Studies in History

and Philosophy
of Science
Stud. Hist. Phil. Sci. 36 (2005) 149169
www.elsevier.com/locate/shpsa

Incommensurability reconsidered
Harold I. Brown
Department of Philosophy, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115, USA
Received 28 April 2004; received in revised form 19 July 2004

Abstract
In his later writings Kuhn reconsidered his earlier account of incommensurability, clarifying some aspects, modifying others, and explicitly rejecting some of his earlier claims. In
Kuhns new account incommensurability does not pose a problem for the rational evaluation
of competing scientic theories, but does pose a problem for certain forms of realism. Kuhn
maintains that, because of incommensurability, the notion that science might seek to learn the
nature of things as they are in themselves is incoherent. I develop Kuhns new account of
incommensurability, respond to his anti-realist argument, and sketch a form of realism in
which the realist aim is a pursuable goal.
2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Incommensurability; Thomas Kuhn; Rationality; Skill; Theory choice; Translation.

1. Background
The incommensurability rubric was introduced by Kuhn and Feyerabend in 1962;
claims associated with this rubric have been subjected to many interpretations, refutations, and defenses. (For recent discussions and an extensive bibliography see
Hoyningen-Huene & Sankey, 2001.) In the years that followed Kuhn returned to this
notion many times, seeking to clarifyand sometimes modifyhis account. In his
last papers, he introduced some new ideas that seem to involve signicant changes
E-mail address: hibrown@niu.edu (H.I. Brown).
0039-3681/$ - see front matter 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.shpsa.2004.12.008

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in the import of incommensurability. In this paper I will explore Kuhns modications, defend some of them, and assess the status of incommensurability as a
meta-concept for understanding the development of science.1
Kuhn introduced his original account of incommensurability in a specic historical
context, and in opposition to the prevailing logical empiricist view of science. To
understand Kuhns idea, we must be clear on the aspects of logical empiricism he
was opposing. Consider, rst, the theory of meaning that was central to logical empiricism. According to this theory, we have a basic vocabulary made up of terms that derive their meaning directly from experience. This vocabulary, dubbed the observation
language, could be shared by all human beings with normal sense organs (variations are
a matter of the particular experiences one has had), and the meanings of its terms are
established independently of any of our beliefsand a fortiori independently of any
scientic theories. Dierent natural languages associate dierent phonemes and graphemes with experienced items, but terms that are associated with qualitatively identical bits of experience have the same meaning. Thus, the terms of the observation
language are precisely and mechanically translatable among all natural languages.
We also have a large body of auxiliary terms that are introduced for convenience,
and ultimately derive their meaning from the observation language. However, the exact relation between the observation language and the auxiliary language was a matter
of some debate. Ideally, all auxiliary terms would be translatable into the observation
language, so that all meaningful discourse would be expressible in this language.
Unfortunately, certain key terms resisted translation. In philosophy of science theoretical terms constituted the most important class of resistant terms; as logical empiricism
developed there were several attempts to assimilate theoretical terms to this framework.2 By 1962 there was a widely accepted account of theoretical terms that had been
introduced in 1920 by Campbell (1957) and independently rediscovered by Carnap
(1956). This view held that a theory consists of a set of axioms containing the theoretical terms plus a set of correspondence rules that relate the theoretical terms (more or
less directly) to the observation language. There were residual disputes about the exact
nature of these correspondence rules, and about whether the relations between theoretical terms established in the axioms contribute to the meaning of these terms. But it was
generally agreed that the empirical import of a theory derives from its relation to the
observation language. Once this relation is established there is an upward seepage
of meaning from the observational terms to the theoretical concepts (Feigl, 1970, p.7).
The observation language plays a second role for logical empiricists, in addition
to its role in semantics: it provides the basis for comparing and choosing between
competing theories. This follows directly from the thesis that all empirically signi-

I will follow Kuhns practice of referring to The structure of scientic revolutions (1962) as Structure;
Kuhns later papers are collected in The road since Structure, Kuhn (2000); I will cite specic papers from
this collection, and give the original publication date in square brackets.
2
For reviews of these attempts see Brown (1979); Feigl (1970); Hempel (1965, 1970); Scheer (1963).
Quines (1953) attack on the analytic/synthetic distinction provided an additional challenge to this
programsince translations were supposed to be expressed by analytic propositionsand provided part
of the background of Kuhns challenge to logical empiricism (1962, p. viii).

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cant claims are expressible in the observation language. As a result, if two theories
are genuine competitors, their disagreements will amount to alternative claims about
what we will observe under specied conditions. These disagreements are completely
expressible in the observation language, and decidable (except for possible pragmatic
diculties) by appropriate observations.
There is one more issue that was not actually discussed by logical empiricists before the challenges of 1962, but that is easily solved given their theory of meaning.
Note, rst, that empirical generalizationsboth in science and everyday lifeare
typically expressed in the auxiliary language. At this level logical empiricism is compatible with the existence of competing generalizations that make use of radically different concepts. Indeed, from a logical empiricist perspective a major part of the
creative challenge of scientic research is nding auxiliary conceptsthat is, ways
of classifying observablesthat yield reliable predictions. Historically, the development of science has often required replacement of those classications that rst leapt
to inquiring minds. Familiar examples include the classication of all solids as instances of earth, and all liquids as instances of water; treating hot and cold as ontologically equivalent contraries; and treating rest and uniform motion as dierent
dynamical states. I have already noted the logical empiricist account of how the consequences of such competing generalizations can be compared. The additional issue I
want to introduce concerns the resources that allow someone who has learned to
think about some domain using a particular set of auxiliary concepts to make the
transition to thinking in terms of a very dierent set. The logical empiricist answer
is straightforward, at least in principle: empirically signicant dierences between
two generalizations can be expressed in the observation language, and one can move
from one set of auxiliary concepts to another by making the appropriate translations
into this language. A parallel account holds for the ability to learn new theoretical
terms.
Kuhn challenged this entire framework by challenging the existence of an observation language and the theory of meaning built on it. In eect, his alternative account of meaning begins from the picture of a theory as an axiom system
connected to observation by correspondence rules, but reverses the direction in
which meaning ows. Focusing on theoretical terms, Kuhn maintained that their
meaning is determined by their interrelations. Moreover, if observation is to play
a role in evaluating a scientic theory, descriptions of what we observe must be expressed in the language of that theory. As a result, dierent theories that deploy different concepts will yield dierent descriptions of a single body of observations. In
this sense, at least, observation language is theory-laden. It is important to be clear
that the observation language, rather than perceptual events in someones psyche, is
the important factor in this context. This is because logical empiricists treated conrmation (and disconrmation) as logical relations, and logical relations hold between statements (or propositions if you prefer, this is a metaphysical dispute that
we need not consider here).3 To my knowledge, Kuhn never challenged this aspect
3
The key role of observation statements, rather than observations, was especially emphasized by
Popper in his 1934 book Logic der Forschung (see Popper, 1992).

