Explaining Science

Explaining Science PDF Author: Ronald N. Giere
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226292037
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 345

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Book Description
"This volume presents an attempt to construct a unified cognitive theory of science in relatively short compass. It confronts the strong program in sociology of science and the positions of various postpositivist philosophers of science, developing significant alternatives to each in a reeadily comprehensible sytle. It draws loosely on recent developments in cognitive science, without burdening the argument with detailed results from that source. . . . The book is thus a provocative one. Perhaps that is a measure of its value: it will lead scholars and serious student from a number of science studies disciplines into continued and sharpened debate over fundamental questions."—Richard Burian, Isis "The writing is delightfully clear and accessible. On balance, few books advance our subject as well."—Paul Teller, Philosophy of Science

Explaining Science

Explaining Science PDF Author: Ronald N. Giere
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226292037
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 345

Get Book Here

Book Description
"This volume presents an attempt to construct a unified cognitive theory of science in relatively short compass. It confronts the strong program in sociology of science and the positions of various postpositivist philosophers of science, developing significant alternatives to each in a reeadily comprehensible sytle. It draws loosely on recent developments in cognitive science, without burdening the argument with detailed results from that source. . . . The book is thus a provocative one. Perhaps that is a measure of its value: it will lead scholars and serious student from a number of science studies disciplines into continued and sharpened debate over fundamental questions."—Richard Burian, Isis "The writing is delightfully clear and accessible. On balance, few books advance our subject as well."—Paul Teller, Philosophy of Science

Making Sense of Science

Making Sense of Science PDF Author: Steven Yearley
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 9780803986923
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 230

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Book Description
This volume demystifies science studies and bridges the divide between social theory and the sociology of science.

The Science of Interstellar

The Science of Interstellar PDF Author: Kip Thorne
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393351386
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 560

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Book Description
A journey through the otherworldly science behind Christopher Nolan’s award-winning film, Interstellar, from executive producer and Nobel Prize-winning physicist Kip Thorne. Interstellar, from acclaimed filmmaker Christopher Nolan, takes us on a fantastic voyage far beyond our solar system. Yet in The Science of Interstellar, Kip Thorne, the Nobel prize-winning physicist who assisted Nolan on the scientific aspects of Interstellar, shows us that the movie’s jaw-dropping events and stunning, never-before-attempted visuals are grounded in real science. Thorne shares his experiences working as the science adviser on the film and then moves on to the science itself. In chapters on wormholes, black holes, interstellar travel, and much more, Thorne’s scientific insights—many of them triggered during the actual scripting and shooting of Interstellar—describe the physical laws that govern our universe and the truly astounding phenomena that those laws make possible. Interstellar and all related characters and elements are trademarks of and © Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (s14).

The Curves of Life

The Curves of Life PDF Author: Theodore Andrea Cook
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Aesthetics
Languages : en
Pages : 520

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Book Description


Teaching for Conceptual Understanding in Science

Teaching for Conceptual Understanding in Science PDF Author: Richard Konicek-Moran
Publisher: Corwin
ISBN: 9781938946103
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
What do you get when you bring together two of NSTA’s bestselling authors to ponder ways to deepen students’ conceptual understanding of science? A fascinating combination of deep thinking about science teaching, field-tested strategies you can use in your classroom immediately, and personal vignettes all educators can relate to and apply themselves. Teaching for Conceptual Understanding in Science is by Richard Konicek-Moran, a researcher and professor who wrote the Everyday Science Mysteries series, and Page Keeley, a practitioner and teacher educator who writes the Uncovering Student Ideas in Science series. Written in an appealing, conversational style, this new book explores where science education has been and where it’s going; emphasizes how knowing the history and nature of science can help you engage in teaching for conceptual understanding and conceptual change; stresses the importance of formative assessment as a pathway to conceptual change; and provides a bridge between research and practice. This is the kind of thought-provoking book that can truly change the way you teach. Whether you read each chapter in sequence or start by browsing the topics in the vignettes, Konicek-Moran and Keeley will make you think—really think—about the major goal of science education in the 21st century: to help students understand science at the conceptual level so they can see its connections to other fields, other concepts, and their own lives.

Explaining Science's Success

Explaining Science's Success PDF Author: John Wright
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317544897
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 206

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Book Description
Paul Feyeraband famously asked, what's so great about science? One answer is that it has been surprisingly successful in getting things right about the natural world, more successful than non-scientific or pre-scientific systems, religion or philosophy. Science has been able to formulate theories that have successfully predicted novel observations. It has produced theories about parts of reality that were not observable or accessible at the time those theories were first advanced, but the claims about those inaccessible areas have since turned out to be true. And science has, on occasion, advanced on more or less a priori grounds theories that subsequently turned out to be highly empirically successful. In this book the philosopher of science, John Wright delves deep into science's methodology to offer an explanation for this remarkable success story.

