William H. Newton-Smith (1943–2023)

Abstract

William (Bill) Newton-Smith was a renowned Canadian philosopher of science who spent his career largely in Oxford and then at the Central European University in Hungary. Newton-Smith was born in Orillia, Ontario and completed a B.A. in mathematics and philosophy at Queen’s University, Canada. In his second year as an undergraduate, he decided he was a logical positivist. In the interview for an exchange scholarship with St Andrews, in which he would be successful and at which he would spend his third year, the head of the Queen’s philosophy Department remarked that he had thought logical positivism was dead. With the confidence of youth Newton-Smith replied that the fact that it may not be popular was no reason to think it wasn’t true! During his year at St Andrews he fell under the spell of the later Wittgenstein. Upon graduating from Queen’s in 1966, he went to Cornell to do a PhD, as Norman Malcolm had photocopies of all of Wittgenstein’s unpublished works. Unimpressed with Malcolm, NewtonSmith transferred to the analytic philosopher Max Black. He thought Black a great supervisor, lively and clear—just the sort of teacher and mentor he would himself become. But NewtonSmith had already decided to transfer to Oxford. Black didn’t want him leaving Ithaca without a Cornell degree, so he secured funding for him to do an MA over the summer. Once at Oxford, Newton-Smith became a leading figure there. He finished his DPhil under the supervision of the logician Arthur Prior. In 1970 he was elected a Fellow of Balliol College. He was a pillar of the College and the University, taking on important administrative positions for both. He was a beloved undergraduate tutor, lecturer, and supervisor of an astounding number of DPhil theses. He could make logic fun and had a fine nose for what was a good (and bad!) argument in a student’s work. Newton-Smith made important contributions in several areas of philosophy, especially the nature of time and the general philosophy of science. Perhaps his two most important works are The Structure of Time (1980) and The Rationality of Science (1981). The latter appeared in the middle of the realism debate, a hot topic at any time but particularly so in the late 70s and early 80s. Even after four decades it stands up well and gives an excellent snapshot of his realistic approach to philosophy. Newton-Smith was a scientific realist; he had no qualms about the theoretical entities postulated by science, though he did have an interestingly radical solution to one problem that presses in on the realist. He was also a rationalist; he believed that science has clearly progressed and part of the philosopher’s job is to explain or make sense of that progress. As Newton-Smith saw it, there are a number of challenges which face the traditional rationalist, including: overcoming the problem of incommensurability (the same term could have different meanings in different theories); it must be shown that science does indeed have a goal; and explaining how the normative methods of science lead to that goal. Finally, it must be shown there is a good fit between the prescriptive philosophy of science and the descriptive history of science, for only then can we give a satisfactory account of real scientific change.