Teaching physics to in-service primary school teachers and advisors in the
context of history of science: The design of a training curriculum on the topics of
electricity and electromagnetism
KOKKOTAS Panagiotis and PILIOURAS Panagiotis, Pedagogical Department of
Primary Education, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece
kokkotas@primedu.uoa.gr, piliouras@primedu.uoa.gr
Abstract
The paper concerns the design of an in-service primary school teachers and advisors
training curriculum which is based on History and Philosophy of Science (HPS),
using concepts on electricity and electromagnetism.
. The design of the training curriculum will be used for the development of e-material
on the context of the “STeT project”. The training curriculum is based on
socioconstructivist and sociocultural learning principles and embodies appropriate
teaching strategies (e.g. debates,argumentation, group work, simulations) for
exploiting authentic historical science events on the topic of electricity and
electromagnetism. A basic characteristic of the training curriculum is that it is of a
collaborative inquiry nature in order to involve teachers and advisors, with the
guidance of the trainers, in conversations about common experiences and in the
development of their own educational instructional material (e.g. worksheets). We
believe that when teachers have the opportunity to collaboratively research their own
practices, they establish what works for them and their students. This could become a
creative transformative process that is participant-driven.
Introduction
Our paper concerns the presentation of an in-service primary school teachers’
and advisors training program which is based on HPS. This training program is
developed in the context of Comenius 2.1 (2006-2008) programs. It is a European
Union program. The program is funded by the European Union.
The role of ΗPS in learning Physics
Nowadays, science education research(e.g. Stinner et al, 2003; Seroglou et al,
1998; Bevilaqua & Giannetto, 1998; Heering, 2000, Seroglou & Koumaras 2001;
Matthews et al, 2001) emphasizes the importance of incorporating meaningful
contexts like historical case studies in learning science, as well as the nature of
science in instruction (e.g. Osborne et al., 2003; McComas et al, 1998). There are also
arguments which stress the significance of the use of HPS for proper science
understanding, and hence the need for its inclusion in appropriate designed curricula
(e.g. Duschl, 1994; Matthews, 1994).
The HPS is one of the best resources which could help students understand the
human dimensions of science, the nature of scientific thought, and the role of science
in society. The topic of electricity and electromagnetism is rich in examples of science
as a human endeavor, its historical perspectives, and the development of scientific
understanding. The rationale for the use of HPS relative material in science
instruction, as Galili and Hazan (2001) refer to is related with several kinds of
arguments such as: fostering the learning process; concern for the image of science;
pragmatic (related to everyday use); addressing relevance and general interest; and
necessity for genuine understanding. Matthews (1994, p. 50) refers to arguments for
introducing science by means of history of science.
1
HPS can serve as an occasion to organize the serial development of concepts,
to change the ideas of students using conceptual change approaches, to promote
students' problem-solving abilities (Lin et al, 2002) and scientific inquiry abilities
(Allchin, 2000). Researchers and educators search for the best ways to use history and
philosophy of science in science education. Some of these are:
a) The “story-line” approach to the teaching of science. Several writers and science
education researchers have recommended and elaborated the notion of using a
“story line” approach (construction of historical vignettes) to the teaching of
science (e.g. Stinner et al, 2003; Hadzigeorgiou, 2006).
b) Case Studies (Irwin, 2000; Stinner et al, 2003; Bevilaqua & Giannetto, 1998; Nott
& Wellington, 1998).
c) Historically faithful instruments -replicas (e.g. Heering et al, 1994; Riess, 1995).
d) Dramatization - role play (e.g. Stinner et al, 2003).
e) Portraits of historical characters.
f) Introduction of social and ethical contexts of science through case studies (e.g.
Hagen, Allchin & Singer, 1996).
j) Experimental simulations: For example Masson & Vázquez-Abad (2006)
proposed a new way to integrate history of science in science education to
promote conceptual change by introducing the notion of historical microworld,
which is a computer-based interactive learning environment respecting historic
conceptions.
h) Historical confrontations/debates.
k) Historical vignettes: these are stories that describe a brief episode from the life of
a scientist, which characterizes the HPS, demonstrates scientific attributes, and
provides students with a historical perspective of the topic illustrated.
l) Historical thought experiments, and finally.
m) a variety of teaching tools such as, poster design and poster presentation,
discussion on texts, web-site design.
We try to make productive use of the above ways to use HPS in the
development of the training curriculum on the topics of electricity and
electromagnetism.
