Hermann von Helmholtzs Mechanism: The Loss of Certainty

Focusing on Hermann von Helmholtz, this study addresses one of the nineteenth century's most important German natural scientists. Among his most well-known contributions to science are the invention of the ophthalmoscope and grou- breaking work towards formulating the law of the conservation of energy. The volume of his work, reaching from medicine to physiology to physics and epis- mology, his impact on the development of the sciences far beyond German borders, and the contribution he made to the organization and popularization of research, all established Helmholtz's prominence both in the academic world and in public cultural life. Helmholtz was also one of the last representatives of a conception of nature that strove to reduce all phenomena to matter in motion. In reaction to the increasingly insurmountable difficulties that program had in fulfilling its own standards for s- entific explanation, he developed elements of a modern understanding of science that have remained of fundamental importance to this day.

InhaltsangabeIntroduction A. Mechanism between the Classical and the Modern I. The Concept of Mechanism 1. What is Meant by 'Mechanism'? 2. On the Concept of Classical Mechanics II. Mechanism as a Classical Philosophy of Nature 1. The Classical Concept of Science 2. Two Instances of the Legitimation of Classical Mechanism a) Galileo's Scientism b) Descartes' Metaphysics and his Concept of Hypothesis III. The Three Lines of Traditions of Mechanism 1. Materialist Mechanism (Boyle and Huygens) 2. Dualist Mechanism (Newton and Boscovich) 3. Dynamic Mechanism (Leibniz and Kant) IV. Contours of a Modern Philosophy of Nature 1. Hypotheticity as a Characteristic of the Modern Conception of Science 2. Interpretation of Nature as World-View B. Helmholtz's Mechanism at the Dawn of Modernity I. Helmholtz as Educator, Natural Scientist, and Research Strategist II. Helmholtz's Classical Mechanism 1. The Mechanistic Programmatic of 1847 a) The Grounding of Dual Mechanism b) The Energetic Heuristic of Mechanism 2. Mechanics as Foundation of Geometry 3. Helmholtz's Classical Conception of Science and Nature a) His Conception of Science Until the End of the Eighteen Sixties b) His Classical Mechanistic Conception of Nature III. The Hypothesization of Helmholtz's Mechanism 1. Helmholtz's Conception of Science Since the Beginning of the Eighteen Seventies 2. Helmholtz's Model-Theoretical Mechanism. Mechanistic Analogies and Mathematical Unification IV. Conditions and Causes of the Change in Helmholtz's Conception of Nature and Science Bibliography Index