PHL246H1, HPS390H1 or HPS391H1
5.  1.0 100+level FCE in History
6.  1.0 200+level in Science, including 0.5 at the 300+level (These courses should be in the same area)
7.  0.5 FCE from HPS300+ level courses, JHE353H1, JHE355H1, PHL355H1, PHL356H1, PHL357H1
8.  0.5 FCE from Special Research Opportunities (HPS481H1, HPS482H1, HPS483H1, HPS484H1, HPS485H1) or Independent Studies course HPS495Y1

Enrolment in this program requires the completion of 4.0 courses.

(4 FCEs including at least one FCE at the 300+level)

1.  HPS100H1
2.  0.5 FCE from: HPS200H1, HPS201H1, HPS202H1, HPS210H1, HPS211H1, HPS250H1, SMC230Y1, SMC231Y1
3.  An additional 3.0 FCEs from: any HPS course, JHE353, JHE355H1, PHL356H1 PHL357H1

History and Philosophy of Science and Technology Courses

The 199Y1 and 199H1 seminars are designed to provide the opportunity to work closely with an instructor in a class of no more than twenty-four students. These interactive seminars are intended to stimulate the students’ curiosity and provide an opportunity to get to know a member of the professorial staff in a seminar environment during the first year of study. Details here.

An investigation of some pivotal periods in the history of science with an emphasis on the influences of philosophy on the scientists of the period, and the philosophical and social implications of the scientific knowledge, theory and methodology that emerged.

An introduction to issues at the interface of science and society. Including the reciprocal influence of science and social norms, the relation of science and religion, dissemination of scientific knowledge, science and policy. Issues may include: Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Weapons; Genetic Engineering; The Human Genome Project; Climate Change.

Technology and its place in our culture from Antiquity to the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution. Relations between technology and science, religion, the arts, social institutions, and political beliefs.

A survey of technical change and its social implications from the Industrial Revolution to the present.

Case studies in the history of science from antiquity to 1800, including the revolutionary work of Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Descartes, Newton, Linnaeus, Lavoisier, and Herschel. The course is designed to be accessible to science students and non-scientists alike.

Case studies in the history of science from 1800 to 2000, including Volta, Lyell, Darwin, Mendel, Einstein, Schrdinger, Watson, and Crick. The course is designed to be accessible to science students and non-scientists alike

This course traces the use of geometry and algebra in the evolution of physics and astronomy from around 1310 to 1690. It examines the conceptual foundations of geometry, algebra, analytic geometry and the differential calculus and their use in understanding the physical world. No prior mathematical knowledge is presupposed.

An examination epistemological and logical aspects of medical science. Topics may include anecdote, bias, complexity, evidence, expertise, heuristics, phronesis, placebos, plausibility, probability, randomness, statistics and uncertainty.

This course introduces and explores central issues in the philosophy of science, including scientific inference, method, and explanation. Topics may include underdetermination, realism and empiricism, and laws of nature.

Credit course for supervised participation in faculty research project. Details here.

Topics vary year to year.

An examination of the tools of war in the Western world from the Middle Ages to World War II, including not only weapons but the means of transportation, communication, and organization used in violent conflict. The effects of war on the development of science and technology.

The history of human control of various sources of energy, including technical developments, scientific theories, and impact on culture and society. Recent debates on fossil fuel and nuclear power examined in historical context.

The systemic nature of modern technology suggests that it has intimate interactions with society, human values, ideologies, and the economy. We will attempt to examine these interactions in history in order to promote reflection on ways in which technology and its evolution could be managed for the benefit of humankind.

Topics in the history of physics from antiquity to the 20th century, including Aristotelian physics, Galileo, Descartes, electromagnetism, thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, relativity, quantum physics, and particle physics. The development of theories in their intellectual and cultural contexts.

The emergence of the modern discipline of chemistry from 1785 to 1939. Seminar discussions focus on key papers of important Historical analysis of the interplay between theory and practice, and of the dynamics of scientific communities

A history of the science and technology of electricity in the 19th and 20th centuries in its social, economic, and cultural context.

A survey of medical theory and practice from Antiquity to the Renaissance, with emphasis on medicines social, cultural and political setting.

A survey of medical theory and practice from the 17th century to the modern welfare state, with emphasis on medicines social, cultural and political setting.

Personally and socially, we experience illness as a narrative. Narratives of health and illness have been constructed and interpreted from the early modern period to the present. The continuities and discontinuities that characterize the structure of these stories over time, and what narratives reveal about historical realities will be explored.

This course seeks to understand the nature of engineering practice, which comprises complex social, intellectual, and technical actions at various stages from design to entrepreneurship.  Building upon the history and social studies of technology, philosophy of engineering, business history, and management science, we introduce ways to analyze such complex actions.

A survey of the history of and recent developments in the scientific study of complex systems and emergent order. There will be particular emphasis on the biological and cognitive sciences. Topics covered may include: mechanism and teleology in the history of science, 19th and 20th century emergentism, complex systems dynamics, order and adaptiveness, self-organisation in biology and congitive development.

Historical examination of the interactions of science (both as body of knowledge and as enterprise) with ideological, political and social issues. The impact of science; attacks on and critiques of scientific expertise as background to contemporary conflicts. Subjects may vary according to students interests.

From its origins in the Renaissance, modern science has developed in the context of European religious beliefs and institutions. Although cases of conflict like Galileo or the Monkey Trial are famous, more common are cases of scientists like Newton or Faraday whose religious convictions were crucial to their scientific success.

