ON HACKING’S ‘STYLE(S) OF
THINKING’:
A TWO-DAY WORKSHOP TO BE HELD
AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN ON 30 - 31
MARCH 2011
Keynote Speaker:
Professor Ian Hacking
Focus
This workshop, which coincides
with Professor Hacking’s 75th birthday, aims to
explore the philosophical significance
of his suggestion that there are distinct Styles of Thinking
in the sciences.
Conference Programme
Conference Abstracts
Attending the workshop
In addition to those presenting
a paper, there are a limited number of spaces available for
those wishing to participate in the workshop. The workshop
fee (including refreshments, light lunches and the workshop
dinner) is R 300.00. We especially want to encourage
postgraduate students to attend the workshop, and we have
secured funding which will allow us to waive the workshop
fee for a limited number of postgraduate attendees. This
will be done on a ‘first-come, first-served’ basis. Should
you wish to occupy one such place, please email the
conference
organisers no later than 15th of March 2011.
Conference fee payments should be made
to:
Account holder: University of Cape Town
Name of bank: Standard Bank of SA Ltd
Branch: Rondebosch
Branch code: 02 50 09 11
Account number: 071 503 854
Once payment is made please
email a copy of your deposit slip to:
Cindy Gilbert.
Theme 1: Styles of Thinking
A Style of Thinking is in part
constituted by specific methods of reasoning, new kinds of
sentences and specific objects of study, where methods,
sentences and objects are all intimately interrelated. By a
method of reasoning, we mean a distinctive way of
finding things out that is grounded in cognitive human
capacities, has emerged at distinct moments in human history
and has evolved in stable and historically traceable ways.
By new kinds of sentences, we mean new candidates for
being true-or-false which come into being with the new style
of thinking. By an object of study, we mean a
distinct class of objects of study introduced by that method
of reasoning. One example of a style of reasoning in this
sense is that of a taxonomic style of thinking: the
methods of reasoning involve the ordering of difference
and variation in terms of some form of hierarchic structure,
the new sentences are those involving claims about
such species and genera and their connections and the
objects of study include the species and genera of
systematic biology.
The suggestion that there are
distinct styles of thinking raises a number of issues of
potential philosophical interest, which can be grouped into
three different categories.
-
The first category
aims at clarifying the terms of the suggestion itself.
Questions include: How should we distinguish one style of
thinking from another? How does the notion of a style differ
(if at all) from similar ideas, such as the Kuhnian
disciplinary matrix or Lakatosian research programme? What
is the best way of characterising the interrelation between
method, new sorts of sentences and objects of study?
-
The second
category focuses on (purportedly) extant styles of
reasoning. Questions include: How many extant styles of
thinking can be identified? What possible interrelations can
there be between these extant styles? Can the notion of
styles of thinking be extended beyond styles of scientific
thinking? If so, what examples are there?
-
The third category
explores the possible philosophical ramifications of these
claims. Questions include: Does the notion of a style of
reasoning change or undermine the way we think of
traditional ontological disputes in the philosophy of
science, concerning species, unobservables, and other
objects which appear to be products of these styles? Does
talk of historically-contingent styles of thinking
inevitably lead to a form of relativism? Are there forms of
thinking that do not fall under a style or that are not
historically contingent?
Theme 2: Hacking’s Style of
Thinking
A common thread running through
the many varied areas that Hacking has explored is the
explicit focus on the historical conditions surrounding the
emergence and development of a target concept. He is clear
that this attention to historical detail is not an exercise
in history per se, but a way of grappling with philosophical
problems by understanding how they became possible, as a
‘historicised conception of British 1930s philosophical
analysis’.
Obvious questions abound,
including:
- In terms of methodology, how
does this approach differ from related approaches – such
as those falling under the heading of Genealogies? How
central is the role played by actual history, as opposed
to imaginary narratives for example, in such a
methodology? What criteria are there for assessing the
success of such narratives, and do these differ from the
criteria used to judge good history? How does this
differ from so-called ‘Whig-histories’, and what
precisely is wrong with the latter?
- In terms of philosophical
import, how may an understanding of the history of a
concept serve to resolve philosophical disputes and can
such a resolution ever serve to favour one side? Must
attention to historicity reveal the contingency and
indeterminateness of conceptual norms? Is philosophical
theorising that fails to pay attention to history
problematic, or is this just one approach to philosophy
amongst many?
Workshop Organizers:
Jack Ritchie & Jeremy Wanderer
