Feyerabend's Humanistic Theatre of Science
Research piece @ the Theatre about Science: Performing and Communicating, University of Coimbra Press
FEYERABEND’S HUMANISTIC THEATRE OF SCIENCE
When the meeting was over and we moved out into the streets, we ran into elephants, camels, horses—the circus had just come to town. "A fitting conclusion to Feyerabend's seminar," wrote the Neue Zürcher Zeitung. From Killing Time: The Autobiography of Paul Feyerabend Philosopher of science
Paul Feyerabend was a forerunning and vigorous critic of formal models of scientific knowledge and of the scientific method defended by logical positivists and critical rationalists. Feyerabend’s writings often invoke artistic metaphors and references to the Dada movement; above that, the topic of theatre persistently runs through both his biography and his reflections about science. In this chapter, I briefly outline the place of theatre in Feyerabend’s life and work and, following that, cast out three epistemic lessons that come from his juxtapositions of theatre and science: that science as practice is embodied and spontaneous; that theatre is a unique medium for an intellectual debate; and that all our knowledge depends on staging “contraptions”. Following that, I portray a thought experiment on how a theatre might be at the service of science and society – in Feyerabend’s spirit.
Universidade de Coimbra