Philip Kitcher > Quotes

“Thomas Kuhn’s book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions has probably been more widely read—and more widely misinterpreted—than any other book in the recent philosophy of science. The broad circulation of his views has generated a popular caricature of Kuhn’s position. According to this popular caricature, scientists working in a field belong to a club. All club members are required to agree on main points of doctrine. Indeed, the price of admission is several years of graduate education, during which the chief dogmas are inculcated. The views of outsiders are ignored. Now I want to emphasize that this is a hopeless caricature, both of the practice of scientists and of Kuhn’s analysis of the practice. Nevertheless, the caricature has become commonly accepted as a faithful representation, thereby lending support to the Creationists’ claims that their views are arrogantly disregarded.”
― Philip Kitcher, Abusing Science: The Case Against Creationism

“Darwin’s point about variation often goes unappreciated today in philosophical discussions, even though it has been uncontroversial for well over a century. Recent discussions of natural kinds, prompted by the seminal ideas of Saul Kripke and Hilary Putnam, often assume that one can revive essentialism. Yet if species are natural kinds no such revival is in prospect. Kripke and Putnam largely restricted their discussions to the cases of elements and compounds, and with good reason. For, given the insights of neo-Darwinism, it’s clear that the search for some analogue of the microstructural essences can’t be found. No genetic or karyotypic property will play for species the role that atomic number does for the elements.”
― Philip Kitcher

“In similar fashion, Bellarmine's decree of 1616, banning the teaching of Copernicanism, looks like a calculated political move, designed to secure the interests of the church. Part of the traditional idea of an opposition between the "rational scientist" and the "prejudiced opponents of science" is best captured by noting that some people do not give the highest priority to impersonal cognitive goals but to certain practical ends (sometimes personal, sometimes impersonal) and that their actions are well designed for achieving these ends.”
― Philip Kitcher, The Advancement of Science: Science without Legend, Objectivity without Illusions

“Religion long ago modified the character of ethical discussion by undermining the original egalitarianism.”
― Philip Kitcher, Life After Faith: The Case for Secular Humanism

“Philosophy might aspire to something similar, the framing of conceptions that can assist existing disciplines, or even initiate new modes of inquiry. At important moments in its history it has done just that, but its success has resulted from careful attention to features of the state of knowledge or of the broader human condition. There is no internal dynamic of building on and extending the problem solutions of a field that can be pursued in abstraction from other inquiries. In part that is because of the lack of procedures for yielding firm solutions, but also because philosophical issues evolve. As Dewey remarks of philosophical questions, “We do not solve them: we get over them” (Dewey 1909/1998, 14).”
― Philip Kitcher, What's the Use of Philosophy?