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of logical empiricism. As a result, even if perception were to yield experiences that

are independent of our beliefs, these experiences do not become relevant to theory
evaluation until they have been described in the language of that theory.4 This shift
undermines the logical empiricist account of theory comparison since it eliminates
any theory-neutral observational evidence. In eect, each theory has its own empirical data. Note that holding observation to be theory-laden in this sense does not imply that every observation will support a theory. Interpreting data in terms of a
particular theorys concepts is quite compatible with recognizing that the data contradicts specic theory-generated expectations. Indeed, this is the source of the
empirical anomalies that, for Kuhn, provide one major locus of normal-scientic research. But the lack of a common observation language would seem to block comparisons of theories that describe observations using dierent concepts. This yields
one of two incommensurability problems that Kuhn originally raised: the absence
of some common unit for comparing theories that deploy dierent concepts. At
the time he wrote Structure Kuhn agreed with logical empiricists that full objective
comparisons of competing fundamental theories requires a common language in
which the consequences of the competitors can be expressed; they disagreed on the
availability of this language. We will see in the next section that while Kuhn continues to stress this form of incommensurability in his last papers, and continues to consider it important, he reconsiders its signicance for the problem of theory
comparison.
A second incommensurability problem derives from another Kuhnian thesis: that
observation and logic are not sucient to resolve disputes between fundamental theories (1962, p. 93; Kuhn 2000c [1997], p. 204); additional methodological criteria are
required, and these additional criteria are internal to specic theories. Familiar
examples that Kuhn discusses include the requirement in ancient astronomy that
celestial motions be circular; Newtons gravitation law and the requirement that
acceleration be proportional to force in, say, the nineteenth century; and conservation of energy.5 The key point is that we do not have a theory-neutral set of methodological rules that will allow us to compare competing theories. Presumably, this
problem would remain even if we had a relevant body of theory-neutral data. Kuhn
does not address this form of incommensurability in his late papers, but we will see
that his revised approach to incommensurability has consequences for this problem.
In addition to the two problems just noted, incommensurability provides Kuhn
with the basis for an attack on scientic realism.6 The term scientic realism is used
to describe many claims; here I am interested only in the thesis that the history of
4

In Brown (1995) I distinguished six dierent senses in which it has been claimed that observation is
theory-laden, and explored the sustainability and signicance of each. The deepest of these is the claim that
our theories infect what we perceive, and Kuhn adopts this view in several passages. I have challenged the
relevance of this claim for scientic research in Brown (2005). For present purposes only the version
introduced in the main text is relevant.
5
This form of incommensurability was stressed in Doppelt (1978). Examples of recent discussions will
be found in Bird (2002) and Brown (1996).
6
This is not a point on which Kuhn diers from logical empiricists since they were generally antirealists as well.

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science exhibits a progressively improving set of approximations to a correct description of reality, as it exists independently of our beliefs. The two forms of incommensurability considered above seem to undermine this thesis because they allow for the
possibility that successive theories in a eld are just dierent, without any reason to
think that the later theory is more nearly accurate. This line of argument will be
sharpened by Kuhns reconsideration of the role of incommensurability in theory
choice.

2. Reconsideration
I begin my account of Kuhns reconsideration with his clear rejection of an important feature of his earlier practice. For a long time Kuhn approached conceptual
incommensurability in terms of his initial encounter with the phenomenon: his rst attempt to understand Aristotelian physics from the perspective of his own training in
Newtonian physics. In one report of this experience (Kuhn, 2000h [1987], pp. 15
20) he prefaces the account with this remark: The road I traveled backward with
the aid of written texts was, I shall simply assert, nearly enough the same one that earlier scientists had traveled forward with no text but nature to guide them (p. 15). In
Structure Kuhn placed much emphasis on a comparison of the conceptual frameworks
of Aristotelian and Newtonian physics. But for the scientists involved these were never
genuine competitorsa point that Kuhn acknowledged soon after the remark just
quoted: In recent years I have increasingly recognized that my conception of the process by which scientists move forward has been too closely modeled on my experience
with the process by which historians move into the past (Kuhn, 2000e [1989], p. 87).
The point and the example are suciently important to warrant some elaboration.
Westfall notes that when Newton came on the scene Aristotelian physics was no
longer a major player: As far as men active in the study of nature were concerned,
the word overthrown is not too strong. For them, Aristotelian philosophy was
dead beyond resurrection (Westfall, 1983, p. 14). Cartesian physics was at center
stage, and was the view Newton sought to replace in the Principia. Descartess mature physics is found in Parts II and III of his Principles of philosophy (1991). There is
no doubt that Newton was thoroughly versed in this material since he wrote a detailed critique of it in an unnished manuscript generally referred to as De gravitatione (Newton, 1962). Although Newtons Principia contains few explicit references to
Descartes, Newton systematically argues that the vortex theory of planetary motion
is incompatible with each of Keplers laws and with the motion of comets. Much of
this argument is in Section 9 of Book II and its concluding Scholium. Newton opens
the General Scholium that appears at the end of the second and third editions of the
Principia with a summary of the case against Descartess vortex hypothesis (Newton,
1999, pp. 939940); Cotes Preface to the second edition states the case at greater
length (ibid., pp. 393398).7 Newton returns to the critique of Cartesian physics in

References to Newtons Principia are to the 1999 translation unless otherwise specied.

