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Dalton's Chemical Atoms versus Duhem's Chemical Equivalents

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Karen R. Zwier
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Abstract

Paul Needham has claimed in several recent papers that Dalton's chemical atomism was not explanatory. I respond to his criticism of Dalton by arguing that explanation admits of degrees and that under a view that allows for a spectrum of explanatory value, it is possible to see ample worth in Dalton's atomistic explanations. Furthermore, I argue that even Duhem, who rejected atomism, acknowledged the explanatory worth of Dalton's atomism.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 78 , Issue 5 , December 2011 , pp. 842 - 853
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

I thank Thomas Cunningham, Julia Bursten, and Matthew Zwier for helpful comments on previous versions of this article. I also thank Alan Chalmers for an interesting seminar on the history of atomism in the fall of 2007, which spurred my work on this topic.

References

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