Terry Bristol | Portland State University (original) (raw)

Papers by Terry Bristol

International Communications in Heat and Mass Transfer, 2024

Oxford's Peter Atkins emphasizes that there are two histories, and two corresponding modern formu... more Oxford's Peter Atkins emphasizes that there are two histories, and two corresponding modern formulations, of thermodynamics. The Clausius, Boltzmann, Gibbs history and mechanistic formulation has dominated. But as Manchester's Cardwell comments, this mechanistic Newtonian-based tradition ‘may be to take to narrow a view’. The other history usually traces from Sadi Carnot's new understanding engines. Although appreciated piecemeal by practicing engineers in problems of design in heat and fluid flow systems, the broader foundations of engineering thermodynamics have remained unclear. Since 1996, Duke engineer Adrian Bejan's seminal contributions have renewed and clarified the engineering thermodynamics of the Carnot tradition. In his engineering thermodynamics, Bejan opens us to an understanding of the nature and evolution of the structures and functions
of reality. In the mechanistic, analytic thermodynamics both the nature and evolution of reality had been represented as largely chance-governed and tending to a maximum entropic disorganization. Bejan stresses that in
the engineering thermodynamic worldview practicing engineers are participants, in the irreversible, constructive evolution of the organizational design of reality. This essay reports my investigation into Bejan's Constructal
insight, my attempt to understand it in the context of the philosophical and historical foundations of engineering thermodynamics and the engineering worldview.

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 381: 20220287. , 2023

Feynman insisted ‘no one understands quantum theory’. Yet, experimentalists tell us quantum theor... more Feynman insisted ‘no one understands quantum
theory’. Yet, experimentalists tell us quantum theory
is the most successful theory in history. Quantum
theory cannot be understood as a classical mechanical
theory since it arose through the ‘interpolation’ of
two highly successful but complementary classical
mechanics: Newtonian particle mechanics and
Maxwellian wave mechanics. The two-slit experiment
illustrates that what is experienced depends on
choice of experimental set-up. Quantum theory
is properly understood within the more general
framework of engineering thermodynamics. In
Part One, I point to four essential characteristics
of quantum theory that cannot be understood in
any framework defined by the classical mechanical
presuppositions of symmetry and conservation.
These four characteristics are the participatory, the
complementary, the indeterminate and the new
non-commutative geometry. In Part Two, articulating
engineering thermodynamics, I note there are two
histories and two formulations of thermodynamics:
Carnot’s engineering thermodynamics and the
‘rational mechanical’ tradition of Clausius-Boltzmann.
These four essential characteristics of quantum
theory are also characteristics of engineering
thermodynamics. In Part Three, I trace the precursors
of Lazare Carnot’s engineering thermodynamics to
earlier insights of Huygens, d’Alembert, Leibniz and the Bernoullis. Leibniz brought these forth in his meta-paradigm shift from Statics to
Dynamics.

Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Jun 1, 1983

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A, Aug 14, 2023

Feynman insisted ‘no one understands quantum theory’. Yet, experimentalists tell us quantum theor... more Feynman insisted ‘no one understands quantum theory’. Yet, experimentalists tell us quantum theory is the most successful theory in history. Quantum theory cannot be understood as a classical mechanical theory since it arose through the ‘interpolation’ of two highly successful but complementary classical mechanics: Newtonian particle mechanics and Maxwellian wave mechanics. The two-slit experiment illustrates that what is experienced depends on choice of experimental set-up. Quantum theory is properly understood within the more general framework of engineering thermodynamics. In Part One, I point to four essential characteristics of quantum theory that cannot be understood in any framework defined by the classical mechanical presuppositions of symmetry and conservation. These four characteristics are the participatory, the complementary, the indeterminate and the new non-commutative geometry. In Part Two, articulating engineering thermodynamics, I note there are two histories and two formulations of thermodynamics: Carnot's engineering thermodynamics and the ‘rational mechanical’ tradition of Clausius-Boltzmann. These four essential characteristics of quantum theory are also characteristics of engineering thermodynamics. In Part Three, I trace the precursors of Lazare Carnot's engineering thermodynamics to earlier insights of Huygens, d'Alembert, Leibniz and the Bernoullis. Leibniz brought these forth in his meta-paradigm shift from Statics to Dynamics. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Thermodynamics 2.0: Bridging the natural and social sciences (Part 2)’.

