Lauden, Bruno, my hedge fund talk & speed metal

Current reading is mainly Laudan's Progress and its Problems - the basic idea of which is to replace theory appraisal with the appraisal of what he calls "research traditions". This is a very wide framework, much wider than that of Lakatos's MSRP for instance. I always thought that a good goal for philosophy of science would be to make the unit of appraisal as small as possible thus avoiding any form of Quinean holism. Laudan's second main idea is to appraise via "progress" rather than verificationism or falsificationism. His book contains two chapters that seek to apply this methodology to the History of Science and the History of Ideas. Even if his main proposals aren't accepted, these two chapters should be worth examining closely

I have also been reading more about Giodarno Bruno, from the point of view of his early and very enthusiastic Copernicanism. This raises the question of why he believed this at this time. I have been skimming through one of my oldest books - Frances Yates's Giodarno Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition - for some clues. I am also about to start on Gatti's Giodarno Bruno and Renaissance Science which does cover his Copernicanism in some detail. I am pondering on whether to include Bruno in my dissertation - how to explain both his and Kepler's reactions to Copernicus?

Over the weekend I have been compiling a huge list of books that I want to look for in the library on Tuesday. Maybe 20 books in total - mostly books I had not been aware of before this course - so already it has achieved one of my MSc aims, which was to widen my reading base.

I am giving a talk to the LSE Hedge Fund Society on Tuesday afternoon on the theme of the Credit Crunch and Sept 11th - similarities and differences. I am planning to use my draft Clare Market Review article as the basis for this - and so have not bother to actually prepare a presentation. This is supposed to be the first of many lectures - perhaps 10. This society is one of LSE's most popular societies and is mainly dominated by very studious asian students.

Listening to lots of speed metal music today - mainly Carcass, Napalm Death, and Morbid Angel. All good stuff.