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the Queries that he included in the nal edition of his Opticks (Newton, 1952, pp.
362365, 368369, 397400).
Commentators note that Newtons full title, Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica, is intended to refer to Descartess Principia philosophiae. On the title pages
of the rst and second editions of Newtons Principia the words Philosophiae and
principia are in larger type than the other two words of the title; in the third edition
these two words are also printed in red. In addition, the third edition begins with a
half-title page containing just the two words Principia philosophiae plus Newtons
name (Newton, 1972, pp. 17). At the beginning of Principia there is considerable
similarity between Newtons and Descartess language. (For discussion of this and
other connections between Newton and Descartes see Cohen, 1983, pp. 182193
and Brackenridge, 1995, pp. 1724.) For example, Newtons second denition
(D2) reads: Quantity of motion is a measure of motion that arises from the velocity
and the quantity of matter jointly. This is followed by the comment: The motion
of a whole is the sum of the motions of the individual parts, and thus if a body is
twice as large as another and has equal velocity there is twice as much motion,
and if it has twice the velocity there is four times as much motion (p. 404). Verbally,
this passage could have been written by Descartes who also introduces a concept of
the quantity of motion and writes: when one part of matter moves twice as fast as
another twice as large, there is as much motion in the smaller as in the larger . . .
(1991, p. 58). To be sure, Descartess concern is rather dierent from Newtons, since
Descartes is here discussing the total quantity of motion in the universe which, he
maintains, is constant. Still, like Newton, Descartes considers this total quantity
to be the sum of the quantities of the individual parts. Thus both hold that the quantity of motion in a compound body is the sum of the quantities of the constituent
parts, and that this quantity is measured by the bodys speed multiplied by some
measure of the amount of matter in the body. However, Newton and Descartes have
dierent measures of this amount of matter. Although Descartes never explicitly
states it, his identication of matter with extension makes it is clear that his measure
of quantity of matter must be the bodys volume.8 Newtons rst denition reads:
Quantity of matter is a measure of matter that arises from its density and volume
jointly (p. 403), which is a considerably dierent conception from Descartess. But
Newton eases us into his new framework by initially providing text that will be familiar to readers of Descartes. I want to consider some further near parallels, but must
rst introduce a bit more of Descartess physics.
Unlike Newton, Descartes was seeking to replace Aristotelian physics. One of
Descartess major departures from the tradition he inherited is a change in the extension of the concept of a state. Descartes also endeavors to ease his readers into his
new account. Like his predecessors, Descartes views a state as a property (i.e., a
mode) of a body that does not change spontaneously. It has long been recognized,
Descartes notes, that objects do not change their shape or begin to move without
an external cause; shape and rest serve as paradigm examples of states. Descartes

This is especially clear in his account of condensation and rarefaction (Descartes, 1991, p. 4142, 48).

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155

now claims that uniform motionmotion in a straight line at constant speedis

also a state. The idea that a form of motion might continue spontaneously was
not completely new since in ancient and medieval astronomy the eternal circular motion postulated in the heavens exhibited this characteralthough in this case no
forces exist that could change the motion. Descartes, however, explicitly denies that
circular motion is a state (1991, p. 60). In the terrestrial realm, the Aristotelian natural motions would not count as Cartesian states since these motions spontaneously
cease when the moving object reaches its natural place. So Descartes is making signicant changes in what counts as a state, but working in terms of notions that
would have been familiar to Aristotelians. They might disagree, but there is no reason to think they would not understand.
Newton built on this extended notion of a state. Verbally, Newtons third and
fourth denitions and rst law of motion could have come from Descartess pen.
D3. Inherent force of matter is the power of resisting by which every body, so far
as it is able, perseveres in its state of either of resting or of moving uniformly
straight forward. (p. 404)
D4. Impressed force is the action exerted on a body to change its state either of
resting or of moving uniformly straight forward. (p. 405)
L1. Every body perseveres in its state of being at rest or moving uniformly
straight forward, except in so far as it is compelled to change its state by forces
impressed. (p. 416)
L1 should also be compared with a comment Descartes makes on his own rst law.
Descartess law reads: each thing, provided that it is simple and undivided, always
remains in the same state as far as is in its power, and never changes except by external causes (1991, p. 59). Descartes then adds that if such a body is at rest, we do not
believe that it will ever begin to move unless driven to do so by some external cause.
Nor, if it is moving, is there any reason to think that it will ever cease to move of its
own accord and without some other thing which impedes it (ibid.).
However, in spite of this verbal similarity Newton makes major conceptual
departures from Descartes. For example, although Descartes considers both rest
and uniform motion to be states, he views them as fundamentally dierent states.
This is clear, for example, in Descartess rules of impact (ibid., p. 6469) where
cases in which one body is at rest before impact are treated dierently from cases
in which both bodies are initially in motion.9 Newton considered rest and uniform
motion to be the same state; rest is just motion with a speed of zero. Thus, for
Newton, when a moving object reverses direction it passes momentarily through
a state of rest, but this involves no dierence of principle from any other speed that
the object passes through. Descartes denies that a state of rest occurs in such cases
(e.g. 2001, pp. 7576). Newton also holds that change of direction and change of
speed are the same phenomenon, while for Descartes these are fundamentally
9
Descartess accounts of motion and rest are conceptual quagmires that we need not discuss for present
purposes.

