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Mary B. Hesse
(15 Oct 1924 - )
English philosopher of science who explored philosophical interpretations of the analogies, logic, methods, and fundamental assumptions in both the natural and social sciences. Her books include Science and the Human Imagination (1954) and Models and Analogies in Science (1963).
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Science Quotes by Mary B. Hesse (5 quotes)
... one of the main functions of an analogy or model is to suggest extensions of the theory by considering extensions of the analogy, since more is known about the analogy than is known about the subject matter of the theory itself … A collection of observable concepts in a purely formal hypothesis suggesting no analogy with anything would consequently not suggest either any directions for its own development.
— Mary B. Hesse
'Operational Definition and Analogy in Physical Theories', British Journal for the Philosophy of Science (Feb 1952), 2, No. 8, 291.
... there is an external world which can in principle be exhaustively described in scientific language. The scientist, as both observer and language-user, can capture the external facts of the world in prepositions that are true if they correspond to the facts and false if they do not. Science is ideally a linguistic system in which true propositions are in one-to-one relation to facts, including facts that are not directly observed because they involve hidden entities or properties, or past events or far distant events. These hidden events are described in theories, and theories can be inferred from observation, that is the hidden explanatory mechnism of the world can be discovered from what is open to observation. Man as scientist is regarded as standing apart from the world and able to experiment and theorize about it objectively and dispassionately.
— Mary B. Hesse
'Introduction', Revolutions and Reconstructions in the Philosophy of Science (1981), xii. In John Templeton and Robert L. Herrmann, Is God the Only Reality (1994), 11-12.
It could plausibly be argued that far from Christian theology having hampered the study of nature for fifteen hundred years, it was Greek corruptions of biblical Christianity which hampered it.
— Mary B. Hesse
Science and the Human Imagination: Aspects of the History and Logic of Physical Science (1955). Quoted in V.F. Lenzen, book review, Isis (Jun 1956), 47, No. 2, 190.
Outside the practice of science itself, scientists have sometimes been the greatest offenders in adhering to dogmatic ideas against all the evidence.
— Mary B. Hesse
Science and the Human Imagination: Aspects of the History and Logic of Physical Science (1955).
Science is in a literal sense constructive of new facts. It has no fixed body of facts passively awaiting explanation, for successful theories allow the construction of new instruments—electron microscopes and deep space probes—and the exploration of phenomena that were beyond description—the behavior of transistors, recombinant DNA, and elementary particles, for example. This is a key point in the progressive nature of science—not only are there more elegant or accurate analyses of phenomena already known, but there is also extension of the range of phenomena that exist to be described and explained.
Co-author with Michael A. Arbib, English-born professor of computer science and biomedical engineering (1940-)
Co-author with Michael A. Arbib, English-born professor of computer science and biomedical engineering (1940-)
— Mary B. Hesse
Michael A. Arbib and Mary B. Hesse, The Construction of Reality (1986), 8.
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) -- 
