'If you begin by treating the scientific ideas of earlier centuries as myths, you will end by treating your own scientific ideas as dogmas': we have tried, throughout this book, to display the developing character of the scientific endeavor, and to indicate why the different problems of cosmology came to be tackled in the order in which they did. If we are to understand even our own scientific ideas, and do more than simply manipulate with the most up-to-date calculi, we shall do well to study the strong points of the scientific systems which they displaced. From the quandaries and difficulties which delayed the formation of our modern 'common sense' we can discover best the true character and meaning of our twentieth-century conceptions.
- Stephen Toulmin and June Goodfield, Foreword toe The Fabric of the Heavens (1962)
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