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dierent. Descartess clearest argument for this claim occurs in his Optics where he
notes that in order to change the speed of a tennis ball I must change the force
with which it is hit, while to change its direction I need change only the angle
of the racket (ibid.). Descartess distinctions between rest and motion, and between
change of direction and change of speed are combined in his rules of impact which
include cases in which (as he describes them) there is change of direction with no
change in quantity of motion.10 The upshot, then, is that there are deep conceptual
dierences between Newtonian and Cartesian physics, so that the import of the
verbally similar claims I have noted is quite dierent in the two systems. Still,
the language Newton uses at the beginning of his exposition provides a bridge between Descartess physics and his own.
It is worth noting that Ptolemaic astronomy was also dead by Newtons day. To
the extent that Copernicanism had a competitor, it was Tycho Brahes system in
which the traditional planets move around the sun while that entire system moves
around the earth. The status of Brahes account is reected in an interesting way at
the beginning of Principia Book III where Newton applies the mathematical results
of the two prior books to the planetary system. Early in Book III Newton introduces six phenomenaempirical generalizations about major constituents of the
solar system that will provide the basis for his account. Newton is temporarily
agnostic about the motion of the earth. Phenomenon 4 reads: The periodic times
of the ve primary planets and of either the sun about the earth or earth about
the sunthe xed stars being at restare as the 3/2-powers of their mean distances
from the sun (p. 800, italics added).11 The phenomena that precede and follow this
statement make it clear that he has Brahes alternative in mind. Phenomenon 3
states that the ve primary planets encircle the sun, while Phenomenon 5 tells us
that radii from these planets to the sun pass through equal areas in equal times,
while this does not hold for radii from the planets to the earth. Newtons resolution
of the questiongiven in Book III, Proposition 12 and its corollaryis not quite
what any of his predecessors expected. Newton introduces the hypothesis (p. 816)
that the center of the world is at rest. But the common center of gravity of the
earth, sun, and planets is at rest (Book III, Proposition 11), and The sun is engaged
in continual motion but never recedes far from the common center of gravity of all the
planets (p. 816). This common center of gravity is to be considered the center of
the universe (p. 817). Since the sun, unlike the planets, is always close to this center,
treating the sun as stationary is often a good approximation. Thus, Newton rejects
a central assumption of all previous astronomy: that the center of rotation must be
occupied by a specic body. This is a revolutionary move, although we are brought
to it in a way that should not be at all dicult for astronomers of the time to
understand.

10
There are considerable further complications in Descartess account of motion that we need not
consider here. See Garber (1992), Chap. 68, for a detailed discussion.
11
The ve primary planets are Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. Newton sometimes call the
satellites secondary planets and sometimes uses planet to encompass both sets.

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As these examples illustrate, the conceptual gaps that must be closed in typical
cases of scientic theory choice are often much smaller than the gaps that an historian must cross. We might, then, have a series of theory replacements running
from T1 to Tn, where T1 and Tn have little in common although there is a great
deal in common between any two adjacent members of the series. Kuhn recognizes the point. Discussing an historical narrative describing a series of changes
in scientic belief, Kuhn concludes: By the end of the narrative those changes
may be considerable, but they have occurred in small increments, each stage historically situated in a climate somewhat dierent from that of the one before
(2000g [1991], p. 112). The dierence between the small changes that occur in scientic practice and the larger changes that we nd when we look at a longer historical development are central to Kuhns later views on the rationality of theory
choice and on scientic realism. For Kuhn these are distinct issuesa point
that he underlines by distinguishing between questions concerning the rationality
of belief and the rationality of change of belief. In eect, the former is the question of realism, the latter that of theory change. I will focus rst on theory
change.
In his later work, Kuhn clearly holds that in science change of belief is rational
even though incommensurability occurs. For example, after reviewing the traditional demand for observations that are neutral with respect to all beliefs, Kuhn
writes:
From the historical perspective, however, where change of belief is whats at
issue, the rationality of the conclusions requires only that the observations
invoked be neutral for, or shared by, the members of the group making the
decision, and for them only at the time the decision is being made. By the same
token, the observations involved need no longer be independent of all prior
beliefs, but only of those that would be modied as a result of the change.
The very large body of beliefs unaected by the change provides a basis on
which discussion of the desirability of change can rest. It is simply irrelevant
that some or all of those beliefs may be set aside at some future time. To
provide a basis for rational discussion they, like the observations the discussion invokes, need only be shared by the discussants. (Kuhn, 2000g [1991],
p. 113)
Kuhn still maintains that there is incommensurability between the competing views
involved in such local changes, but this is because he holds that incommensurability
is just untranslatability, where translation is to be understood as a quasi-mechanical
activity governed in full by a manual which species, as a function of context, which
string in one language may, salva veritate, be substituted for a string in another language (Kuhn, 2000e [1989], p. 60). As a result, Incommensurability thus becomes a
sort of untranslatability, localized to one area or another in which two lexical taxonomies dier (Kuhn, 2000f [1991], p. 93). But, Kuhn now insists, translation is not
required either for communication or for rational theory choice. A dierent cognitive processwhich he describes as interpretation and as language learning is
required.

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Translation is, of course, only the rst resort of those who seek comprehension.
Communication can be established in its absence. But where translation is not
feasible, the very dierent processes of interpretation and language acquisition
are required. These processes are not arcane. Historians, anthropologists, and
perhaps small children engage in them every day. (Kuhn, 2000b [1983], p. 53;
cf. 2000a [1993], p. 238)
A few years later, discussing historians, with their frequent need to cross larger conceptual gaps than that of scientists involved in actual theory choice, Kuhn writes:
Faced with untranslatable statements, the historian becomes bilingual, rst
learning the lexicon required to frame the problematic statements and then,
if it seems relevant, comparing the whole older system (a lexicon plus the science developed with it) to the system in current use. Most of the terms used in
either system will be shared by both, and most of these shared terms occupy
the same positions in both lexicons. Comparisons made using those terms
alone ordinarily provide a sucient basis for judgment. (Kuhn, 2000e [1989],
p. 77)12
Kuhn also tells us that anything which can be said in one language can, with
imagination and eort, be understood by a speaker of another. What is prerequisite
to such understanding, however, is not translation but language learning (ibid., p.
61). And, with sucient patience and eort, [one can] discover the categories of
another culture or of an earlier stage of ones own (Kuhn, 2000d [1991], p.
220). At this point it looks as if incommensurability is irrelevant for questions of theory choice.
Kuhn also backs o from his metaphor of a scientic revolution as a gestalt shift
(although this may still be an appropriate analogy for particular historical studies).
To speak, as I repeatedly have, of a communitys undergoing a gestalt shift is to
compress an extended process into an instant, leaving no room for the microprocesses by which the change is achieved (Kuhn, 2000e [1989], p. 88). Indeed, Kuhn
even clams that the possibility of signicant comparisons of competing modes of scientic practice was never for me in question (Kuhn, 2000b [1983], p. 55). Leaving
aside considerations of whether Kuhn is correctly reporting his earlier views, once
we acknowledge the possibility of mutual understanding, there is no residual problem of the rationality of theory comparison. Moreover, this applies not only to the
use of dierent concepts, but also to dierences in evaluation standards and in conceptualization of the data. In all these cases, there may be genuine disagreements
disagreements that are more severe than those acknowledged by logical empiricists
but there is no reason why failures of rational discussion need occur. To be sure, such

12

At his death Kuhn was working on a new systematic account of scientic change in which the notion
of a lexicon appears to be the centerpiece (see, e.g., 2000a [1993], p. 239). Perhaps the manuscript will be
edited and published at some point. This concept is often mentioned in Kuhns last papers, but there is no
published systematic account. While the term appears in some passages that I quote, nothing in the present
discussion turns on its exact characterization.

