Philosophy of Science and Education

This is a vast and vague topic. In order to do justice to it one has to write a book or maybe more than one. For it can be understood in quite different ways and on different levels For example you may think mainly of the historical aspect, that is how philosophy of science developed in the last hundred or so years and how its influence on education changed; you may think of quite different schools of philosophy, from Marxist or positivist to such exotic but at some places influential philosophic positions like that of Rudolph Steiner; of course, you may limit the subject to special fields like epistemology, theory of scientific methodology, or, what has become fashionable recently, sociology of knowledge which may have a considerable bearing on physics teaching (Collins and Shapin 1983; Jung 1985). Again we may think of the topic treated by a philosopher, a scientist, an educationalist, a teacher, which would mean quite a difference. I am trying here to speak as an educationalist, with the physics teacher in mind: this is my vocational perspective as someone who educates physics teachers. Of course, our main concern is the contribution of science, especially physics, to general education, which integrates many of the special topics mentioned. Philosophy of science comes in because it is not at all clear what science and physics is, and what of it should be taught, and how such chosen parts should be taught. I also take this opportunity to give an idea of the longstanding tradition of this discussion in Germany, connected with names like Wagenshein, Litt, Heisenberg and many others.     

Philosophy of Science,Critical Thinking and Science Education

In this article I explore a case for the inclusion of some aspects of critical thinking and of philosophy of science within science education that appeals to two commonly accepted aims of science education. Although motivated by reading Harvey Siegel's Educating Reason (1988), and emerging from his discussion there, the aspects I explore go beyond that discussion.     

Philosophy of Science in the Science Teacher Education Curriculum

Summaries

English

The purpose of this article is to promote awareness of a growing body of literature concerned with the relationship between the epistemology of science and school science education, and to stimulate debate concerning the role such epistemological considerations should play in the professional training of science teachers. First of all, a rationale is provided for the inclusion of the epistemology of science and its relationship to school science education as an essential component on the professional training of all science teachers. This is followed by a review of existing resources for use in science teacher education curricula, and suggestions for new resource material. Finally, a possible curriculum for inclusion in science teacher education programmes is presented.     

科学技术哲学的科学教育解读

科学技术从根本上改变了人类的生存方式和发展模式,它是人类能够更好地生活的基本保证,但并不等于生活的全部智慧。科学技术虽然给人类带来了高度发达的物质文明,却不能为人类提供生活何以值得过下去的理由。该问题的解决必须依靠在正确的科学技术哲学思想指引下的科学教育,并从系统哲学、生态哲学和技术哲学三个维度,对如何提高和发展科学教育提出了初步设想。只有在正确的科技哲学观的指导下,科学教育的质量才会得以提高,全民科学素质的提升才可能得以实现,人们才会获得更好的生活。     

科学哲学的文化转向及其对科学教育的影响

科学哲学的文化转向使人们对科学的本质的认识由传统向现代转变。科学知识是暂时性、主观性、建构性的,它会不断地被修正和推翻。科学哲学的文化转向推动了科学教育改革。培养学生的科学素养是科学教育目标,科学教育应更加重视知识的产生和形成过程。科学学习过程要以探究为主要形式,同时注重对学生进行科学情感、态度与价值观的培养。科学哲学的文化转向将促进科学与人文的融合。     

科技哲学视阈下的科学教育

科学技术从根本上改变了人类的生存方式和发展模式。它是人类能够更好地生活的基本保证,但并不等于生活的全部智慧。科学技术虽然给人类带来了高度发达的物质文明,却不能为人类提供生活何以值得过下去的理由。该问题的解决必须依靠科学技术哲学思想引领下的科学教育。文章从系统哲学、生态哲学和技术哲学三个维度,对如何提高和发展科学教育提出了初步的设想。只有在正确的科技哲学观的指导下,科学教育的质量才会得以提高,全民科学素质的提升才可能得以实现,人们才会获得更好的生活。     

