List of Possible Courses that meet the History, Philosophy, or Sociology of Science requirement for Science Standard I

EDUC 725: Recent issues in science education

Critical examination of recent research and policy initiatives in the teaching and learning of science in the context of contemporary schooling. Areas of focus include research in cognitive science on constructivism, the conceptual change model, development of curricula, and national standards and assessments.

History 180 Western Science and Technology I: From the Greeks to the Scientific Revolution (HS) (1st sem)

Focus on the birth of Western science in the rational cosmology of the ancient Greeks, on its transmission to medieval Europe, and its eventual overturning in the Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries.

History 181 Western Science and Technology II: From the Enlightenment to the Cold War (HS) (2nd sem)

Science in the modern world from the Enlightenment to the Cold War. Key scientific issues of the modern age, the social organization of science, the place of the scientific community in larger social and cultural context, and the expanding relationship between science and modern technology.

History 397 Special Topics: The Scientific Revolution 1500-1700

The transformation of Western ideas about the constitution of Nature and the place of natural knowledge in society. The nature of that transformation and the new relationships between authority, political power, and the natural knowledge generated by the New Science and the experimental philosophy. Focus on Copernicus, Galileo, Descartes, Bacon, and Boyle.

History 432 U.S. Science and Technology I: From Franklin to Edison (1st sem)

Transformation of American science and technology, ca. 1800-1882, and the economic, political, and cultural contexts in which it occurred.

History 433 U.S. Science and Technology II: From Edison to the Bomb (2nd sem)

Edison and Oppenheimer bridge two fundamental transformations in modern science, its linkage to late 19th century industrialization and its essential involvement with national security. The course of science and technology from the first through the second transformation.

Philosophy 382 Philosophical Approaches to Science

Introduction to the logic and methodology of science, and to scientific thinking. How to think scientifically, how to distinguish science from pseudo-science, and how to recognize and avoid common fallacies in everyday reasoning.

Philosophy 582 Philosophy of Science
Critical study of issues in confirmation theory. For advanced undergraduates and graduate students. Prerequisites: two courses in philosophy or consent of instructor.

Biology 105 Biology of Social Issues (BS) (both sem)

For non-science or science majors; not for Biology major credit. Aspects of biology of current social concern: organic evolution as fact, fertility, embryogenesis, birth defects, genetic engineering, race, population growth, and other topics

Astronomy 215 History of Astronomy (ASTFC 15)

Astronomy and cosmology from earliest times, Egyptian, Babylonian, Greek, Islamic; the medieval universe; Middle Ages; Copernican revolution, the infinite universe; Newtonian universe; mechanistic universe of the 18th and 19th centuries. Gravitational theory; origin, structure, and evolution of stars and galaxies; developments in modern astronomy. Nontechnical; emphasis on history and cosmology.

Sociology 109 Population and Environment (SBD)

Introduction to sociology. Analysis of population trends such as fertility, mortality, and migration. The sociological significance of population pressures on human environments, environmental changes, and changes in populations themselves.

Amherst College

History 67s:  History of Science

History 68:    Science and Society in Modern America

Philosophy of Science (PHIL 37)

Philosophy of Mathematics (PHIL 50)

Natural Philosophy: The Conceptual Puzzle of the Quantum World (Colloquium 24)

Hampshire College

NS 123 Human Biological Variation: Exploding Myths Of Race

Mt. Holyoke College

121f   The Unity of Science

Smith College

Anthropology244 Gender, Science, and Culture

The starting point for this course will be feminist anthropological studies of the biology of women's bodies. The course is located at the intersection of feminist critiques of science, ethnographic studies of modern Western scientific practices, and the new historiography of science. The course will range from women's explicit exclusion from the beginnings of science in 16th and 17th century Western Europe to contemporary practices of in vitro fertilization and germ-line engineering.

Philosophy 209 Philosophy and History of Psychology

An examination of the philosophical issues which have troubled psychology as a science, such as determinism and free will, conscious and unconscious processes, the possibility and efficacy of self-knowledge, development of knowledge and morality, behaviorism vs. mentalism, realism and constructivism, and the relation of mind and brain. Prerequisite: at least one 100-level course in philosophy or psychology.

Philosophy 224 Philosophy and History of Scientific Thought

What is science? Is it a method, a practice or an accumulated body of truths? Does it give us objective and universal knowledge? How do scientific discoveries affect the world and the way we know it and live in it?

History 244 (L) The Scientific Revolution, 1500-1700

Science, society, and religion in Europe from the Middle Ages to the French Revolution. Topics include Aristotelianism; magic and occult philosophies; baroque artisans and the mechanical philosophy; Galileo and the Catholic Church; Descartes vs. Newton; Newtonianism, deism, and atheism in the 18th century.

List prepared 4/23/01

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