Nature of Science and the design of a curriculum for training of science teachers
Science education is not a static field but a dynamic one. It changes in direct
relation to the developments in the society which it serves. An important issue that
led to the change of the direction in science education is the gradual change of our
views about the Nature of Science-NOS (Kokkotas, 2003a).
'Scientific Literacy' has been used as a general theme for science education
since the early 1980s. There has been much debate about the meaning of the concept
but some common features have emerged. Among these is the need for students to
gain an understanding of NOS and to have some appreciation of the HPS. Nowadays
a vast majority of scientists, science educators, and science education organizations
have agreed upon the objective of helping students develop informed conceptions of
nature of science NOS (Lederman, 2007).
“Contemporary society, it is argued (American Association for the
Advancement of Science, 1989; Jenkins, 1997; Jenkins, 1998; Millar,
1996; Millar & Osborne, 1998), requires a populace who has a better
understanding of the workings of science thus enabling them to engage in
2
a critical dialogue about the political and moral dilemmas posed by
science and technology and arrives at considered decisions.”
(Osborn et al, 2003)
Science curriculum reform has taken place in many countries (AAAS, 1993;
NRC, 2000) to give scientific literacy a central place by developing pupil ideas about
NOS.
NOS refers to the values and beliefs inherent to scientific knowledge and its
development (Lederman, 1992). Researchers and educators accept that no single NOS
exists. It is argued that a contemporary accepted view about this issue is that “science
is dynamic, changing and tentative. It is not a static collection of facts. We can not
take current scientific knowledge to be complete and final” (Bell, Lederman, & AbdEl-Khalick, 2000). Lemke (2001) supports that “Historians, sociologists, and cultural
anthropologists came increasingly to see that science had to be understood as a very
human activity whose focus of interest and theoretical dispositions in any historical
period were, and are, a part of the dominant cultural and political issues of the day”.
We reviewed the relative literature about NOS (Lederman, 2007, McComas,
1998) in order to use it in the development of the the training curriculum on the topics
of electricity and electromagnetism.
NOS and science teachers’ professional development
Teaching NOS in schools and training science teachers about it, has attracted
the attention of the science education research community (Hodson, 1988; Matthews,
1998; McComas et al, 1998; Abd-El-Khalick & Lederman, 2000; Driver et al, 1996;
Jenkins, 1996).
Studies have shown that high school science students and in-service teachers’
views of Nature of Science are not consistent with current accepted definitions of the
nature of science (Lederman, 1992; Ryan & Aikenhead, 1992; Driver et al., 1996;
Leach et al, 2000; Lederman et al, 1998). For example, most teachers and students
believe that all scientific investigations adhere to an identical set and sequence of
steps known as the scientific method (McComas, 1996), and does not recognize the
fact that scientists’ disciplinary training and commitments, as well as their personal
experiences, preferences, and philosophical assumptions do influence their work
(Akerson, Abd-El-Khalick, & Lederman, 2000).
In a research conducted in Greece (Kokkotas et al, 2007) in the context of “The
MAP prOject” about NOS, it was found that:
1. Teachers adopt a variety of views about NOS. Most of them, as other
internationally researches have also indicated (e.g. Bartholomew et al 2004;
Lederman et al 1998; Leach et al 2000), have no recognition of the tentative
nature of scientific knowledge, and hold positivist or empiricist views of NOS.
2. The most of the teachers regard scientific method as something steady, as a
universal step-by-step scientific method.
3. The vast majority of science teachers hold the view that “scientific discoveries
result from a logical series of investigations”. Furthermore, the majority of the
respondents seem to ignore that history of science reveals both an evolutionary
and revolutionary character of the scientific knowledge.
According to Lederman (2007) the results of the research on NOS may be
summarized as follows: (a) science teachers do not possess adequate conceptions of
NOS, irrespective of the instrument used to assess understandings; (b) techniques to
improve teachers’ conceptions have met with some success when they have included
either historical aspects of scientific knowledge or direct, explicit attention to nature
3
of science; and (c) academic background variables are not significantly related to
teachers’ conceptions of NOS.
In conclusion, the research has demonstrated teachers’ need for better
understandings of NOS, and has emphasized the critical role that
teachers play in developing these understandings. Research is pointing
to the effectiveness of explicit instruction in teacher education and the
exploitation of authentic historical science events to present the social
and cultural NOS.
In the development of our training program we follow the principle of the
explicit instruction about NOS engaging science teachers to study and compare the
views, on electrostatic phenomena, of scientists such as Gilbert, Franklin, Galvani,
Volta and the exploitation of authentic historical science events to present the social
and cultural character of NOS.