A Bibliography for Philosophy and Constructivism in Science Education

The research literature on educational constructivism is voluminous (see the Carmichael (1990) Pfundt & Duit (1994) and Driver et al. (1994b) bibliographies cited below). The research - in both the Piagetian and Alternative Conception traditions - covers children's learning, cognitive development, curriculum development, classroom practices, teacher education, and much else. There is a further enormous literature on constructivism in philosophy of science (see Leplin (1984) and Churchland & Hooker (1985)), and on constructivism in the sociology of science (see Brown (1984), McMullin (1988, 1992). In turn these latter literatures overlap with the ocean of writing on post-modernist theory of knowledge and cognition (see Gross & Levitt (1994)). The following references relate mostly to educational constructivism, and then, with some exceptions, to articles that address epistemological and philosophical matters in science education. Even so it is not an exhaustive list, but hopefully it will be useful for teachers and researchers in the field. The author welcomes additions or omissions being brought to his attention.     

Introductory Comments on Philosophy and Constructivism in Science Education

This article indicates something of the enormous influence of constructivism on contemporary science education. The article distinguishes educational constructivism (that has its origins in theories of children's learning), from constructivism in the philosophy of science (usually associated with instrumentalist views of scientific theory), and from constructivism in the sociology of science (of which the Edinburgh Strong Programme in the sociology of scientific knowledge is the best known example). It notes the expansion of educational constructivism from initial considerations of how children come to learn, to views about epistemology, educational theory, ethics, and the cognitive claims of science. From the learning-theory beginnings of constructivism, and at each stage of its growth, philosophical questions arise that deserve the attention of educators. Among other things, the article identifies some theoretical problems concerning constructivist teaching of the content of science.     

科学教育中的迷信及哲学救赎

在我国的科学教育中存在着迷信化现象,主要表现为重结论轻根据,重肯定轻质疑,化多元为一元,视猜测为真理。导致学生偶像重重、思维僵化、不善追问、缺乏创新能力,这与长期以来哲学与科学教育未能有机融合有关。时代呼唤科学与哲学的重新结盟,充分发挥哲学对科学前提和结论的批判、质疑功能。要充分实现这一功能,需要广泛吸收科学哲学的优秀成果,凸显和改进认识论,形成科学友好型哲学,在各科学专业中开设这样的课程,或在科学课程中融入这样的内容。     

Contributions from the Philosophy of Science to the Education of Science Teachers

One of the most important topics on the international agenda in educational research is to gain an understanding of the processes of educational change in teachers and of the factors that favour or hinder it. Such understanding is, for instance, an essential element in planning and putting into practice initial and ongoing teacher education programs. This article reviews the research on science teachers’ educational change. To organize the information, an analogy is made with the process of scientific change, analyzing and evaluating the contributions of the different models taken from the philosophy of science – positivism, Popper’s principle of falsifiability, Lakatos’ scientific research programs, Laudan’s research traditions, Toulmin’s evolutionism, and Kuhn’s relativism. We conclude the article with the implications for science teacher education.     

Reforming Science Education: Part I. The Search for a Philosophy of Science Education

The call for reforms in science education has been ongoing for a century, with new movements and approaches continuously reshaping the identity and values of the discipline. The HPS movement has an equally long history and taken part in the debates defining its purpose and revising curriculum. Its limited success, however, is due not only to competition with alternative visions and paradigms (e.g. STS, multi-culturalism, constructivism, traditionalism) which deadlock implementation, and which have led to conflicting meanings of scientific literacy, but the inability to rise above the debate. At issue is a fundamental problem plaguing science education at the school level, one it shares with education in general. It is my contention that it requires a guiding “metatheory” of education that can appropriately distance itself from the dual dependencies of metatheories in psychology and the demands of socialization—especially as articulated in most common conceptions of scientific literacy tied to citizenship. I offer as a suggestion Egan’s cultural-linguistic theory as a metatheory to help resolve the impasse. I hope to make reformers familiar with his important ideas in general and more specifically, to show how they can complement HPS rationales and reinforce the work of those researchers who have emphasized the value of narrative in learning science. This will be elaborated in Part II of a supplemental paper to the present one. As a prerequisite to presenting Egan’s metatheory I first raise the issue of the need for a conceptual shift back to philosophy of education within the discipline, and thereto, on developing and demarcating true educational theories (essentially neglected since Hirst). In the same vein it is suggested a new research field should be opened with the express purpose of developing a discipline-specific “philosophy of science education” (largely neglected since Dewey) which could in addition serve to reinforce science education’s growing sense of academic autonomy and independence from socio-economic demands.     

