Anthonie Meijers – Philosophy of Technology and Engineering Sciences

Автор: Anthonie Meijers
Название книги: Philosophy of Technology and Engineering Sciences
Формат: PDF
Жанр: Философия
Страницы: 1473
Качество: Изначально компьютерное, E-book

The Handbook Philosophy of Technology and Engineering Sciences addresses numerous issues in the emerging field of the philosophy of those sciences that are involved in the technological process of designing, developing and making of new technical artifacts and systems. These issues include the nature of design, of technological knowledge, and of technical artifacts, as well as the toolbox of engineers. Most of these have thus far not been analyzed in general philosophy of science, which has traditionally but inadequately regarded technology as mere applied science and focused on physics, biology, mathematics and the social sciences.

• First comprehensive philosophical handbook on technology and the engineering sciences
• Unparalleled in scope including explorative articles
• In depth discussion of technical artifacts and their ontology
• Provides extensive analysis of the nature of engineering design
• Focuses in detail on the role of models in technology

Not so very long ago most philosophers of science maintained that the subjectmatter
of this volume was uninteresting and most ontologists claimed it was nonexistent.
It was thought to be uninteresting because technology was taken to be
an applied science in which the application itself presented no new philosophical
challenges. It was believed to be non-existent, because technological artifacts and
systems did not live up to the criteria for being part of the ultimate inventory of
the world. A combination of these two views leads to the rather fatal conclusion
that the philosophy of technology and engineering sciences is boring stuff about
non-existing entities! This volume shows how completely wrong that conclusion
is.
The fact that most philosophers of science have not regarded technology or
engineering as a subject worthy of serious study clearly emerges from various wellknown
introductions, companions and anthologies. [Curd and Cover, 1998] and
[Curd and Psillos, 2008], for example, do not have a single index entry for ‘artifact’,
‘design’, ‘engineering’ or ‘technology’ in 2000 pages of philosophy of science. There
are some exceptions though, such as [Newton-Smith, 2000] which contains a small
section on the philosophy of technology.1
In analytic ontology interest in technological artifacts has also been largely lacking.
2 If such artifacts are discussed at all it is often in the context of arguments
intended to show that they do not really exist. The roots of this attitude lie in the
positivist rejection of metaphysics.3 What survived of metaphysics after positivism
focused on the fundamental concepts of the natural sciences. Basic social sciences
and humanities concepts were ignored, taken to refer to non-existing entities, or
thought to be reducible to concepts in physics. Since technological artifacts are human-dependent objects, they do not fit the physicalist mould and are therefore
an easy target for eliminativists.
There are many reasons why the above conclusion is wrong. The relation between
science and technology is infinitely more complex than suggested by the
simplistic idea that technology is just an applied science.4 One only has to look at
the pervasive role of technology in modern science to see this. Furthermore, the
fact that most ontological accounts of artifacts, or medium sized objects in general,
are eliminativist can be taken as an indication that there are serious problems
with key concepts in metaphysics, such as the concepts of co-location and existence.
So instead of simply biting the bullet about the non-existence of artifacts
the conclusion might be that we should rethink basic ontological concepts.5
Technology forms a very rich philosophical terrain and the Handbook can be
read as a map of the many fascinating issues that can be found here. A number of
them have been investigated in depth in the philosophical literature, such as the
relation between science and technology,6 the theory of measurement,7 or the role
of professional standards in engineering practice.8 Other issues have only been
partially explored, such as the types of design problems that engineers solve;9 the
epistemic role of models in engineering,10 or the notion of technological explanation
as distinct from scientific explanation.11 Many issues, however, have not been
addressed at all and that is why there still is a lot of pioneering work to be done
in the philosophy of technology and engineering sciences.
In what follows I will first define technology and the engineering sciences, which
is the subject of this Handbook (Section 1). In Section 2, I will discuss various
ways of studying the subject. This will include the approaches taken by historians
of technology, by researchers working in the field of Science and Technology Studies
(STS), and by philosophers of technology. I will then briefly review highlights
in the history of the philosophy of technology and engineering sciences (Section 3).
In Section 4, I discuss the architecture of the Handbook which consists of six parts,
each covering major aspects of the field. Section 5, the final section, reflects on the
nature of the essays in this volume. The philosophy of technology and engineering
sciences is a relatively young discipline. In addition to well-established accounts
there are explorative essays on a number of areas so far more or less uncharted by
philosophers. The Handbook thus also aims to set a research agenda