Socioconstructivist and sociocultural approaches to teachers training: Science
teacher professional development as a process of collaborative inquiry.
Each of the models for teacher education is aligned implicitly or explicitly
with a particular theory or theories of learning and has different implications for the
nature of a teacher professional development program, because different models
predict different roles for teachers and trainers, different training materials, different
curriculum organization, and different time-frames (Kokkotas et al, 2007; Valanides,
& Angeli, 2005).
The traditional teacher-centered model in which knowledge is “transmitted”
from the trainer to the trainee has rapidly being replaced by alternative models of
teacher development (socioconstructivist and sociocultural ones – Rogoff, 2003;
Wells, 1999; Kokkotas, 2003b) in which the emphasis is on guiding and supporting
teachers as they learn to construct their understanding of the culture and the
communities of which they are part (Duffy & Cunningham, 1996). In the process of
shifting our attention to the constructive activity of the teacher, it is recognized the
need to anchor learning in real-world or authentic contexts like historical case studies
on electricity and electromagnetism that make teacher professional development
meaningful and purposeful. The current emphasis is to embed knowledge and
competencies appropriation within a framework of teacher professional development,
collaborative programs, and interactive research within a community of learners
(Rogoff, Matusov, & White, 1996; Wells, 2002)
We believe that professional development should be seen as a social process of
enculturation in a work practice. So we propose a model of professional development
that will be based on participation and not in an acquisition metaphor (Bruner, 1996).
For the designing of science teachers’ training program we adopted
socioconstructivist and sociocultural learning principles. Our aim is the training
program to be characterized by the following:
• To make explicit, through the exploitation of authentic historical science events,
the contemporary views about NOS. Explicit instruction about NOS is needed.
• To include a variety of teaching and learning strategies (e.g. group work,
debates - argumentation, concept maps, role playing, making posters, creating
interviews, simulations) that exploit authentic historical science events in the
topics of electricity and electromagnetism.
• To facilitate learning/training and development through collaborative inquiry
activities among trainer and in-service primary science teachers (learning is an
inherently social-dialogical activity). An oriented in collaborative inquiry
4
training program should involve teachers in conversations about common
experiences and in development of collaborative projects (e.g. collaborative
construction of a poster).
• To involve science teachers in collaborative activities in order to develop their
own educational instructional material (e.g. worksheets). We believe that when
teachers are given the opportunity to research their own practice,
collaboratively and with support, they establish what works for them and their
students. This could become a creative transformative process that is
participant-driven.
• To contextualize training, learning, and joint productive activity in the
experiences and competencies of in-service science teachers (knowledge is
embedded in practice) and to anchor training/professional development in realworld or authentic problems of science teaching, that make science teacher
development meaningful and purposeful (learning is embedded in the activities
and practices in which it occurs).
Our overall aim is teachers to re-examine their role in the classroom and try to
transform their teaching methods, procedures and approaches. We believe that every
science teacher training procedure should pursue the gradually shifting of the views of
teachers from traditional to more contemporary aspects concerning Nature of Science,
Nature of Learning and Nature of Teaching.
An overview of the training program.
The training program on the topics of electricity and electromagnetism initially will
be implemented in real training conditions and after this it will be used for the
development of training e-material on the context of the “STeT project”. The training
curriculum is based in socioconstructivist and sociocultural learning principles and
embodies appropriate teaching strategies (e.g. debates - argumentation, group work,
simulations, historical text, experiments, dramatization - role play, historical
vignettes, poster design and poster presentation, discussion on texts) exploiting
authentic historical science events on the topic of electricity and electromagnetism.
The training curriculum
1. From myths and fallacies to the establishment of Natural Sciences: Gilberts
experiments on electricity and magnetism
2. Electricity from Gilbert to Franklin: exploring the nature of electricity
3. From positive and negative charges or plus and minus to the law of conservation
of the electric charge
4. The Volta Galvani controversy: From animal electricity to the construction of the
battery
5. From electricity to the magnetic field: Oersted’s experiment
6. The new discoveries which changed our world: Faraday’s experiments led to
electric motors and generators
The objectives of the training program are in-service science teachers and advisors:
 To better understand scientific concepts of electricity, magnetism and
electromagnetism, and how these concepts got their meaning
 to immerse them to teaching and learning strategies in Science Education
using case studies from HPS of electricity, magnetism and electromagnetism,
 to critically evaluate ideas and processes related to HPS and become aware
that scientific understanding is developed by people, whose ideas change over
time,
5
 to explore the nature of science by investigating:
1. how science knowledge is developed by scientists (e.g. in-service
teachers studying the Galvani-Volta controversy could get an
understanding about how science evolves)
2. the processes and practices of the science community (e.g. in-service
teachers studying the work of Franklin [Franklin’s letter to Colinson],
discuss on the ways that scientists communicate their ideas),
3. how science shapes the world we live in (e.g. in-service teachers
studying Faradays discoveries could understand the contribution of
science to the community and the interaction between science and
technology0
4. the history of science (processes, knowledge, and purposes),
5. how social and cultural frameworks influence the way scientists work.
