Abstract
The notion of exploratory modeling constitutes a powerful heuristic tool for historical-epistemological analysis and especially for studying concept formation. I will show this by means of a case study from the history of particle physics: the formation of the concept of “strangeness” in the early 1950s at the interface of theory and experiment. Strangeness emerged from a broad space of possibilities opened up by exploratory modeling by authors working in communication and competition, and constructing both new questions and new answers. A systematic focus on exploratory modeling also helps compensate a bias towards the “right” developments still often present in historical investigations of theoretical work.
One of the central operations of science is finding patterns in data. Pattern Recognition, although based in capabilities of the human perceptual system, is a cultural and social process bases on assemblages of different technologies and practices. This will be shown by comparing two case studies from the history of particle physics.
Rigden: Physics and the Sound of Music/Lottermoser: Orgeln, Kirchen und Akustik/Société Française de Physique: Colloque International sur l'Histoire de la Physique des Particules / International Colloquium on the History of Particle Physics/Niels Bohr: At