Philosophy of Science and School Science

The purpose of professional education programs is to prepare aspiring professionals for the challenges of practice within a particular profession. These programs typically seek to ensure the acquisition of necessary knowledge and skills, as well as providing opportunities for their application. While not denying the importance of knowledge and skills, this paper reconfigures professional education as a process of becoming. Learning to become a professional involves not only what we know and can do, but also who we are (becoming). It involves integration of knowing, acting, and being in the form of professional ways of being that unfold over time. When a professional education program focuses on the acquisition and application of knowledge and skills, it falls short of facilitating their integration into professional ways of being. In addition, through such a focus on epistemology (or theory of knowing), ontology (or theory of being) is overlooked. This paper explores what it means to develop professional ways of being where the focus is becoming, not simply knowing as an end in itself.     

科学教育中的知识、方法与信念——基于科学哲学的考察

科学教育强调学生理解科学的本质,而不仅仅是知识,这是因为科学与社会之间的联系越来越紧密,凸显了将科学看作了解世界的方式在认识论上的重要性。出于个体认识论的需要、科学研究的认识论特征以及科学外行与科学家在认知劳力上的区分,科学教育的目标转向受教育个体未来的社会行动,应培育学生建立对科学的信任和维护科学的认识论权威。为实现这种目标,科学教育应从理解科学的本质转向理解真实的科学实践的本质,在科学教育中呈现真实的而非理想化的科学实践,采纳基于科学哲学模型和理论的实用主义进路。科学哲学对科学实践的新近研究,虽然可以提供理论基础,但应该与科学教育进行建设性对话,更加关注非科学家理解科学的模式,将哲学模型转化为适合学生认知水平和需要、符合教学情境的教学资源。     

高职思想教育的科技哲学观探析

上世纪90年代以来,随着我国改革开放的顺利进行,高等职业教育得到了迅猛发展。如何使高职院校学生素质的全面发展,成为21世纪科技创新人才是摆在高职教育的一大问题。加强高职院校的思想政治教育是我们的神圣使命,科学技术哲学是高职思想教育中关键的一个重要内容,提高高职院校大学生对科学技术的哲学反思是必要的,也是至关重要的。     

Mario Bunge, Systematic Philosophy and Science Education: An Introduction

Mario Bunge was born in Argentina in 1919 and is now in his mid-90s. He studied atomic physics and quantum mechanics with Guido Beck (1903?C1988), an Austrian refugee and student of Heisenberg. Additionally he studied modern philosophy in an environment that was a philosophical backwater becoming the first South American philosopher of science to be trained in science. His publications in physics, philosophy, psychology, sociology and the foundations of biology, are staggering in number, and include a massive 8-volume Treatise on Philosophy. The unifying thread of his scholarship is the constant and vigorous advancement of the Enlightenment Project, and criticism of cultural and academic movements that deny or devalue the core planks of the project: namely its naturalism, the search for truth, the universality of science, the value of rationality, and respect for individuals. At a time when specialisation is widely decried, and its deleterious effects on science, philosophy of science, educational research and science teaching are recognised, and at a time when ??grand narratives?? are thought both undesirable and impossible??it is salutary to appraise the fruits of one person??s pursuit of the ??Big?? scientific and philosophical picture or grand narrative. In doing so this special issue brings together philosophers, physicists, biologists, sociologists, logicians, cognitive scientists, economists and mathematicians to examine facets of Mario Bunge??s systematic philosophy and to appraise its contribution to important issues in current philosophy and, by implication, education.