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Appendix
1st Lesson
From myths and fallacies to the establishment of Natural Sciences
The objectives of this lesson are:
1. In-service teachers to understand the passing from the Aristotelian theories and
practices about the explanation of the world to the practices of the new Physics as it
has started to be shaped after the scientific revolution.
2. In-service teachers to study texts on the work of Gilbert in order to understand the
passing from anthropomorphic explanation of the world to scientific ones
3. In-service teachers to get through the work of W. Gilbert (De magnete), which is
based on inquiry and experimentation, in order to study attractive and repulsive forces
which are developed between the poles of magnets as well as between opposite
electric charges.
4. In-service teachers studying text on Gilbert discuss how theory, observation and
experiment are interrelated.
9
Worksheet 1: From myths and fallacies to the establishment of
Natural Sciences
Traditionally, in almost all textbooks,
Thales The Miletian (6th century
B.C), is mentioned to had known
Already since the 7th century B.C the
ancient Greeks knew the existence of magnet.
In Magnesia of Asia Minor they had discovered
a rock, characterized by the unusual property
to attract iron objects. Also they had
discovered that pieces of this rock attract each
other. Thales the Miletian, knowing the place
of origin of this rock, named it magnetite.
Except the Greeks, other nations also knew
the existence of magnets. Already since the
12th century A.D the Chinese used magnets
for compasses, in order to orient themselves
during their journeys
Antoniou et. al., Physics, Second Form of
Secondary School.
very well that
the natural magnet had the property to attract iron
objects, and that amber, when it is rubbed by fabric
William Gilbert 1544 - 1603
has the property to attract various light objects.
‘Thales discovered the unity of Being and when he
http://measure.igpp.ucla.edu/solarwanted to express it he spoke about water”. But
terrestrial-luminaries/timeline.html
although water is the principle of All, we must not
forget “that everything is filled with gods” (Aristotle, On the Soul, 411a7), and
that the world has a soul: amber and magnet show to us that even in the most
insignificant things exists a vitalizing spirit.
The magic opinion that bodies have soul, prevailed and interpreted the behavior
of magnet and amber until 16th century. Then in reality begins the history of
electricity and magnetism with the experiments of the English doctor William
Gilbert, as they are presented in his famous treatise De Magnete. (1600
http://scanserver.ulib.org/is/scanserver/BrowseList.asp?groupId=gilbert )
In order to answer the following questions you need to study the three
extracts, attached to the worksheet The first extract refers to the work of William
Gilbert
(De
magnete)
which
was
written
in
1600
http://scanserver.ulib.org/is/scanserver/ BrowseList.asp?groupId=gilbert and it
is taken from the book of Rossi ).
The second extract is from Gavroglous book… and the third one from the
introduction of a Greek Physics textbook for students in the 9th grade.
Activity 1
We discuss in our group:
a. Which are the documents in the first extract that indicate that Gilbert
has taken a different view from the authors of his era about the nature of
magnetism? Explain.
b. Which are the elements that compose the new science and shape the
scientific revolution, according to the view of the historians of science?
c. We construct a conceptual map for the concept of scientific revolution,
and underline the concepts that Gilbert uses in his work
10
Activity 2
The construction of Versorium
For the needs of his experiments Gilbert invented a new
instrument the Versorium, which could trace electric
charges. This was actually the first systematic approach
to the electric phenomena. As you can see in the
picture above the Versorium is a metallic needle which
can revolution around of a vertical axis.
step 1o
We cut a piece of felizol
with dimensions2 X 2 X 4
cm.,
like the one in the picture
step 2
We give it the shape of
pyramid.
