An outline of my meager understanding of the history of science:
- Informal natural observation; unsystematic explanation
- Informal natural observation; systematic metaphysical explanation
- Formal natural observation; systematic metaphysical explanation
- Formal natural observation; systematic metaphysical/mathematical explanation
- Artificial experiment; systematic metaphysical/mathematical(?) explanation
- Artificial experiment; systematic phenomenological/mathematical(?) explanation
I’m thinking of reading Koyre’s From the Closed World to the Infinite Universe in order to get a basic, probably outdated, plot-line to work with.
Why do I care? I want to paint business as being stuck back at step 4, and make a case for progressing to step 6. And yes, I’m whigging.