---
title: "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions"
chunk: 8/9
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Structure_of_Scientific_Revolutions"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:37:26.249284+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

Relativistic mass: the mass of a particle is equal to the total energy of the particle divided by the speed of light squared. Since the total energy of a particle in relation to one system of reference differs from the total energy in relation to other systems of reference, while the speed of light remains constant in all systems, it follows that the mass of a particle has different values in different systems of reference.
"Real" mass: the mass of a particle is equal to the non-kinetic energy of a particle divided by the speed of light squared. Since non-kinetic energy is the same in all systems of reference, and the same is true of light, it follows that the mass of a particle has the same value in all systems of reference.
Projecting this distinction backwards in time onto Newtonian dynamics, we can formulate the following two hypotheses:

HR: the term "mass" in Newtonian theory denotes relativistic mass.
Hp: the term "mass" in Newtonian theory denotes "real" mass.
According to Field, it is impossible to decide which of these two affirmations is true. Prior to the theory of relativity, the term "mass" was referentially indeterminate. But this does not mean that the term "mass" did not have a different meaning than it now has. The problem is not one of meaning but of reference. The reference of such terms as mass is only partially determined: we do not really know how Newton intended his use of this term to be applied. As a consequence, neither of the two terms fully denotes (refers). It follows that it is improper to maintain that a term has changed its reference during a scientific revolution; it is more appropriate to describe terms such as "mass" as "having undergone a denotional refinement".
In 1973, Donald Davidson objected that the concept of incommensurable scientific paradigms competing with each other is logically inconsistent. In his article Davidson goes well beyond the semantic version of the incommensurability thesis: to make sense of the idea of a language independent of translation requires a distinction between conceptual schemes and the content organized by such schemes. But, Davidson argues, no coherent sense can be made of the idea of a conceptual scheme, and therefore no sense may be attached to the idea of an untranslatable language.
The philosopher Tim Maudlin observes that incommensurability must have limits or "else the need to revise theories would never arise."

=== Incommensurability and perception ===
The close connection between the interpretationalist hypothesis and a holistic conception of beliefs is at the root of the notion of the dependence of perception on theory, a central concept in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Kuhn maintained that the perception of the world depends on how the percipient conceives the world: two scientists who witness the same phenomenon and are steeped in two radically different theories will see two different things(Theory-ladenness). According to this view, our interpretation of the world determines what we see.
Jerry Fodor attempts to establish that this theoretical paradigm is fallacious and misleading by demonstrating the impenetrability of perception to the background knowledge of subjects. The strongest case can be based on evidence from experimental cognitive psychology, namely the persistence of perceptual illusions. Knowing that the lines in the Müller-Lyer illusion are equal does not prevent one from continuing to see one line as being longer than the other. This impenetrability of the information elaborated by the mental modules limits the scope of interpretationalism.
In epistemology, for example, the criticism of what Fodor calls the interpretationalist hypothesis accounts for the common-sense intuition (on which naïve physics is based) of the independence of reality from the conceptual categories of the experimenter. If the processes of elaboration of the mental modules are in fact independent of the background theories, then it is possible to maintain the realist view that two scientists who embrace two radically diverse theories see the world exactly in the same manner even if they interpret it differently. The point is that it is necessary to distinguish between observations and the perceptual fixation of beliefs. While it is beyond doubt that the second process involves the holistic relationship between beliefs, the first is largely independent of the background beliefs of individuals.
Other critics, such as Israel Scheffler, Hilary Putnam and Saul Kripke, have focused on the Fregean distinction between sense and reference in order to defend scientific realism. Scheffler contends that Kuhn confuses the meanings of terms such as "mass" with their referents. While their meanings may very well differ, their referents (the objects or entities to which they correspond in the external world) remain fixed.
In this regard, there is also a discussion of genetic fallacy in terms of how to evaluate theories.

== Subsequent commentary by Kuhn ==
In 1995 Kuhn argued that the Darwinian metaphor in the book should have been taken more seriously than it had been.

== Awards and honors ==
1998 Modern Library 100 Best Nonfiction: The Board's List (69)
1999 National Review 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the Century (25)

== Publication history ==
Kuhn, Thomas S. (1962). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1st ed.). University of Chicago Press. pp. 172. LCCN 62019621.
Kuhn, Thomas S. (1970). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Enlarged (2nd ed.). University of Chicago Press. pp. 210. ISBN 978-0-226-45803-8. LCCN 70107472.
Kuhn, Thomas S. (1996). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (3rd ed.). University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-45807-6. LCCN 96013195.
Kuhn, Thomas S. (2012). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 50th anniversary. Ian Hacking (intro.) (4th ed.). University of Chicago Press. p. 264. ISBN 978-0-226-45811-3. LCCN 2011042476.
Kuhn, Thomas S. (2020). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Marcus du Sautoy (foreword); Ian Hacking (intro.) (Folio Society ed.). Folio Society (licensed by The University of Chicago Press). p. 169.