Reddit mentions of Physics and Philosophy: The Revolution in Modern Science

I guess Werner Heisenberg was just wasting his time writing Physics and Philosophy and Philosophical Problems of Quantum Physics.

One of the problems with reconciling natural science and the humanities is that academic specialization has made everyone regard their field as the axis of knowledge. Formerly, a guy like Kant was professor of astronomy, arithmetic, metaphysics, and literature; guys like Nietzsche (who was well read in the science of his day), Russell, Heisenberg, and Schrodinger, they all were raised in a school system where you read Newton's Principia (in Latin) alongside Aristotle's Metaphysics (in Greek) in what we now call high school. That kind of education simply ceased as academia put a greater and greater emphasis on specialization and as our schools began looking more and more like factories (something Foucault documented fairly well in his Discipline & Punishment).

Arguing science can make do without philosophy or vice versa is equally silly, both historically and in terms of application. For example, apart of Gould's argument against Dawkins and others who conceive evolution in strict adaptationist terms is that they think evolution in the very terms of old metaphysics (notice how a lot of evolution papers claim things like "laughter is an adaptation to living in a group"? Yeah, Nietzsche had criticized that type of thinking and Gould followed suite in exploring exaptation). Gould was pretty familiar with continental philosophy (he leverages Foucault's work in his original article on exaptation), so it's difficult to conceive that his work on emphasizing the contingency of evolution wasn't influenced or abetted by that education.

Werner Heisenberg in this book.

I haven't read it myself, but I heard it was very good.

http://www.amazon.com/Physics-Philosophy-Revolution-Science-Perennial/dp/0061209198

It is worth noting that a brilliant explanation for this is provided for us by a participant: Werner Heisenberg. Not only was he a protagonist in Breaking Bad but he was also one the most intelligent men to have ever lived, and it shows in this fine book by him, which you can download for free. It is interesting to see how he engages with the philosophical side of things: how can we know that which we claim to know.

I found this 1958 book by Heisenberg himself a good read (with the added historical perspective): Physics and Philosophy: The Revolution in Modern Science. Copenhagen interpretation only, for obvious reasons.