This chapter relates a broadly chronological story of the developments over the last 50 years that have sought to reshape the science curriculum in English schools by introducing aspects of the history of science and nature of science. The chapter highlights key curriculum projects by outlining the contexts in which they developed and summarising their rationales as set out in their publications. It also provides signposts to some of the reports of research and scholarship that have evaluated these initiatives. The (...) chapter shows how the first national curriculum in 1989 was influenced by earlier initiatives as it made teaching about the nature of science mandatory for all. This requirement faded into the background after a few years and then re-emerged with a new rationale as ‘how science works’ in 2004. The chapter ends by looking to the future with a discussion of a new course which contrasts with earlier traditions by focussing the teaching and learning on the history and philosophy of science rather than using ideas from these disciplines to teach about science. (shrink)

Modern epistemology is reluctant to presume the objectivity of a mental event. Because a valid theory of knowledge is subjected to objective standards of rationality, the invocation of a transcendent ground of existence termed ‘god’ is deemed extra‐systematic. This reference lacks warrant because it fails to satisfy the impartial criteria methodologically basic to contemporary paradigms of knowledge. Still the biochemist Arthur Peacocke (1924–2006) claimed defensible public truth for an ultimate reality based on the ‘supremely’ rational nature of existence; it is (...) the further contention of this paper that there are intelligible patterns to the universe whose discovery is incapable of ‘objective’ explanation. By failing to meet these criteria, however, they do not fall into irrationality, still less do they disqualify or exclude themselves from public consideration; quite the opposite. There are perhaps depths to human experience then, including science, to which an existentialist epistemology is appropriate. In this connection the philosophy of Karl Jaspers (1883–1969) provides a compelling account of the transition of scientific research into aesthetics and theological discourse. (shrink)