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failures may occur among those who do not approach the problem with sucient
eort, patience, and imagination, but there is no problem of theory comparison that
transcends rational mediation. Such mediation is possible because scientists are not
limited to thinking in the language of a single theory. Given the ability to understand
incommensurable theories, and the occurrence of these theories in a wider shared linguistic framework, they can derive results that are expressible either in this common
language or in the language of each theory. Let us consider some examples of such
mediation.
Innovators and early adopters of a new framework are often masters of the previous view and thus able to nd means of catching the attention and interest of those
they would convert. Galileos use of the rock dropped onto a moving ship provides
an example. Once the test is done, there is no particular diculty in seeing where the
rock lands. And while die-hard Aristotelians may attempt to explain away the result,
Galileos correct prediction could also provide an opportunity for an opponent to
wonder how Galileo had arrived at his result, and undertake to learn his approach.
Note also that one of Galileos major projects in his Dialogue is to show that Aristotelian arguments against the motion of the earth commit specic logical fallacies
that would be familiar to Aristotelians. (Finocchiaro, 1980, provides detailed analyses of many of these arguments). Another example is provided by the shape of the
planetary orbits for Descartes and Newton. Since they both required that their theories explain these shapes, Newton could argue that his theory gets them right while
Descartess theory cannot do this. In a similar way, in presenting special relativity
Einstein starts o from two well known problems: a problem in the interpretation
of Maxwellian electrodynamics, and a problem of consistency between two postulates that others had already found attractive. He then resolves these problems while
working within the established mode of mathematical physics, and in a way that preserves Maxwells equations and explains why Newtonian physicswhich is supersededworks as well as it does. From this perspective, Kitchers (1978) account
of reference potential, which allows for the exible identication of some items countenanced by a later theory with items invoked by a predecessor, is one technique that
can be used by both historians and innovators to build bridges between competing
theories.
An important feature of Kuhns later approach to theory comparison is its invocation of human cognitive abilitieswhich introduces scientists (in addition to abstractly formulable linguistic structures) into his account of theory evaluation.
This introduction of scientists into philosophy of science was a central theme of
Structure, although it dropped into the background in much of Kuhns later work.
I want to review the role this theme played in Structure. Again, the discussion is best
set in the context of the philosophical situation in 1962.
Recall that logical empiricists drew a central distinction between context of discovery and context of justication. The latter deals with logical relations between observation statements, on one hand, and those generalizations and theoretical claims that
go beyond observation statements, on the other. Logical empiricists held that the
philosophical analysis of sciencewhich includes the analysis of its epistemic statusis concerned only with logical relations. Any considerations of the psychology

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of the actors in the development and acceptance of scientic claims was considered
irrelevant to epistemic evaluation and was relegated to the context of discovery. We
should be clear that the context of discovery was not rejected as unimportant, but
only as irrelevant to the task of philosophical analysis. The psychology of discovery,
for example, is a legitimate eld of scientic researchbut the evaluation of its results depends (it was held) on their meeting the appropriate criteria for the evaluation of scientic theoriescriteria which must be established independently of any
particular scientic results.
In Structures introductory chapter Kuhn indicated that he would be challenging
the distinction between the two contexts (1962, pp. 89). This challenge is captured
especially in Kuhns thesis that observation and logic are not sucient to account for
revolutionary theory change, and his attempt to close the gap by taking into account
aspects of the psychology of scientists and the social interactions in scientic communities.13 While many rejected this as an inappropriate intrusion of psychology and
sociology into epistemology,14 Kuhns move is more accurately interpreted as a proposal to rethink the epistemological relevance of psychological and social factors.15
In other words, Kuhns claim is that in order to understand and evaluate scientic
theory choice we must attend to the scientic process as well as the scientic product.
The relevant aspects of the scientic process are not passing quirks of the scientists
involved, but rather the skills that scientists develop through their training and
continuing scientic work. Skills are lodged in individual scientists, but are no more
subjective in a pejorative sense than is the ability to drive a car. These skills include
the cognitive resources that Kuhn is invoking when he writes, in his later papers, of
the need forand availability ofpatience and imagination in understanding a
competing theory. The point, then, is that human theory evaluation is dependent
on human psychology and we cannot give an adequate account of this process without taking human psychology into account. Note especially that this dependence on
our psychology is not just a limiting constraint on the prospects of human knowledgeit is also a feature that enables the development of knowledge. Our ability
to respond with intelligence and sensitivity overcomes the gaps left by failures of
translation which are inevitable given that early conceptualizations are often quite
inadequate, and that scientic progress requires both the introduction of new concepts and elimination of older concepts which no longer have a role to play in the
researchers repertoire.
We are, however, not completely nished with incommensurability. In Kuhns
late works the impact of incommensurability appears in the evaluation of beliefs
that is, the question of realism. If, as Kuhn maintains, the development of science
13
Kuhn discusses two situations in which logic and observation are not sucient for theory choice. One
occurs in normal science, where shared principles close the gap. The other more severe case occurs in
revolutionary situations where these principles are among the items being challenged.
14
For example: On my rst reading of Thomas S. Kuhns The Structure of Scientic Revolutions (1962)
I was so deeply shocked at his repudiation of the distinction between the context of discovery and the
context of justication that I put the book down without nishing it (Salmon, 1991, p. 325).
15
In this regard, Structure is continuous with the naturalistic approach to epistemology that was
emerging at that time.

