Pierre Duhem was a French physicist, philosopher of science, and historian of science. As a believing Catholic he defended the autonomy of both physics and metaphysics — against the scientistic appropriation of either side. His contribution to the book lies in the insight from the philosophy of science that natural science depends on non-empirical presuppositions.
Key Contribution: Theory Holism
In his principal work La Théorie physique: son objet et sa structure (1906), Duhem shows:
- No experiment tests an isolated hypothesis. The physicist always subjects a whole bundle of hypotheses to experimental control — the hypothesis itself, the theory of the measuring instruments, the auxiliary hypotheses about the experimental conditions.
- A contradiction between theory and observation shows only that at least one assumption in the system is false — not which one.
- The decision as to which hypothesis is to be revised requires bon sens — a practical reason that goes beyond the purely empirical.
This insight was later radicalized by Quine into a universal holism of all cognition: the Duhem-Quine thesis.
Physics and Metaphysics
Duhem advocates a clear division of labor: physical theory is a “system of mathematical propositions” that summarizes and orders empirical laws — but it is not a picture of reality. The question of what things are in their essence belongs to metaphysics, not to physics.
This position protects natural science from scientistic overreach: if physics makes no claims about essences, it cannot claim to explain or to deny personhood either. At the same time Duhem preserves the autonomy of physics: it needs no metaphysical legitimation to be good physics.
Place in the Book
Duhem’s theory holism supports the thesis of Chapter 2 (German) that natural science depends on philosophical presuppositions that it cannot clarify itself. His concept of bon sens points to that rationality which distinguishes the person as a spiritual being — a power of judgment that eludes the method of natural science.
Together with Planck’s critique of positivism and Plantinga’s argument against naturalism, Duhem’s holism forms a third argument against scientism — this time at the level of the philosophy of science.
Sources: Bexten 2017, pp. 44–47 (concept of science and method).
Further sources:
- Duhem, Pierre (1906): La Théorie physique: son objet et sa structure. Paris: Chevalier et Rivière. — Engl.: The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory. Transl. Philip P. Wiener. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954. German: Ziel und Struktur der physikalischen Theorien. Transl. F. Adler, foreword E. Mach. Leipzig: Barth, 1908. Reprint: Hamburg: Meiner (PhB 477), 1998.
- Harding, Sandra G. (ed.) (1976): Can Theories Be Refuted? Essays on the Duhem-Quine Thesis. Synthese Library 81. Dordrecht: Reidel.