Conceptual Systems

Now in paperback at https://www.routledge.com/products/9781138971455 Conceptual Systems Harold I. Brown The central concern of this book is to understand how radically new concepts are introduced into our thinking while maintaining sufficient continuity with older concepts to ensure intelligibility. It is argued that the introduction of new concepts and abandonment of older concepts are persistent features of human thought as we discover new phenomena and reexamine familiar phenomena because of developments in science, technology, and society. The book provides a general account of the nature of concepts, with particular emphasis on the development of scientific concepts. After a general introduction to the project, the book provides several case studies of conceptual change that serve as a working database. This is followed by critical studies of several influential theories of concepts, and the construction of a new theory that begins from the work of Wilfrid Sellars. Detailed studies of causation and of the concepts appropriate for describing and evaluating our epistemic situation and achievements follow. These studies lead to an account of philosophical analysis as the exploration of alternative conceptual systems, and the conclusion that it is an empirical question which concepts are appropriate for understanding particular bodies of discourse or domains of the natural world. Two new studies of conceptual change in physics follow: developments in the seventeenth century from Galileo to Descartes to Newton; and the conceptual framework of the “standard model” in late-twentieth-century high-energy physics. These studies illustrate how the theory of concepts developed in the book can guide historical studies. They also provide further tests of the adequacy of this theory. The book ends with a reexamination of two central themes in philosophy of science: incommensurability and scientific

progress. The book thus offers a theory of concepts, detailed studies of conceptual systems, a new view of conceptual analysis, and a framework that can guide studies of conceptual variation and innovation over time and across cultures. Contents 1. Studying Concepts 2. Conceptual Journeys 3. Some Theories of Concepts 4. Sellars: Expositions, Interpretation, Critique 5. Reconstruction 6. Clarifications, Responses, Refinements 7. Conceptual Analysis I: Causation 8. Conceptual Analysis II: Epistemic Concepts 9. Historical Studies I: Seventeenth-Century Physics 10. Historical Studies II: Interactions 11. Conceptual Change, Incommensurability, and Progress