Explaining Science in the Classroom

Explaining Science in the Classroom PDF Author: Jon Ogborn
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Education (UK)
ISBN: 0335232442
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
"This is an impressive book. It is an example of that rare item - a book about complex scientific ideas, expressed in clear, simple language - built on real teacher - learner conversations. Starting in the classroom, or the laboratory, with the most common occurence - a teacher offering an explanation, it proceeds by analysing the nature of specific explanations so that teachers can gain fuller insights into what is happening. Having teased out the processes of explanation, the authors then reconstruct them showing how elaboration, transformation and demonstration can enhance the understanding of the learner." Professor Peter Mortimore * How do science teachers explain science to students? * What makes explanations work? Is explaining science just an art, or can it be described, taught and learned? That is the question posed by this book. From extensive classroom observations, the authors give vivid descriptions of how teachers explain science to students, and provide their account with a sound theoretical basis. Attention is given to the ways in which needs for explanation are generated, how the strange new entities of science - from genes to electrons - are created through talk and action, how knowledge is transformed to become explainable, and how demonstrations link explanation and reality. Different styles of explanation are illustrated, from the 'teller of tales' to those who ask students to 'say it my way'. Explaining Science in the Classroom is a new and exciting departure in science education. It brings together science educators and specialists in discourse and communication, to reach a new synthesis of ideas. The book offers science teachers very practical help and insight.

The Knowledge Machine: How Irrationality Created Modern Science

The Knowledge Machine: How Irrationality Created Modern Science PDF Author: Michael Strevens
Publisher: Liveright Publishing
ISBN: 1631491385
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 368

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Book Description
“The Knowledge Machine is the most stunningly illuminating book of the last several decades regarding the all-important scientific enterprise.” —Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, author of Plato at the Googleplex A paradigm-shifting work, The Knowledge Machine revolutionizes our understanding of the origins and structure of science. • Why is science so powerful? • Why did it take so long—two thousand years after the invention of philosophy and mathematics—for the human race to start using science to learn the secrets of the universe? In a groundbreaking work that blends science, philosophy, and history, leading philosopher of science Michael Strevens answers these challenging questions, showing how science came about only once thinkers stumbled upon the astonishing idea that scientific breakthroughs could be accomplished by breaking the rules of logical argument. Like such classic works as Karl Popper’s The Logic of Scientific Discovery and Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, The Knowledge Machine grapples with the meaning and origins of science, using a plethora of vivid historical examples to demonstrate that scientists willfully ignore religion, theoretical beauty, and even philosophy to embrace a constricted code of argument whose very narrowness channels unprecedented energy into empirical observation and experimentation. Strevens calls this scientific code the iron rule of explanation, and reveals the way in which the rule, precisely because it is unreasonably close-minded, overcomes individual prejudices to lead humanity inexorably toward the secrets of nature. “With a mixture of philosophical and historical argument, and written in an engrossing style” (Alan Ryan), The Knowledge Machine provides captivating portraits of some of the greatest luminaries in science’s history, including Isaac Newton, the chief architect of modern science and its foundational theories of motion and gravitation; William Whewell, perhaps the greatest philosopher-scientist of the early nineteenth century; and Murray Gell-Mann, discoverer of the quark. Today, Strevens argues, in the face of threats from a changing climate and global pandemics, the idiosyncratic but highly effective scientific knowledge machine must be protected from politicians, commercial interests, and even scientists themselves who seek to open it up, to make it less narrow and more rational—and thus to undermine its devotedly empirical search for truth. Rich with illuminating and often delightfully quirky illustrations, The Knowledge Machine, written in a winningly accessible style that belies the import of its revisionist and groundbreaking concepts, radically reframes much of what we thought we knew about the origins of the modern world.

Explaining Understanding

Explaining Understanding PDF Author: Stephen R. Grimm
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317414160
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 534

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Book Description
What does it mean to understand something? What types of understanding can be distinguished? Is understanding always provided by explanations? And how is it related to knowledge? Such questions have attracted considerable interest in epistemology recently. These discussions, however, have not yet engaged insights about explanations and theories developed in philosophy of science. Conversely, philosophers of science have debated the nature of explanations and theories, while dismissing understanding as a psychological by-product. In this book, epistemologists and philosophers of science together address basic questions about the nature of understanding, providing a new overview of the field. False theories, cognitive bias, transparency, coherency, and other important issues are discussed. Its 15 original chapters are essential reading for researchers and graduate students interested in the current debates about understanding.

Aspects of Teaching Secondary Science

Aspects of Teaching Secondary Science PDF Author: Sandra Amos
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134508808
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
A key new textbook which is part of a new series co-published with The Open University Written to be used in conjunction with its counterpart in the Teaching in the Secondary School series. Between them they address both the theoretical and practical issues in science teaching Examples of good practice are underpinned by reference to research and other literature