Science and Philosophy
I stumbled onto a very interesting article about a scientist, Michela Massimi, who was making waves by promoting the idea that philosophy has an important role in science. It seems fairly obvious to me, but I don't work in science so my perspective is very different. Then again, I also felt that philosophy had an obvious role in history, and many historians don't. It often seems that way as long as you're taking some of the fundamental things for granted, but the moment they become questioned, you need philosophy to help you out. The interesting thing is not just that Massimi defends philosophy, but that she takes a contrarian view that science is actually closely related to physical reality. This probably seems to most people like a silly thing to debate, but it is a major issue in philosophy. Do scientists describe what actually happens, or do they just give us a model that can account for what happens but bears no actual relation to what is going on?...