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Gaston Bachelard
(27 Jun 1884 - 16 Oct 1962)
French philosopher and science historian who was a postmaster before he studied physics followed by an interest in philosophy. He originated the idea that the historical progress of science resulted when epistemological obstacles were resolved by the epistemological break.
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Science Quotes by Gaston Bachelard (2 quotes)
A scientific observation is always a committed observation. It confirms or denies one’s preconceptions, one’s first ideas, one’s plan of observation. It shows by demonstration. It structures the phenomenon. It transcends what is close at hand. It reconstructs the real after having reconstructed its representation.
— Gaston Bachelard
In The New Scientific Spirit (1934).
Any work of science, no matter what its point of departure, cannot become fully convincing until it crosses the boundary between the theoretical and the experimental: Experimentation must give way to argument, and argument must have recourse to experimentation.
— Gaston Bachelard
The New Scientific Spirit (1934), trans. A. Goldhammer (1984), 3-4.
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
(1987) -- 
