Local explanation in historiography of science
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(2021) 11:2
PAPER IN HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE
Open Access
Local explanation in historiography of science Veli Virmajoki 1 Received: 6 February 2020 / Accepted: 18 September 2020/ # The Author(s) 2020
Abstract In this paper, I offer an explication of the notion of local explanation. In the literature, local explanations are considered as metaphysically and methodologically satisfactory: local explanations reveal the contingency of science and provide a methodologically sound historiography of science. However, the lack of explication of the notion of local explanation makes these claims difficult to assess. The explication provided in this paper connects the degree of locality of an explanans to the degree of contingency of the explanandum. Moreover, the explication is shown to be compatible with the methodological need for a general consideration in the historiography of science. In this way, the explication (i) satisfies the need to explicate an important notion, (ii) connects local explanations and contingency, and (iii) enables us to see how local explanations and general considerations can be connected. However, the explication also sheds critical light on many claims and expectations that are associated with local explanations and their satisfactoriness. Keywords Localism . Local explanation . Contingency . Generalizations . History and
philosophy of science . Philosophy of historiography
1 Introduction The notion of local explanation is a topic of wide interest in the historiography of science. James Secord writes: As will be evident to anyone who has looked over publishers’ catalogues in recent years, historians of science have developed superb techniques for placing science in local settings of time and place. A standard model for historicizing science is to locate specific pieces of work in as tight a context as possible, binding them ineluctably to the conditions of their production. (2004, 657.)
* Veli Virmajoki [email protected]
1
University of Turku, Verkapiha 1 as 24, 20100 Turku, Finland
2
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European Journal for Philosophy of Science
(2021) 11:2
Moreover, Peter Galison notes that “the turn toward local explanation in the historical, sociological, and philosophical understanding of science may well be the single most important change in the last thirty years” (2008, 119). What is striking is that, despite the general historiographical interest in local conditions and despite all the philosophical discussion1 about the notion of explanation, a detailed analysis of the notion of local explanation cannot be found in the literature of historiography of science.2 In this paper, I analyze the notion of local explanation to see whether local explanations can live to up to the expectations that have been placed upon them. The discussion places the notion of local explanation in a wider philosophical perspective and suggests that local explanations are not quite as groundbreaking as has been suggested. In order to get the discussion going, we need to take a closer look on (i) the
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