Mary Hesse 1924 – 2016
Mary Brenda Hesse was a British philosopher of science and one of the first women to hold a senior chair in the philosophy of science in the United Kingdom. After early studies in mathematics and electromagnetism, she turned to philosophy of science and produced influential analyses of the role of models, metaphors, and analogies in scientific reasoning. Her Models and Analogies in Science and The Structure of Scientific Inference shaped the post-positivist understanding of how scientific theories represent the world. She held the chair of philosophy of science at Cambridge for many years.
Key facts
- Nationality
- British
- Era
- Contemporary
- Movements
- Analytic
Selected quotes
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Attributed to Mary Hesse:
“Models are essential to scientific theorizing.”
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Attributed to Mary Hesse:
“All scientific knowledge is metaphorical at the deepest level.”
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Attributed to Mary Hesse:
“Theories are not mere instruments; they are claims about the world.”
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Attributed to Mary Hesse:
“Analogy is the engine of theoretical progress.”
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Attributed to Mary Hesse:
“Inference in science is always defeasible, always open to revision.”