Boston studies in the philosophy of science, 2018

ABSTRACT The Philosophy of Engineering and the Engineering Worldview The correct, self-referentia... more ABSTRACT The Philosophy of Engineering and the Engineering Worldview The correct, self-referentially coherent Philosophy of Engineering is found through a reflection on the limits of Philosophy of Science and the Engineering Worldview is found through a reflection on the limits of the Scientific Worldview. The Philosophy of Engineering and Engineering Worldview are the more general frameworks subsuming the traditional Philosophy of Science and Scientific Worldview. Similarly Petroski has argued1 that actual inquiry is really a creative engineering activity. The inadequacies of the standard Logical Positivist Philosophy of Science were pointed out by Thomas Kuhn,2 Sir Karl Popper,3 Paul Feyerabend4 and Imre Lakatos5 – among others. Many of these difficulties stem from the failure to take into account the more fundamental context of the History and Philosophy of Engineering. American Pragmatist John Dewey6 differentiates the scientific and engineering frameworks by characterizing them correspondingly as the Spectator and the Participant representations of inquiry. In the Spectator representation inquiry is intent on discovering the objective nature of reality. Advances progressively converge to the final Theory of Everything7 – a complete and consistent correspondence with objective reality. In order for the inquiry to converge to reality, the nature of reality must remain constant. If the nature of reality were changing, perhaps randomly, convergence would be impossible. The Spectator representation tacitly assumes that the nature of reality, the order governing all the phenomena of the universe, must be invariant over time. The Spectator representation also entails that our activity as inquirers doesn’t alter the nature of reality. If our activity alters the nature of reality then the possibility of convergence is lost. The Participant representation of inquiry, which I identify with Engineering Philosophy, immediately accepts that the activity of inquiry causally alters the nature, structure and operation of reality precluding any ultimate convergence to a supposed time-invariant reality. Engineers naturally imagine they alter the course of events and progressively re-organize the way the universe works. The Philosophy of Engineering and the Engineering Worldview are Participant representations and perspectives and so presuppose that the universe develops, and must have an emergent history. The proponents of the Scientific Worldview saw that their defining presuppositions entailed a Steady State Model of Reality.8 However, modern cosmology now accepts the Big Bang Model entailing a beginning and an emergence through a series of symmetry-breaking events9 – subsequent states unpredictable by their very nature, under-determined by the prior order. Whereas it is unclear whether the Spectator representation and the Scientific Research Program can ever make sense the Big Bang Model, the Engineering Worldview naturally expects evidence for a progressive, emergent history of the cosmos. Herbert Simon10 argues that engineering is problem solving and that problem solving is ‘attempting to move from a current state to a more desirable future state’. The ‘solution’ is never derivable, predictable or determined from any ‘real problem’ state. Real problem-states are opportunity-states enabling alternative futures. What is better (viz. actually more desirable) is not derivable from the prior state. Engineering presupposes that the engineer finds himself ‘enabled’ in a situation with potential alternative futures. The potential is embodied in the engineer and situation. I will argue that the evidence that Philosophy of Engineering and the Engineering Worldview constitute the more general framework subsuming the traditional Philosophy of Science and the Scientific Worldview arose with ‘the new physics’ at the beginning of the 20th century. The failure of the interface of the highly successful Newtonian and Maxwellian Research Programs11 forced the embrace of complementarity – a post-scientific position in search of a new post-objectivist theory. Complementarity entails that the inquirer is encountering a universe that is not governed by one universal, objective order that uniquely determines subsequent states. Complementarity entails that the future is under-determined so that the emergence of the actual future involves a choice. That choice by its very nature can have no objective mechanical determinant or explanation. The choice is by its very nature scientifically ‘problematic’. Properly understood however – in the framework of the Philosophy of Engineering – the choice is the embodied ability of the agent-engineer to attempt to bring about a more desirable (viz better) future. What I refer to as Carnot’s Epiphany12 (viz. the Engineering Worldview) is that we are all engineers in a world of engineering. John Dewey13 referred to the evolutionary engineering process as ‘the construction of the good’. References 1.…

