lew@ihuxr.UUCP (Lew Mammel, Jr.) (11/08/84)
Last summer I read (most of) THE COPERNICAN REVOLUTION, by Thomas S. Kuhn, who is more famous lately for his later work, THE NATURE OF SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTIONS (title may not be exact.) One particular remark of Kuhn's in the former work caused me to wonder about the general acclaim that his ideas enjoy. Quoting ( re: Law of freely falling bodies ): Galileo himself got the law not from observation, at least not from new observation, but by a chain of logical arguments like those we shall examine in the next chapter. Probably he did not perform the experiment at the tower of Pisa. That was performed by one of his critics, and the result supported Aristotle. The heavy body did hit the ground first. Mark you, "... the result supported Aristotle." Now let's see what our Academician has to say on this point. From TWO NEW SCIENCES: SIMP. Your discussion is really admirable; yet I do not find it easy to believe that a bird-shot falls as swiftly as a cannon ball. SALV. Why not say a grain of sand as rapidly as a grindstone? But, Simplicio, I trust you will not follow the example of many others who divert the discuyssion from its main intent and fasten upon some statement of mine which lacks a hair's-breadth of the truth and, under this hair, hide the fault of another which is as big as a ship's cable. Aristotle says that "an iron ball of one hundred pounds falling from a height of one hundred cubits reaches the ground before a one-pound ball has fallen a single cubit." I say that they arrive at the same time. You find, on making the experiment that the larger outstrips the smaller by two finger-breadths, that is, when the larger has reached the ground, the other is short of it by two finger-breadths; now you would not hide behind these two fingers the ninety-nine cubits of Aristotle, nor would you mention my small error and at the same time pass over in silence his very large one. This admonition seems almost presciently directed at Kuhn. I find it amazing that this renowned scholar made such a gaffe. I appreciate the trend in historical scholarship to avoid lionizing certain heros, and to see their achievements in their contemporary context, but it seems that Kuhn presumes too much in thinking that his moderninity automatically gives him a vantage point over Galileo. The Dover edition of TWO NEW SCIENCES, translated by Henry Crew and Alfonso De Salvio, appropriately quotes Benjamin Franklin on the title page: I think with your friend that it has been of late too much the mode to slight the learning of the ancients. Lew Mammel, Jr. ihnp4!ihuxr!lew