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161

requires the introduction of new concepts that are not translatable into existing concepts, then it seems impossible to assess whether successive frameworks are moving
closer to a correct description of items in their domain. Commenting on the question
of sciences zeroing in on, getting closer and closer to, the truth, Kuhn contends that
such claims are meaningless, and that this is a consequence of incommensurability
(2000a [1993], pp. 243244). Elsewhere Kuhn writes: I am not suggesting, let me
emphasize, that there is a reality which science fails to get at. My point is rather that
no sense can be made of the notion of reality as it has ordinarily functioned in philosophy of science (2000g [1991], p. 115). In what I take to be his clearest statement
of the basis for this position, Kuhn begins with the untranslatability of a lexicon into
its successor. As a result, the earlier statements are immune to an evaluation conducted with [the later] conceptual categories. But, he adds, The immunity of such
statements is, of course, only to being judged one at a time, labeled individually with
truth values or some other index of epistemic status. Another sort of judgment is
possible, and in scientic development something very like it repeatedly occurs
(Kuhn, 2000e [1989], p. 76). The passage quoted earlier on becoming bilingual follows, and Kuhn continues:
But what is then being judged is the relative success of two whole systems in
pursuing an almost stable set of scientic goals, a very dierent matter from
the evaluation of individual statements within a given system.
Evaluation of a statements truth values [sic] is, in short, an activity that can be
conducted only with a lexicon already in place, and its outcome depends upon
that lexicon. If, as standard forms of realism suppose, a statements being true
or false depends simply on whether or not it corresponds to the real world
independent of time, language, and culturethen the world itself must be
somehow lexicon dependent. Whatever form that dependence takes, it poses
problems for a realist perspective, problems that I take to be both genuine
and urgent. (Ibid., p. 77)
Although Kuhns argument turns on the supposed impossibility of evaluating individual statements in a theory, he does not invoke the DuhemQuine thesis here.
Rather, his argument depends on his view that the meaning of scientic concepts
is determined by their relations to other concepts. Kuhn treats the view that meaning
is dependent on relations among scientic terms as itself incompatible with realism.
I suggest that, with the help of some ambiguity in the notion of evaluation being
dependenton the lexicon, Kuhn has confused three dierent issues. First, there is the
claim that the conceptual content of the claims of a theory is dependent on the system
of concepts in which it occurs. Second, the DuhemQuine thesis supports the view
that only entire theoretical systems are subject to epistemicin particular, empiricalevaluation. But neither of these speak to the third issue: what it means to attribute truth values to individual statements in a system. Suppose we have a scientic
theory that embodies a set of interrelated concepts, and that the available evidence
supports this theory. It makes good sense not only to accept the entire theory, but
also to hold that each of the sentences constituting the theory is truewhere this
means that each sentence correctly describes the items it speaks about. This is just

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a dierent question from that of how the meaning of these sentences is determined.
What we must avoid is the all-too-common confusion between the meaning of a
claim, the evidence for (or against) it, and what it means to say that a claim is true.
Although the evidence may support only the theory as a whole, this does not block
attribution of truth to the individual sentences of that theory. Moreover, if a theory
is replaced, a bilingual historian or scientist aware of the new evidence, canthinking in terms of the older theoryconclude that certain claims in the theory are false,
and explore which claims carry over to the new theory (recall Kuhns remark, cited
above, that most of these claims will be retained), or have close successors in that
new theory.
Two further points are worth making. First, there is no reason why realism
understood as a quest for the correct account of things-in-themselvesneed be tied
to the view that scientic knowledge is apportioned to individual sentences. There is
no bar to a version of realism which holds that a theoretical system is the minimum
unit of correspondence. Thus even if one rejects attribution of truth-values to individual sentences, a robust form of scientic realism remains a possibility. Second,
Kuhns argument from incommensurability does provide grounds for rejecting the
view that science pursues such accounts in a linearly progressive fashion. But this
is not the same as rejecting the claim that science pursues correct accounts, nor does
it eliminate all grounds for thinking that, as science develops, our ability to pursue
this goal improves. I want to consider such an alternative approach.
We must not forget the central role that empirical evidence plays in driving
research (cf. Brown, 1990, 1995, 2001). This occurs in two respects. First, much research is directly elicited by experience. In recent decades many have argued for a
central role of theory in driving research. While I think this is basically correct,
the point was often overstated because it emerged as part of a critique of logical
empiricism which focused mainly on the empirical side of science, and gave theory
only a secondary role. By now we can see that experience and theory are more nearly
equal partners in generating scientic problems. Consider a well worked example: at
the beginning of planetary astronomy the wandering motions of the planets need not
have seemed problematic; they could have just been listed among the observed facts.
It required the hypothesis that all true planetary motions are circular to generate theoretical research. But let us not forget the other side. The belief in circular motion
would not have generated a research problem without the observation of celestial
items that appeared to violate this hypothesis. The point is especially dramatic when
nature impinges on researchers in unexpected wayssuch as in the initial observations of sperm, X rays, and radioactivity.16 To be sure, none of these phenomena

16

The case of sperm is less well known than the other two. Sperm were discovered in seminal uid in the
1670s by the early microscopists van Leeuwenhoek and Hartsoeker. Initially it was unclear what role, if
any, they played in reproduction (Farley, 1981; Gasking, 1967, p. 54). For a substantial period after their
discovery many naturalists believed that sperm were parasites of the testes that had no reproductive
functiona view that survived into the nineteenth century (Farley, 1982, pp. 4347). The exact role that
sperm played remained a subject of dispute for some 200 years (see Farley, 1982 for an extended
discussion).