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences

Despite impressive contributions, the philosophical foundations of systems theory remain in flux.... more Despite impressive contributions, the philosophical foundations of systems theory remain in flux. In the practical context, the proper understanding of the relation of the systems framework to classical mechanics and quantum theory remains unresolved. I argue our understanding of systems theory is advanced by recognizing the crucial link to engineering and thermodynamics. Engineering thermodynamics is more general than the historically dominant ‘rational mechanical’ thermodynamics of Clausius, Boltzmann, the Entropy Cult (viz. Jaynes’s MEP) and the recent information theory. That systems theory’s philosophical foundations are in a philosophy of engineering and an engineering worldview should be no surprise, given the modern origins in cybernetics and operations research. The natural extension of systems to ecology, from Odum to Ulanowicz, support the thesis. More recently, Paul Romer’s New Growth Economics moved us from the old scientific economics to an inherently developmental eng...

: In conclusion, chronic DMSO injections did not retard or accelerate the pathogenesis of autoimm... more : In conclusion, chronic DMSO injections did not retard or accelerate the pathogenesis of autoimmune-lymphoproliferative disease in three genetically distinct mouse models of systemic lupus. This result is consistent with observations described in our accompanying study, which showed no effect of DMSO injections on primary IgM or secondary IgM plus IgG antibody plague-forming cell responses after sheep erythrocyte immunization. Nor was any change in natural killer cell activity observed. It remains possible that other doses, routes, or regimens of DMSO treatment might influence disease pathogenesis.

The engineering knowledge research program is part of a larger effort to articulate a philosophy ... more The engineering knowledge research program is part of a larger effort to articulate a philosophy of engineering and an engineering worldview. Engineering is not ‘merely’ applied science. Engineering knowledge requires a more comprehensive conceptual framework than scientific knowledge.

The research reported here is concerned with understanding the components and composition of real... more The research reported here is concerned with understanding the components and composition of reality, according to the systems engineering worldview. To start, George Bugliarello argues that what engineers do, their progressive development of reality, is a natural extension of biological evolution. The implication is that biological evolution is, and always has been, an emergent, systems engineering enterprise. Reality, therefore, should be understandable (intelligible) both chronologically and ontologically as an emerging system of technological structures and functions. As I will point out, the Systems Engineering Worldview is not new. In Plato’s Timaeus reality is presented as the emerging product of the actions of the Architekton, the Master Craftsman, the global systems engineer. I develop this approach in several steps. In Step One, I briefly present the modern philosophy of systems engineering, as represented in the works of George Bugliarello, Walter Vincenti, Sam Florman an...

Philosophy of Engineering, East and West, 2018

Bulletin of the American Physical Society, 2012

Politics and the Life Sciences

Nurses, as other life science students, have been prejudiced against politics, imagining that it ... more Nurses, as other life science students, have been prejudiced against politics, imagining that it only contaminates techno-scientific enterprises. However, the new, professional nurse is aware of the need for political understanding and political skills. The transformation of the socio-economic status of the health care industry from a social service to a business provides an excellent opportunity for introducing the nursing student to political thought in a positive conjunction with practical analysis. To generate a credible metapolitical framework, I embrace rather than avoid the current problems about the nature of the subject matter of politics. An aggressive, philosophically informed attack on the myth of autonomous, objective science opens the student's intellectual map of reality, and lays the groundwork for a proposed (paradoxical) complementarity of the two traditional models: politics as a science and politics as a humanity. This uncomfortable, middle ground position, a...

Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Engineering, 2021

Reimagining suggests the idea of opening up new, unconventional spaces of possibilities for an ac... more Reimagining suggests the idea of opening up new, unconventional spaces of possibilities for an activity or an entity that already exists. At its most transformative, the activity of reimagining develops spaces of possibilities that alter the very definition of that activity or entity. What then would it be to reimagine the future of engineering? Such a question cannot be addressed by a single individual but rather requires the combined perspectives and insights of a number of individuals. The tentative answer presented in this chapter had its beginnings in a workshop on this topic which took place at a meeting of the Forum on Philosophy, Engineering and Technology (fPET) at the University of Maryland, College Park, in 2018. Because participants in the workshop came from the fPET community, they included philosophers and engineers from both inside and outside the academy. On this account, reimagining the future of engineering is a matter of reimagining and redrawing the spaces of engineering itself: spaces for designing, action, problem framing, professional and disciplinary identity, and for the training of future engineers. The virtuality of future engineering A concrete example of one new space in engineering is digital space. Digital technology permeates engineering work, just like it does all parts of human life. In cyber-physical architectures, digital representations are closely associated with the physical systems to which they refer, such that both are treated as a unity. Comprehensive simulations are used to support the design of such systems, which provide digital representations of physical phenomena that include user behavior to get to know the workings of engineered systems. All this has given engineers better access to the subject matter of their work, but it has also changed the points of orientation that help them find direction in their activities. Digital models allow for new types of benchmarks in the ideation, design and evaluation of engineering products. So, apart from the extended affordances digitalization may provide to products of engineering, it fundamentally changes the engineering process. Epistemological and normative implications of digitalization for the engineering process are extensively explored in many different domains. What remains unclear is whether digitalization also changes the notion of engineering in its core. At first glance, it would seem to be the opposite. For a long time, engineering has been related to the application of abstract mathematical methods to design, build, create, operate and maintain engineering products and systems, e.g. in the specification of the general desiderata for an end product into operationalizable requirements and measurable goals. The use of digital 1

Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Engineering, 2020

The Future of Engineering: Philosophical Foundations, Ethical Problems and Application Cases, Springer. Heidelberg, Berlin, New York ISBN 978-3319910284, 2018

The engineering knowledge research program is part of the larger effort to articulate a philosoph... more The engineering knowledge research program is part of the larger effort to articulate a philosophy of engineering and an engineering worldview. Engineering knowledge requires a more comprehensive conceptual framework than scientific knowledge. Engineering is not 'merely' applied science. Kuhn and Popper established the limits of scientific knowledge. In parallel, the embrace of complementarity and uncertainty in the new physics undermined the scientific concept of observer-independent knowledge. The paradigm shift from the scientific framework to the broader participant engineering framework entails a problem shift. The detached scientific spectator seeks the 'facts' of 'objective' reality-out there. The participant, embodied in reality, seeks 'methods', about how to work in the world. The engineering knowledge research program is recursively enabling. Advances in engineering knowledge are involved in the unfolding of the nature of reality. Newly understood, quantum uncertainty entails that the participant is a natural inquirer. 'Practical reason' is concerned with 'how we should live'-the defining question of morality. The engineering knowledge research program is selective seeking 'important truths', 'important knowledge', 'important methods' that manifest value, and serve the engineering agenda of 'the construction of the good.' The importance of engineering knowledge research program is clear in the new STEM curriculum where educators have been challenged to rethink the relation between science and engineering. A 2015 higher education initiative to integrate engineering colleges into liberal arts and sciences colleges has stalled due to the confusion and conflict between the engineering and scientific representations of knowledge. 2

