Newsletter of Phenomenology

Keeping phenomenologists informed since May 2002

Repository | Book | Chapter

209262

(2001) Incommensurability and related matters, Dordrecht, Springer.

Concept formation and commensurability

Nancy J. Nersessian

pp. 275-301

The paper addresses the issue of how the processes of concept formation and change in science can be brought to bear on the problem of incommensurability. It argues that the problem arises out of a methodological approach that identifies the conceptual structure of a science with a language and transfers what is thought to be known about languages to science. Employing a cognitive-historical method that shifts the focus to the representational and reasoning practices of scientists in constructing new concepts provides a way of uncovering the nature of the commensurability relations between successive representations of a domain.

Publication details

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-015-9680-0_11

Full citation:

Nersessian, N. J. (2001)., Concept formation and commensurability, in H. Sankey (ed.), Incommensurability and related matters, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 275-301.

This document is unfortunately not available for download at the moment.