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would have seemed surprising without some theoretical background that indicated
what to expect, but these new lines of research were initiated by the new observations. In more or less dramatic ways, this same interplay holds throughout the history of scientic innovation. One side or the other may dominate in a particular case,
but both are required to generate new research.
But while the theoretical and experiential sides may be roughly equal in generating new research, the decision to accept a theory depends ultimately on its ability to
handle the results of our interactions with nature. This is the second role of evidence
noted above: it is the nal arbiter of scientic acceptability. Sometimes, in a well
developed science, a piece of research may be primarily driven by theoretical considerations. Diracs determination to construct a relativistically correct quantum
theory that uses only rst derivatives is as clear an example of successful theory-driven science as we are likely to nd. The quest carried him through a signicant
mathematical innovationintroduction of matrices where previously standard
practice would require numbers or vectorsand the introduction of a new conceptantimatter. But the work also had empirical consequencessome already
known, some new. It is only because of its empirical successes that the theory prevailed. In the face of empirical failures, any theoretical principlecircular celestial
motions, conservation of energy, direct proportionality of force and acceleration,
stability of species, the total separation between space and timecan be reconsidered and replaced no matter how well founded it may once have seemed in experience and reason.
Now, a proper understanding of empirical evidence in science requires another
break with the classical empiricist traditionone that, I think, Kuhn never made.
The epistemic signicance of empirical evidence does not derive from its dependence
on our senses. Rather, we pursue evidence pertaining to presumed items in the world
by attempting to interact with those items.17 We evaluate claims about items in a domain by attempting to probe them in various ways, and the greater the variety of
probes at our disposal, the richer the body of evidence we have for these claims.
The development of instrumentationbeginning with Galileos use of the telescope
and exploding in the twentieth centuryhas greatly increased the variety of ways in
which we probe nature; it has also increased the precision of the results of these
probes.18 On this view our senses play a pragmaticnot a foundationalrole in
gathering empirical evidence: our senses are the means by which information about
items in the world enters into our cognitive systems. But the information does not
reduce to the sensationstheory-laden or notthat provide this access.

17
Kuhn approaches this point when he writes that a science students world is determined jointly by the
environment and the particular normal-scientic tradition that the student has been trained to pursue
(1962, p. 112), and by his frequent invocation of the role of nature in producing anomalies. But the
emphasis in these passages is usually on the role of the tradition, and Kuhn does not systematically pursue
the role of items that are independent of our beliefs in scientic research.
18
As one indicator of this explosion, consider that we no longer just have telescopes that gather light. In
addition to optical telescopes, we have radio, infra-red, ultraviolet, X-ray, and neutrino telescopes. For
extended discussions of this view of evidence see Brown (1987, 1995, 2001, 2005).

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From this perspective, the process of conceptual change in science is, in part, a
process by which we seek concepts that describe items that exist independently of
our theories. These items form the subject matter of our theorizing; they are the
items we seek to learn about when we construct and test theories. Sometimes we succeed in picking out items (such as Mars) or kinds of items (such as gold) that provide
a stable focus for research as our ideas about them change. Even if the concepts we
use to think about these items undergo radical change, it is clear that we are discussing the same things throughout, and no fundamental problem arises about comparing successive theories because they are all clearly accounts of the same items. But
this type of research is not the onlyor even the dominantmode of scientic research. It is not the kind of research that led to quarks, gluons, and weak-interaction
bosons; nor is it the kind of research that drives the search for the Higgs boson, or
Newtons identication of change of speed and change of direction as instances of
the same phenomenon, or the (limited) unication of space and time in special relativity. Nor does it apply to cases such as the unexpected darkening of Becquerls photographic plate that led to the discovery of radioactivity. The last example suggests a
familiar variation on the notion that scientists identify and study stable referents:
that one introduces a new item as whatever caused an observed phenomenon, and
that research proceeds to seek out that cause. This is another kind of research that
does occur, but there is a great deal of research that does not t this pattern either.
For example, the approach gives no insight into the development from the Aristotelian search for the cause of the continued motion of projectiles to the (rather dierent) Cartesian and Newtonian conclusions that there is no cause. Nor does it help us
understand the introduction of isospin and its role in modern accounts of the stability of atomic nuclei, or into the role of the weak interaction in understanding why
some nuclei undergo radioactive decay. Nor do either of these approaches give
any insight into the myriad cases in which classications of items as the same kind
are changed. Often cited examples include the changing classications of the earth
and planets, and of the sun and stars, as well as the fate of the Aristotelian elementsnone of which are to be found on modern lists of the chemical elements.
Nor are any of the modern chemical elements on this ancient listseven though
some of these elements were familiar to the ancients.19 Another, more subtle type
of fundamental reclassication is exemplied by the shift from viewing rest and uniform motion as dierent kinds to considering them as instances of the same kind,
and the similar shift with regard to change of speed and change of direction. Meanwhile, research into the structure of atoms has continued to multiply fundamental
kinds, moving from a compact account in terms of just electrons, protons, and neutrons in the early 1930s to the standard model which includes six leptons, six
quarks, 12 eld bosons, the (as yet undetected) graviton and Higgs boson, plus an
anti-particle for each. That is 50 kinds of entities47 if neutrinos are their own
anti-particles. Theories that go beyond the standard model add additional kinds
of entities. Most of theseas well as some of the key properties by which they are
19
An ancient Chinese classication of elements into air, water, earth, metal, and wood suered the same
fate (Leicester, 1971, pp. 5355; Brock, 1993, p. 6).