International Communications in Heat and Mass Transfer, 2024

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 381: 20220287. , 2023

Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Jun 1, 1983

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A, Aug 14, 2023

Feynman insisted ‘no one understands quantum theory’. Yet, experimentalists tell us quantum theor... more Feynman insisted ‘no one understands quantum theory’. Yet, experimentalists tell us quantum theory is the most successful theory in history. Quantum theory cannot be understood as a classical mechanical theory since it arose through the ‘interpolation’ of two highly successful but complementary classical mechanics: Newtonian particle mechanics and Maxwellian wave mechanics. The two-slit experiment illustrates that what is experienced depends on choice of experimental set-up. Quantum theory is properly understood within the more general framework of engineering thermodynamics. In Part One, I point to four essential characteristics of quantum theory that cannot be understood in any framework defined by the classical mechanical presuppositions of symmetry and conservation. These four characteristics are the participatory, the complementary, the indeterminate and the new non-commutative geometry. In Part Two, articulating engineering thermodynamics, I note there are two histories and two formulations of thermodynamics: Carnot's engineering thermodynamics and the ‘rational mechanical’ tradition of Clausius-Boltzmann. These four essential characteristics of quantum theory are also characteristics of engineering thermodynamics. In Part Three, I trace the precursors of Lazare Carnot's engineering thermodynamics to earlier insights of Huygens, d'Alembert, Leibniz and the Bernoullis. Leibniz brought these forth in his meta-paradigm shift from Statics to Dynamics. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Thermodynamics 2.0: Bridging the natural and social sciences (Part 2)’.

Boston studies in the philosophy of science, 2018

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences

Philosophy of Engineering, East and West, 2018

Bulletin of the American Physical Society, 2012

Politics and the Life Sciences

Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Engineering, 2021

Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Engineering, 2020

The Future of Engineering: Philosophical Foundations, Ethical Problems and Application Cases, Springer. Heidelberg, Berlin, New York ISBN 978-3319910284, 2018

Entropy, 2019

Currently, there are two approaches to the foundations of thermodynamics. One, associated with th... more Currently, there are two approaches to the foundations of thermodynamics. One, associated with the mechanistic Clausius-Boltzmann tradition, is favored by the physics community. The other, associated with the post-mechanical Carnot tradition, is favored by the engineering community. The bold hypothesis is that the conceptual foundation of engineering thermodynamics is the more comprehensive. Therefore, contrary to the dominant consensus, engineering thermodynamics (ET) represents the true foundation of thermodynamics. The foundational issue is crucial to a number of unresolved current and historical issues in thermodynamic theory and practice. ET formally explains the limited successes of the 'rational mechanical' approaches as idealizing special cases. Thermodynamic phenomena are uniquely dissymmetric and can never be completely understood in terms of symmetry-based mechanical concepts. Consequently, ET understands thermodynamic phenomena in new way, in terms of the post-mechanical formulation of action. The ET concept of action and the action framework trace back to Maupertuis's Principle of Least Action, both clarified in the engineering worldview research program of Lazare and Sadi Carnot. Despite the intervening Lagrangian 'mechanical idealization of action', the original dualistic, indeterminate engineering understanding of action, somewhat unexpectedly, re-emerged in Planck's quantum of action. The link between engineering thermodynamics and quantum theory is not spurious and each of our current formulations helps us develop our understanding of the other. Both the ET and quantum theory understandings of thermodynamic phenomena, as essentially dissymmetric (viz. embracing complementary), entail that there must be an irreducible, cumulative historical, qualitatively emergent, aspect of reality.

Modern engineering operates within open systems, where design and research problems exist within ... more Modern engineering operates within open systems, where design and research problems exist within social and political contexts. In open systems, engineering is making progress on a problem. It is more about framing problems and viewing the solution space in different ways than "solving" the problem or finding the solution. Open system problems are typified by the Millennium Development Goals, UN Sustainable Development Goals, or the notion of a "grand challenge" or "wicked problem".

