Abstract

The last two developments are obviously related, since much of the rationale for taking the history of a theory to be relevant to its acceptance, rejection, and evaluation, is equally applicable whether our domain is scientific inquiry or philosophy of science. On the other hand, the first is somewhat unrelated to the other two, for it is quite possible to practice philosophy of science as philosophy of the history of science, and yet concentrate on the purely logical aspects of scientific inquiry; it is also possible to emphasize the historicity of scientists’ theory-appraisal, and yet do so unhistorically, and even anti-historically, a good example here being the early Popper himself, as distinct from some of his later work and from some of his followers.