Pierre Duhem

Quotes

• “« La Logique peut être patiente, car elle est éternelle. »("Logic can be patient because it is eternal.")ibid. p. 150”
• “[U]n symbole n'est, à proprement parler, ni vrai, ni faux; il est plus ou moins bien choisi pour signifier la réalité qu'il représente, il la figure d'une manière plus ou moins précise, plus ou moins détaillée...”
• “A physical theory reputed to be satisfactory by the sectarians of one metaphysical school will be rejected by the partisans of another school.”
• “Agreement with experiment is the sole criteria of truth for a physical theory.”
• “The one who contributed most to break down the barrier between physical method and metaphysical method, and to confound their domains, so clearly distinguished in the Aristotelian philosophy, was surely Descartes.”
• “Every time people cite a principle of theoretical physics in support of a metaphysical doctrine or physical dogma, they commit a mistake, for they attribute to this principle a meaning not its own, an import not belonging to it.”

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Key facts

Born

Pierre Maurice Marie Duhem , ( 1861-06-09 ) 9 June 1861, Paris, France

Died

14 September 1916 (1916-09-14) (aged 55), Cabrespine , France

Education

École Normale Supérieure ( licentiate , 1884) University of Paris (doctorate, 1888)

Known for

Clausius–Duhem inequality , Gibbs–Duhem equation , Duhem–Margules equation , Duhem–Quine thesis , Confirmation holism , Thermodynamic potential , Energeticism , Historical epistemology , Conventionalism

Fields

Thermodynamics , philosophy of science , history of science

Institutions

University of Bordeaux

Thesis

De l'aimantation par influence (1888)

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Image

Pierre Duhem.jpg

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