Thomas Samuel Kuhn (1922–96) was an American physicist and philosopher of science who coined the term ‘paradigm shift.’ His The Structure of Scientific Revolutions is one of the books most frequently cited works in the arts and humanities during the latter half of the 20th century.
Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Kuhn studied physics at Harvard and worked first as a physicist but became interested in the historical development of science. He held several academic posts at Harvard, Boston University, Berkeley (1958–64,) Princeton (1964–79,) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1979–91.)
Kuhn’s celebrated work on history and philosophy, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962,) contested the idea of cumulative, unidirectional scientific progress. His hypothesis of ‘paradigms,’ sets of interconnected conceptual worldviews which compete for acceptance in times of rapid scientific change or revolution, has been very influential in political science, economics, sociology, and other fields of inquiry.
Kuhn’s other works include The Copernican Revolution (1957) and Sources for the History of Quantum Physics (1967.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Thomas S. Kuhn
Communication across the revolutionary divide is inevitably partial.
—Thomas S. Kuhn
Topics: Communication
The historian of science may be tempted to exclaim that when paradigms change, the world itself changes with them.
—Thomas S. Kuhn
Topics: Science
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