Marxism and the Philosophy of Science - A Critical History

Sheehan retraces the development of a Marxist philosophy of science through detailed and highly readable accounts of the debates that shaped it. Skilfully deploying a large cast of characters, Sheehan shows how Marx and Engel's ideas on the development and structure of natural science had a crucial impact on the work of early twentieth-century natural philosophers, historians of science, and natural scientists. ,, A singular achievement. Sheehan is masterful in her presentation of the dialectics of nature debates, which begin with Engels and recur throughout the periods covered by this book." Science and Society ,,Sheehan's history is a remarkably effective combination of solid scholarship and engaging writing. Any reader who is led by the title of this book to expect a ponderous study of a technical branch of Marxist philosophy is in for a pleasant surprise. For Sheehan's prose is lively and full of feeling, and she approaches the philosophy of science not as a narrow specialty but as the key to understanding and appraising the many different turns taken by Marxist thinkers in the doctrine's first hundred years." Slavic Review