William Wulf, President of the National Academy of Engineering, recently called for a radical rev... more William Wulf, President of the National Academy of Engineering, recently called for a radical revision of engineering education. I doubt this effort will succeed-until there is a radical revision of our understanding of the place of the engineer and the engineering enterprise in the universe. The Scientific Cosmology has always had a problem making sense of engineering as real and meaningful. By contrasting the scientific and engineering traditions in a number of ways, I begin to construct an Engineering Cosmology that is formally complementary to the Scientific Cosmology. A rigorous examination of scientific idealizations-such as perfect repeatabilityreveals aspects of the limits and incompleteness of the scientific model. An understanding of Popper's Question, together with an examination of the classical idealizations of motion (viz. frictionless; three-body indeterminacy), point to a fundamentally thermodynamic Engineering Cosmology. Popper's demarcation entails that the symmetric Scientific Cosmology is incommensurable with this thermodynamic Engineering Cosmology. Additional methodological and historical arguments strongly support the thesis that Scientific and Engineering Cosmologies are formally complementary. These conclusions demand a radical revision of engineering education and a fundamentally new conceptual framework for management of engineering and technology for reshaping the world.

Metanexus, 2006

Metanexus Institute Conference June 3-6, 2006, Philadelphia “Continuity and Change: Perspective o... more Metanexus Institute Conference June 3-6, 2006, Philadelphia
“Continuity and Change: Perspective on Science and Religion”

“Continuum, Discontinuum and the Middle Way”

Summary and Comments 15 years later.

The 2006 essay argues that there are two opposite scientific metaphysical frameworks that are irreducibly involved in all approaches to understanding the nature of the universe. In the science of the pre-Socratics the opposition was between the Parmenidean and Heraclitan frameworks. In modern physics the opposition is between the Newtonian particle mechanics and the Maxwellian field mechanics. Per hypothesis, a version of the same opposition arises in all scientific disciplines.

Each of the scientific metaphysics, taken by itself, is unable to account for all phenomena. They are both false (inherently incomplete) is their claim to universality. Yet each is clearly essential in account for its own paradigmatic type of phenomena. For instance, in modern terms the Newtonian accounts for particle phenomena and the Maxwellian accounts for wave/field phenomena. But there are no particles (in the Newtonian sense) in the Maxwellian fields. And with the exception of gravity (as a continuing separate issue) there are no fields in Newtonian mechanics (viz. only the three laws).

I argue that the opposition of the two types of scientific metaphysics is unresolvable within any possible scientific (mechanical) framework. Because these opposites, per hypothesis, are complementary neither can be reducible to the other. One way to express this is to say that reality is more ample than can be captured by any one scientific conception. The unresolvable, yet unavoidable opposition, poses for us, what I call, a Dialectical Dilemma.

The overall theme of the essay is that we are forced to a Third Metaphysics that is more general and can subsume the complementary scientific metaphysics as limited idealizing special cases. The Third must also supersede the scientific metaphysics, meaning that it understands them, their successes and limitations, in a new way. The Third metaphysics involves a conceptually more comprehensive understanding of reality – a reality where we, as observers and inquirers, are essential components.

The explication of the Third is only cursory. I argue, following Bartlett, that the ancient response to the Dialectical Dilemma, was the Socratic Turn. And I suggest that this is quite analogous to the modern Pragmatic Turn. There is a fundamental shift, a meta-paradigm shift, involved wherein the question, and the nature of inquiry changes. In the scientific representation of inquiry, the question is about ‘how the (objective) universe – out there – works’, independent of our presence or actions. With the turn to the more general Third, the question has to do with ‘how to work in the world’. Dewey characterizes these as the Spectator and Participant representations of inquiry. The key point is that the questions and the nature of questioning is more general, more comprehensive in the Participant Third.

Following Kant, our actions, as characterized in his Critique of Practical Reason, are concern with developing ‘how we live and work in the world’. In the Critique of Judgment Kant notes that the indeterminate nature of the question ‘how we should live’, thus requiring judgment. He further notes that the question ‘how should we live’ is the fundamental, defining question of morality. Socrates similarly maintains that the question ‘how should we live’ is the most important question. In the Third, the question ‘how should we live’ defines the framework of inquiry and action. The scientific questions are important but idealizing and subsidiary.