We take a sheet of
aluminum of dimensions
1X4 cm and then we make it
of a propeller shape as in
the picture
Step 4
11
We consolidate the
aluminum sheet with the
vertical axis on the top of
the pyramid, as it is shown
in the picture. The
versorium is ready for use.
step 4 operation
We rub a plastic bar
against a piece of stuff and
bring it near to one end of
the versorium, which is in
stillness
We record our observations and we discuss them in our group.
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
Activity 3
How Gilbert explained the motion
explanation according to his theory.
of the versorium? We give our
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
How do we explain the motion of the versorium?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
12
How do we explain the motion of the versorium? (see extract 3)
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
Activity 4
Could you explain the experiment of Gilbert using the terella?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
EXTRACT 1
Paolo Rossi, The Genesis of Modern Science in Europe (p. 350-4)
William Gilbert,
In front of a book such us De magnete, magnetisque corporibus et de mango
magnete Tellure; Physiologia nova, plurimis et argumentis, et experimentis
demonstrata(About magnet, the magnetic bodies and about Earth, the great magnetnew physiology proven by many arguments and experiments), which was published in
London at 1600 by the English doctor William Gilbert (1540-1603), it is very difficult
(even if we accept that the answer has some meaning) to answer to the question if it is
about the last work of natural magic of Renaissance or one of the first works of
modern experimental science. Both these expressions were used about this book the
first chapter of which forms a concerned and well structured exposition of books of
natural magic. The science of Gilbert has nothing to do neither with mathematics and
their methods nor with mechanics as was conceived by Galilei. His book does not
contain measurements, and the experiments implemented are of a typical qualitative
nature.Actually,Gilbert does not use a method more different of the one which
Giovanbatista della Porta uses, although the inventiveness of experiments, the
affluence of details, and the care with which they are performed are undoubtedly
greater of those used by Giovanbatista della Porta . Even the targets set by him are not
different from the targets set by the various writers of treatises of the era: the inquiry
of “occult causes” and the “secret things”, “the noble and superior essence of the
Great Magnet and of “the therapeutical properties of the magnetite”. Gilbert prefers
the “reliable experiments and the proven arguments” from the “beliefs, the
conjectures and the possible suppositions of the professors of philosophy”. On these
foundations he draws an experimental treatise of the basic magnetic properties, which
(leaving aside the concepts of force of a magnetic field, and the lines of force and the
mathematical expression) “does not differ essentially from what is reported about this
issue in the modern elementary textbooks of physics” (Dijksterhuis, 1971:526). Given
the suspicion and his repugnance for the “professors,” Gilbert deals with the issue of
the deviation of the magnetic needle using a book, which was published in London in
1581 by an English sailor, who was engaged in the construction of compasses. That
was the book of Robert Norman (ca. 1560-96). It had been born in the field of practice
and it was among the works which remained outside the cycles of educated. It was
titled The New Attractive, Containing a Short Discourse of The Magnet or Lodestone.
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The encounter with the practice of “engineers and craftsmen” was not without
meaning. Gilbert attempted to exploit the measurement of the inclination of the
magnetic needle (with the help of a complicated map and of……) in order to
determine the latitude in sea. At his eyes this application consisted a great discovery
which would have permitted “with the minimum of effort and with a small
instrument” to determine the latitude in case of cloudiness. During his experiments
Gilbert uses terrelle or microterre or spheroid magnets. His first conclusion was that
Earth itself was a magnet with magnetic polarities which coincide with the
geographical poles. The terrestrial poles are not geometrical points ( as anyone
believed until then) but natural points. As the needle of a compass has a fixed
direction, in the same way the axe of Earth remains invariable. Gilbert accepts the
daily movement of Earth, because he deems that every magnet of a spheroid form has
the capacity to rotate, but he is not willing at all to follow Copernicus up to his
ultimate and adopt the argument of rotation of the Earth around the Sun.
A second and very significant conclusion of Gilbert is the precise distinction
occasioned by him between magnetic and electric action (he even introduces the term
electric force, which will be of a good destiny). Magnetism (the attraction exercised
by the magnet on iron) was giving to him the impression of a copulation or of a
mutual approach which modifies the essence of bodies. Electricity (but this term
never appears in his writings) appears as one attraction undergone by all the small and
light bodies on the side of objects (as amber, agate, glass, resin and sulphur) when
they are rubbed. The versorium that he himself constructed was a real electroscope.