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characterized and dierentiatedwere not conceived of in, say, 1900. In some cases
the question whether two items are instances of the same kind is downright misleading since what counts as the same kind varies with the research context. Protons and
neutrons are the same with respect to the strong interaction, but not with respect to
the electromagnetic interaction. Isotopes of an element share some properties, but
not others; thus most chemical elements are clusters of a number of dierent kinds.
Thorium, for example, has more than 25 known radiactive isotopes with half-lives
running from microseconds to billions of years; H2O in which the hydrogen is
deuterium is toxic. The list expands when we consider isomers of a compound and
ionization states of an atom.
We must recognize that there are multiple forms of scientic research and theory
change, with dierent features providing continuity through dierent changes. This
is quite in accord with Kuhns late view of the microstructure of scientic change.
Thus we return to the question whether we have any good reasons for believing that
we are making progress towards the correct description of items in the world as they
are apart from our theorizing. Given the scope of the conceptual changes that occur
as science develops, an argument on behalf of such progress must allow for a highly
non-linear approach in which we may be on the wrong track for substantial periods
of timeperhaps for most of the history of subjectand for cases in which a new
theoretical development actually moves us further away from the description we
seek. An account of progress that is compatible with this kind of development can
be built on the above remarks about the development of instrumentation yielding
a wider variety of means of interaction with nature, along with results of much higher precision, than in the past. All of these interactions provide constraints on our theorizingconstraints that come from nature. A theory that meets contemporary
constraints has thus passed tougher tests than were available in the past, while the
range and precision of such tests continues to grow. As a result, we have a strong
reason for believing that contemporary theories provide a better account of nature
than their predecessors, even though we cannot measure how close we are. Moreover, as the process of theory testing continues, the constraints on successful theories
continue to grow.20 Note especially that the theory-dependence of observationin
the sense that observational results must be interpreted in terms of the concepts of
the theory being evaluatedsupports this point. It is the pursuit of such interpretation that allows us to recognize cases in which empirical results are incompatible
with a particular theory, and to consider other theories with which they are compatible. Note also how incommensurabilityunderstood as the inability to translate
newly introduced concepts into a previously available frameworkhas dropped
out of the discussion. Empirical evaluation of a theory can take place within the
framework of that theory. Failures of the theory can be recognized, and attempts
to construct or learn an alternative can begin.
20
There is a tension between this account of improving grounds for accepting theories and the
pessimistic induction from the failures of previously well supported theories. The response is to note that
the inductive evidence for many scientic theories is stronger than the inductive evidence for the
pessimistic induction. For details see Levin (1979); Brown (1990).

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We can now also get beyond two further points that have generated some confusion in the literature. First, given that we need a theoretical framework to carry out
coherent research, Kuhn (1962), Lakatos (1970), and others have maintained that
theory evaluation is not just between nature and a theory, but always involves
two competing theories. However, this thesis runs together two quite dierent points.
We can agree that scientists do not reject an established theoryleaving themselves
with no basis for organized researchunless they have an alternative to adopt. In
this sense, theory evaluation is comparative. But scientists do not need an alternative
theory in order to recognize that the prevailing theory is empirically or conceptually
defective, and thus seek an alternative. The empirical failings and internal inconsistency of Bohrs theory of the atom were well known, but it took some time until Heisenberg and Schrodinger provided an appropriate successor.
Second, the kind of incommensurability that remains at this point in our discussion
does not involve even a hint of relativism. It does involve a large dose of fallibilism:
recognition that science proceeds by means of theories that are subject to reconsideration and replacement by radically dierent theories. But, we have seen, the replacement process is based on specic comparisons between theories. This does not mean
that evaluations will be simple, straightforward, or algorithmiconly that there will
be sucient grounds for coherent debate, which may include specication of further
tests that could lead to a decision. Most importantly, as long as we are doing science,
we must accommodate theories to the results of empirical probes, and it is not the case
that any theory can be defended come what may. Note especially that those who invoke the DuhemQuine thesis to argue that we can protect any given thesis acknowledge that once we have an incorrect prediction from a theoretical complex, something
is wrong. Thus the attempt to protect a favored thesis comes only at the cost of making other changes in this complex. It is then an open question whether specic changes
made to protect a favored hypothesis generate further empirical anomalies (see
Greenwood, 1990 and Brown, 2001 for further discussion).
A key question now emerges: Do the empirical constraints on our theories ever become suciently powerful to require acceptance of a single theory? There is no simple
answer to this question, and it may be dierent in dierent domainssuch as the
cause of polio and the fundamental constituents of the material world. Still, we must
not forget that elimination of specic theories, or classes of theories, from serious consideration, is an important form of progress in our knowledge of the world.
There is one more form of incommensurability that remains to be considered: the
psychological problem that arises for many people in adapting to new concepts and
evaluation criteria. Three points are worth making in this regard. First, human cognitive history shows thatas a specieswe are capable of carrying out this task. To
be sure, some people are more able to make such adjustments than others, and the
number of people who introduce new ideas is considerably smaller than the number
of those who can learn them. No doubt some are left behind in the process. But
unanimous acceptance is not a requirement for genuine progress. Second, as Kuhn
has recognized, the gaps that must be crossed to introduce and learn new frameworks are considerably smaller than have sometimes been supposed. Even the transition to a strikingly new framework can result from relatively small systematic

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167

changes in an available framework. As a result, there are conceptual bridges that can
help those who put in the required work to make the transition. Third, it is worth
repeating that innovators and early adopters of a new framework are often masters
of the previous view and thus able to nd means of generating interest in the members of an existing community and constructing the required bridges.
Beyond these three observations, there remain such problems as a detailed understanding of how people adapt to new concepts, and why some adapt more easily than
others. More generally, there is a problem that Kuhn maintains was always his central concern: What was and is at issue is not signicant comparability but rather the
shaping of cognition by language, a point by no means epistemologically innocuous
(2000b [1983], p. 55). But these are empirical questions to be pursued by the appropriate sciences.

3. Conclusion
Kuhns later remarks on incommensurability change the account of its signicance that is commonly attributed to him. These remarks also provide an opportunity for reconsidering the signicance of incommensurability for philosophy of
science. One important feature of these remarks is Kuhns return to a theme that
has pervaded his writings, but that he never fully exploited: debates between advocates of competing views can draw on a wide range of human cognitive resources;
we are not limited to matching words in a translation manual. An anecdote from
outside of science may help underline the point. When the rst joint performance
of the Spanish soprano Montserrat Caballe and the American tenor Richard Tucker
was being planned, the organizers had some concerns about their ability to work together because she did not speak English and he did not speak Spanish. But she
spoke German and he spoke Yiddish, and they had no trouble communicating. Scientists who share a wider cultureboth scientic and extra-scienticand who are
genuinely trying to understand each other can do as well. As a result, the introduction of new ideas into science does not undermine the process of rational assessment.
This is fortunate because once we recognize that humanity did not begin its intellectual journey already possessing all the concepts and methodological tools that would
ever be required, incommensurability becomes a requirement for progress.
Incommensurability does raise a problem about certain forms of realism. I have
suggested a way of thinking about realism that builds on the empiricist traditionalthough with some important modications. This approach provides a reason
for thinking that the realist aim is pursuable, and that it may even be achievable in,
at least, some domains.

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