Reality as a Subject of Scientific Knowledge in the Philosophy of Pierre Duhem
Authors: Yakimenko A. V. 
Published: February 2025

Introduction. This article is devoted to Pierre Duhem's contribution to the formation of the subject of philosophy of science. His main work was recognised by Ernst Mach, who wrote the preface to his main philosophical work. Usually the second stage of the formation of positivism is associated with the names of E. Mach, R. Avenarius, A. Poincaré, and very rarely include P. Duhem among the empiriocritics. However, Duhem is one of the greatest representatives of the positivist tradition, besides he influenced the formation of analytical philosophy. It is not by chance that his ideas were used by W. Quine, formulating the Duhem Quine thesis. Duhem was a fundamental physicist, a representative of positivism, and at the same time he can be referred to the deepest metaphysicians of his time. His metaphysics is manifested in the constant search for the relation between reality and the physical theory describing it. The notions “reality” and “real” occur more than fifty times in his work on the structure of physical theory. Therefore, the aim of the article is to clarify the essential and constitutive foundations of Duhem's philosophy, which define his position as both an empirio-criticist and a serious metaphysician. The scientific novelty of the present study is that the article demonstrates the methodological role of philosophical ontological paradigms in the formation and development of science.

Methodology and sources. The results of the research were based on the comparative analysis of texts by P. Duhem (“Physical Theory. Its Purpose and Structure”), empiriocritic E. Mach (“Knowledge and Delusion”), representative of analytical philosophy W. Quine (“Two Dogmas of Empiricism”) and neo-Kantian G. Feichinger (“The Philosophy of “As If””). Quine (“The Two Dogmas of Empiricism”) and neo-Kantian G. Feichinger (“Philosophy “As If””), as well as the works of researchers of different aspects of Duhem's philosophy: A. Loreti, M. Buzzoni, S.L. Giacchi, R. Niall D. Martin, M. Gegen, S. Psillos; E.S. de O. Barra; E. Ströcker. The article also applied an analytical method to clarify the basic concepts of Duhem's philosophy and the conceptual foundations of the relation between scientific knowledge and reality in his understanding of science.

Results and discussion. Duhem can be spoken of both as a profound investigator of the structure and purpose of physical theory and as an original metaphysician. Within the circle of his metaphysical concerns falls the question of the relation between physical theory and reality. Duhem argues that the choice of physical ontology is ultimately determined by metaphysics rather than by physics proper, and theory as an explanation of reality depends on the metaphysical position the scientist takes.

Conclusion. In Duhem's philosophy of science, scientific knowledge is presented as a tool for describing experimental laws, but at the same time as their natural classification, reflecting the actual order of things. Thus, Duhem's conception of the nature of scientific knowledge can be characterised as the position of a physicist scientist who, striving for a “perfect theory”, comes to the metaphysics of epistemological realism.