Behind the elaborated and genius experiments of Gilbert a magical and
vitalistic standpoint is hidden. Matter is not in deprivation of life and perceptive
abilities. The electric attraction is exercised through effluvia materiali, it is the visible
activity occasioned by invisible effluvia – the magnetic attraction (which cannot be
exterminated by the intervention of material bodies) is on the contrary an immaterial
spiritual force, the action of a form (not in the Aristotelian sense), which is “unique
and particular”, which is “primordial, primary, radical and stellar”, which is found “in
every spheroid, in the Sun, the Moon, the Stars” and which is, on Earth, “the original
magnetic force”, “called primary energy”. The magnet possesses a soul which is more
or less superior from that of man. Earth is the common mother in whose vagina the
metals are formed. The whole world is alive and “all the spheroids, all the stars and
even the glorious Earth are already themselves governed from the beginning by their
souls, and from them stems the natural disposition for self preservation”. Aristotle
committed the mistake to accept the existence of the soul for the heavenly bodies, but
not for Earth: “The condition of the stars in respect to Earth would provoke a grievous
impression if the excellence of the soul was rejected for the stars and , on the contrary,
was recognized to the worms, the emits, the cockroaches, the grass”(Gilbert, 1958:
105,309, 310)
EXTRACT 2
The past of Science as History
Kostas Gavroglou: The Past of Sciences as History
Criticism - especially to the ontological rudiments of aristotelianism, to the
methodological rudiments of scholasticism, to the inclusive interpretation of
natural phenomena according to the Scriptures- together with the opposition to
the existence of an “official” interpretation of natural phenomena whose agent is
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the Church, consist the constituents of a conscious strategy, who led to the
construction of contemporary scientific community in Europe.
During the Scientific Revolution and through polymorphous processes the
new rules of the practicing of physics were formulated and consequently were
legitimized. There where before we were searching the generating causes of
nature, now we ought to search the laws of nature that manage the phenomena.
There where the qualitative description of the characteristics of a phenomenon
was sufficient and the theoretical schemes were proposing interpretations of
those qualitative characteristics, now every description ought to use the precise
language of mathematics and to predict the quantity of magnitudes not being
observed. There where previously the presentations of phenomena were used in
order to locate their qualitative characteristics, now experiments ought to be
sketched, which can be repeated and, during which precise calculations could be
made. Experiments do not take place in order to “verify” or “falsify” theories, but
also in order to perform exact measurements through which emanate new
phenomena and new characteristics of known phenomena. In the shaping of new
scientific speech, what was decisive was not only the dominant position of
experiment, but also the importance of numbers in the experimental process and,
consequently, the definition of an objective field –that
of quantitative
measurements and the possibility of repetition of the measurements by others
The experimental practice acquires a public character, it is addressed to many
and invites many to the participation in the related processes, contributing
decisively in the changing of mentality, which wanted the participation of few in
the knowledge of the secrets of nature. The publication of the experiments
contains the detailed description of the experimental settings and of the various
difficulties who occur during the realization of the experiment, in order that its
reproduction becomes possible. This public character of the experiments shapes
the terms and the rules of disagreement and of the solution of the disagreements
and contributes in the creation of the context of consent of the scientific
community, related to these terms. Thus the experimental practice, except from
the new epistemological characteristics which introduces, obtains also a decisive
social role, since through consent this time, the context of cohesion of the
scientific community is constructed. It must be underlined that the emphasis is on
understanding of the polymorphous experimental practice, and not on that which
many and for many time proclaimed as the experimental method. But the
shaping of the experimental practice and the wide spreading of the experimental
instruments used by the natural philosophers in their experiments, as well as the
settings of the experiments, the sort of materials from which the instruments
were manufactured and the limitations posed by them, together with the limits of
precision of the instruments, were deeply influenced by the new conception of
mathematization (Anderson 1962, Bennett 1975, Bennett 1986, Bennett 1991,
Drake 1957, Drake 1978)
Extract 3
The explanation
The plastic bar has been charged
with negative electric charge due to its
rub against the stuff. The aluminum
sheet is a conductor which has free
electrons and it is not charged. As we
bring the charged bar near the
versorium the free electrons of the
aluminum sheet are in the electric field
of the negatively charged bar and for
this reason they are repelled and move
to the far end of the versorium, which
now is negatively charged.
15
Thus,
nearer
to
charged,
Thus, when
an electric
metallic
conductor,
negative
nearer end
due to a
the end of the versorium, which is
the plastic bar is now positively
as you can see in the two pictures.
a metallic conductor is in the area of
field, then, the free electrons of the
conductor move to the far end of the
if the electric field is due to a
electric charge, or they move to the
of the conductor if the electric field is
positive
electric
charge.
This
phenomenon is called electrostatic
induction.
16