Week 5: Bas van Fraassen (April 5 1941 - Present)

  • Birth

    Bas van Fraassen was born in a region in the Netherlands that was occupied by German forces. His father was forced to work for the Nazis as a steam fitter. In 1956 they emigrated to Edmonton, Canada.
  • Education

    Van Fraassen earned his bachelors in 1963 from the University of Alberta, his masters in 1964 and Ph.D. 1966 from the University of Pittsburgh. He's taught at many universities such as Yale, Southern Cal, and Toronto. He currently resides at Princeton.
  • An Introduction to Philosophy of Time and Space

    In 1970 Fraassen wrote his first book titled "An Introduction to Philosophy of Time and Space. In his book he intended to give some insight of philosophy to science based students and teach of physics to philosophy students. It provides research from scientists like Hans Reichenbach and Adolf Grunbaum about time and space.
  • Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective

    In Fraassen's recent book Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective he talks about the tools nd theories used to describe science. He argues about scientific structuralism and how scientists today fail to to acknowledge key points of it.