Computing technology from Chaldean astronomy to the advent of British and U.S. mass production of electronic mainframes in 1953. Emphasis will be on uses and users, especially on great figures from Babbage through von Neumann, but hardware descriptions will also be featured.

Covers the period from mass production in 1953 to the emergence of minicomputers around 1969. Beginnings of software and services industries, networking, university computer science. Emphasis on international developments.

An investigation into the nature and development of scientific knowledge, inspired by Kuhns notion of revolutions. Topics may include, the rationality of theory choice, and social constructivism.

This course explores central developments, ongoing controversies, and major figures in the social sciences: sociology, economics, political science, anthropology, and the behavioral sciences. It concentrates on such prominent individuals as: Rene Descartes, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Adam Smith, Karl Marx, Franz Boas, Sigmund Freud, and Gunnar Myrdal.

An examination of major ideas about biological evolution from the 18th century to the 1930s and of their impact on scientific and social thought. Topics include the diversity of life and its classification, the adaptation of organisms to their environment, Wallace’s and Darwin’s views on evolution by natural selection, sexual selection, inheritance from Mendel to T.H. Morgan, eugenics, and the implications of evolution for religion, gender roles, and the organization of society.

An examination of ideas about biological evolution from the 1930s to the present. Topics include the Modern Synthesis, population genetics, the concept of biological species, ecology, sociobiology, and creationism.

Conceptions of the universe since 1800 with attention to observational sources of changing ideas. History of large telescopes, stellar spectroscopy and radio astronomy. Relativistic conceptions of space and time, models of stellar evolution, discovery of extra-galactic nebulae, Hubble red-shift and microwave background radiation. Philosophical and religious implications are examined.

First part of a series on the history of science and technology in the Islamic world. History of the exact sciences, including mathematics, astronomy, optics, and cartography.

Second part of a series on the history of science and technology in the Islamic world. History of biological and life sciences, including history of medicine, botany, agriculture, and alchemy.

A survey of ancient, medieval, and early modern mathematics with emphasis on historical issues. (Offered in alternate years)

A survey of the development of mathematics from 1700 to the present with emphasis on historical issues. (Offered in alternate years)

An historical survey from pre-Greek to the present. Various themes are emphasized year to year, to show mathematics as changing and evolving. A student could expect to gain an historical overview as well as a sense of the unity of the mathematical sciences.

An examination of foundational and conceptual aspects of mathematics such as: the nature of mathematical objects, logicism, Church’s elementalistic mathematics, Gödel’s theorem and formal systems, postulational methods, mathematics and reality, the cardinal, ordinal and abstract approaches to numbers, infinity, and Euclidean and non-Euclidean geometries.

Advanced level survey of biological science from ancient Greece to the 20th century emphasizing primary sources analyses.

The development of chemistry from the Chemical Revolution of Lavoisier to the periodic table of Mendeleev: electro-chemistry, the rise of organic chemistry, classification, valency, structural chemistry.

An advanced survey of the history of technology from Antiquity to the Industrial Revolution.

An advanced survey of the history of technology from the Industrial Revolution to modern times.

Complex nature of the scientific method; connection between theory, concepts and experimental data; insufficiency of reductionism; characteristics of pathological and pseudo-science; public perception and misperception of science; science and public policy; ethical issues; trends in modern science.

This course offers advanced undergraduate students the opportunity to undertake original research into the history of medi-cine, under the guidance of a faculty seminar leader and a graduate student mentor. Students are required to initiate and pur-sue a research project of their own design, culminating in a research paper.

This course offers advanced undergraduate students the opportunity to undertake original research into the history of the natu-ral or physical sciences, under the guidance of a faculty seminar leader and a graduate student mentor. Students are required to initiate and pursue a research project, culminating in a research paper.

This course offers advanced undergraduate students the opportunity to undertake original research into the history of the natu-ral or physical sciences, under the guidance of a faculty seminar leader and a graduate student mentor. Students are required to initiate and pursue a research project, culminating in a research paper.

This course offers advanced undergraduate students the opportunity to undertake original research into the history of the natu-ral or physical sciences, under the guidance of a faculty seminar leader and a graduate student mentor. Students are required to initiate and pursue a research project, culminating in a research paper.

This course offers advanced undergraduate students the opportunity to undertake original research into the history of the natu-ral or physical sciences, under the guidance of a faculty seminar leader and a graduate student mentor. Students are required to initiate and pursue a research project, culminating in a research paper.

A reading and research project in some aspect of history of science and technology, supervised by a faculty member. Projects must be approved by the Institute and are subject to availability of a faculty supervisor.

A reading and research project in some aspect of the social, cultural or intellectual history of science and technology, supervised by a faculty member. Projects must be approved by the Institute by the previous June for a Fall course or by November for a Spring course, and are subject to availability of a faculty supervisor.

A reading and research project in some aspect of the social, cultural or intellectual history of science and technology, supervised by a faculty member. Projects must be approved by the Institute by the previous June for a Fall course or by November for a Spring course, and are subject to availability of a faculty supervisor.

 A reading and research project in some aspect of the development of scientific theory or practice, supervised by a faculty member. Projects must be approved by the Institute by the previous June for a Fall course or by November for a Spring course, and are subject to availability of a faculty supervisor.

A reading and research project in some aspect of the development of scientific theory or practice, supervised by a faculty member. Projects must be approved by the Institute by the previous June for a Fall course or by November for a Spring course, and are subject to availability of a faculty supervisor.