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Modeling High-Temperature Superconductivity: Correspondence at Bay?

Hartmann, Stephan (2007) Modeling High-Temperature Superconductivity: Correspondence at Bay? [Preprint]

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Abstract

How does a predecessor theory relate to its successor? According to Heinz Post's General Correspondence Principle, the successor theory has to account for the empirical success of its predecessor. After a critical discussion of this principle, I outline and discuss various kinds of correspondence relations that hold between successive scientific theories. I then look in some detail at a case study from contemporary physics: the various proposals for a theory of high-temperature superconductivity. The aim of this case study is to understand better the prospects and the place of a methodological principle such as the Generalized Correspondence Principle. Generalizing from the case study, I will then argue that some such principle has to be considered, at best, as one tool that might guide scientists in their theorizing. Finally I present a tentative account of why principles such as the Generalized Correspondence Principle work so often and why there is so much continuity in scientific theorizing.


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Item Type: Preprint
Creators:
CreatorsEmailORCID
Hartmann, Stephan
Additional Information: Forthcoming in: L. Soler, H. Sankey and P. Hoyningen-Huene (eds.), Rethinking Scientific Change. Stabilities, Rupture, Incommensurabilities? Berlin: Springer 2008.
Keywords: Theory change, correspondence principle, Bayesianism, high-temperature superconductivity
Subjects: General Issues > Confirmation/Induction
General Issues > Models and Idealization
General Issues > Theory Change
Specific Sciences > Physics > Condensed Matter
General Issues > Reductionism/Holism
Depositing User: Stephan Hartmann
Date Deposited: 14 Aug 2007
Last Modified: 07 Oct 2010 15:15
Item ID: 3464
Subjects: General Issues > Confirmation/Induction
General Issues > Models and Idealization
General Issues > Theory Change
Specific Sciences > Physics > Condensed Matter
General Issues > Reductionism/Holism
Date: August 2007
URI: https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/3464

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