(Image: OUP)
ROM HARRÉ carefully explores the role of living things in science by way of some famous episodes, from Galvani’s experiments with frogs’ legs to Rosemary and Peter Grant’s studies of finches in the Galapagos. What’s novel is that he arranges the studies according to the logical principles of scientific reasoning. From Harré’s analytical perspective, living organisms, like the canary in the coal mine, can serve as “instruments” – as measuring devices, say, causally related to the real world. But organisms can also become “apparatus”, and act as analogies or models related conceptually to the world. Thus Pavlov’s…
