Concepts at work: the dynamics of scientific concepts in the case of research on multiple and interacting galaxies (1925-1980)

该项目的目标是双重的：首先，它旨在重建一个重要的发展在20世纪世纪天体物理学;第二，这种重建应有助于我们的一般理解的动态的经验概念在现代科学。调查的重点是1925年至1980年之间的星系研究，更具体地说，是研究所谓的多重和相互作用星系的创新链。这一研究链几乎没有受到历史分析，但基本的星系概念的发展，并引发了一个全新的宇宙学研究前景，其中星系从静止的岛屿宇宙和仅仅是映射科学的标记发展成为动态实体和准实验科学的“宇宙实验室”。与此同时，研究链的特点是一个非常具体的研究集群：不同国家的少数研究人员在不同的研究条件下工作，他们在非常少的经验数据基础上相互交流的时间最长。这一交换导致星系概念的不断转变;因此，它将成为研究的核心。在主要由天文学本身呈现的历史陈述中，由技术进步引发的意外发现，虽然发生在基本不变的概念框架内，但被视为天体物理学进步的主要推动力。该项目有可能改变这一观点。通过关注概念框架及其在科学传播中的转变和转变，该项目采取了一种新颖的方法。此外，调查将显示这种“将概念付诸实践”如何允许整合，即在逐渐合并为一个连贯的研究活动之前，不同的研究观点共存。最后，这一重点将承担洞察概念动态，从而将该项目的背景下，一个新的历史兴趣的科学概念。作为跨学科小组项目的一部分，该项目汇集了历史，哲学以及科学社会学，旨在富有成效地利用Ludwik Fleck的比较科学理论，该研究将进一步促进对天体物理事实如何形成和发展的共同调查。

The proposed project's objectives are twofold: first, it aims at reconstructing an important development within 20th century astrophysics; second, this reconstruction should contribute to our general understanding of the dynamics of empirical concepts in modern sciences. The investigation focuses on the studies of galaxies between 1925 and 1980 and, more specifically, on the innovative strand which studied so called multiple and interacting galaxies. This research strand has scarcely been subject to historical analysis, but fundamental in the development of the galaxy concept and instigated a whole new outlook for cosmological studies in which galaxies developed from being stationary island universes and mere markers of a mapping science into dynamic entities and 'cosmic laboratories' of a quasi experimental science. At the same time, the research strand features a very specific research constellation: a small number of researchers in different countries working under diverging research conditions who communicated with each other for the longest time on the basis of very little empirical data. This exchange entailed the continuous transformation of the galaxy concept; it will hence lie at the heart of the investigation. In historical presentations, mainly presented by astronomy itself, unexpected chance discoveries triggered by technological progress, while taking place within an essentially unchanging framework of concepts have been perceived as the main impulses for the advancement of astrophysics. The project has the potential to revise this perspective. By focusing on conceptual frameworks and their shifts and transformations within the scientific communication, the project takes a novel approach. Moreover, the investigation will show how this 'putting concepts into work' allowed for the integration i.e. coexistence of diverging research outlooks before they gradually merged into a coherent research activity. Finally, this focus will bear insights into conceptual dynamics and thus place the project within the context of a new historical interest for scientific concepts. As part of an interdisciplinary group project which brings together history, philosophy as well as sociology of science and aims at making fruitful use of the comparative theory of science of Ludwik Fleck, the study will, furthermore, contribute to the shared investigation of how astrophysical facts come into being and develop.