Chemistry

Stephen Esser (University of Pennsylvania)
Quantum physics is the foundation for chemistry, but the concept of chemical bonding is not easily reconciled with quantum mechanical models of molecular systems. The quantum theory of atoms in molecules (QTAIM), developed by Richard F.W. Bader and colleagues, seeks to define bonding using a topological analysis of the electron density distribution. The "bond paths" identified by the analysis are posited as indicators of a special pairwise physical relationship between atoms. While elements of the theory remain subject to debate, I argue that QTAIM embodies a distinctive interactive conception of bonding that is an attractive alternative to others previously discussed.

Karoliina Pulkkinen (University of Cambridge)
Dmitri Mendeleev's periodic system is known for its predictive accuracy, but not for its completeness. Here, I describe how Mendeleev's valuing of completeness influenced development of the periodic system. After introducing five indicators of its completeness, I zoom into one in particular: the inclusion of a schematic row of oxides. As this row guided Mendeleev's predictions, I argue that completeness was instrumental for using the periodic system for predicting. Beyond this, I argue that Mendeleev's predictions should not be mobilised as an example of predictivism or accommodationism: it is an example of how accommodation was a precondition for making predictions.

Geoffrey Blumenthal (University of Bristol), James Ladyman (University of Bristol)
There are two particularly noteworthy examples in late eighteenth-century chemistry of experiments that were explicitly taken by participants on different sides to be turning points in theory choice. This paper argues that in both cases the experiments were "crucial" in the sense of deciding in favour of one among selected testable hypotheses, and establishing its approximate truth in the terms of the contemporary debate. The views of various influential philosophers of science are reviewed in the light of these cases. It is argued that the crucial experiments in question took considerable practical and intellectual ingenuity to engineer and that they are not typical of how science progresses, but nonetheless important when they can be found.

Jonathon Hricko (National Yang-Ming University), Yafeng Shan (Tel Aviv University)
This paper examines the nature of analogical reasoning in Humphry Davy's work in electrochemistry in order to shed light on the nature of analogical reasoning in scientific practice more generally. We examine Davy's reflections regarding analogical reasoning and specific examples of analogical reasoning in his work on electrochemical decomposition reported in his 1806 and 1807 Bakerian Lectures. We conclude that Davy's analogical reasoning provided a way of guiding scientific practice, and experimentation in particular, in the absence of theoretical consensus. This picture of analogical reasoning presents a useful contrast to much of the philosophical literature on that topic.