Scientific Progress

This paper challenges premises regarding the ‘Kuhn vs Popper debate’ which is often introduced to students at a university level. Though I acknowledge the disagreements between Kuhn and Popper, I argue that their models of science are greatly similar. To begin, some preliminary context is given to point out conceptual and terminological barriers within this debate. The remainder of paper illuminates consistencies between the influential books The Logic of Scientific Discoveries (by Popper, abbreviated as Logic) and The Structure of Scientific (...) Revolutions (by Kuhn, abbreviated as Structure). The central purpose of this comparison is to synthesize a shared model of scientific change. The broader implication of this approach is appreciating common ground in discussions that are defined by their disagreements (particularly in philosophy of science). (shrink)

Many philosophers regard the persistence of philosophical disputes as symptomatic of overly ambitious, ill-founded intellectual projects. There are indeed strong reasons to believe that persistent disputes in philosophy (and more generally in the discourse at large) are pointless. We call this the pessimistic view of the nature of philosophical disputes. In order to respond to the pessimistic view, we articulate the supporting reasons and provide a precise formulation in terms of the idea that the best explanation of persistent disputes entails (...) that they are pointless. We then show how to answer the pessimistic argument. Taking a well-known mathematical controversy as our paradigm example, we argue that some persistent disputes reflect substantive disagreements at the “meta-analytic” level, i.e., disagreements about the best way, among quite different candidates, to understand the topic at issue, and the best associated cluster of analytic truths one should accept concerning it. Moreover, our concrete example shows that such meta-analytic disagreements can in principle be settled and yield a genuine theoretical (as opposed to merely pragmatic) breakthrough. We conclude optimistically that persistent disputes can be an important means of fostering epistemic progress. (shrink)

According to some prominent accounts of scientific progress, e.g. Bird’s epistemic account, accepting new theories is progressive only if the theories are justified in the sense required for knowledge. This paper argues that epistemic justification requirements of this sort should be rejected because they misclassify many paradigmatic instances of scientific progress as non-progressive. In particular, scientific progress would be implausibly rare in cases where (a) scientists are aware that most or all previous theories in some domain have turned out to (...) be false, (b) the new theory was a result of subsuming and/or logically strengthening previous theories, or (c) scientists are aware of significant peer disagreement about which theory is correct. (shrink)

In recent years, several philosophers have argued that their discipline makes no progress (or not enough in comparison to the ‘hard sciences’). A key argument for this pessimistic position appeals to the purported fact that philosophers widely and systematically disagree on most major philosophical issues. In this paper, we take a step back from the debate about progress in philosophy specifically and consider the general question: How (if at all) would disagreement within a discipline undermine that discipline's progress? We reconstruct (...) two distinct arguments from disagreement to a lack of progress, and argue that each rests on underscrutinized assumptions about the nature of progress. We then provide independent motivation to reject those assumptions. The upshot of these considerations is that widespread expert disagreement within a discipline is compatible with progress in that discipline. Indeed, progress can occur even as such disagreement increases. However, disagreement can undermine our ability to tell which developments are progressive (and to what degree). We conclude that while disagreement can indeed be a threat to progress (in philosophy and elsewhere), the precise nature of the threat has not been appreciated. (shrink)

A problem-solving-based account of scientific progress that takes understanding as the principal epistemic aim of science is developed and defended against knowledge reductionism.

Recent work takes both philosophical and scientific progress to consist in acquiring factive epistemic states such as knowledge. However, much of this work leaves unclear what entity is the subject of these epistemic states. Furthermore, by focusing only on states like knowledge, we overlook progress in intermediate cases between ignorance and knowledge—for example, many now celebrated theories were initially so controversial that they were not known. -/- This paper develops an improved framework for thinking about intellectual progress. Firstly, I argue (...) that we should think of progress relative to the epistemic position of an intellectual community rather than individual inquirers. Secondly, I show how focusing on the extended process of inquiry (rather than the mere presence or absence of states like knowledge) provides a better evaluation of different types of progress. This includes progress through formulating worthwhile questions, acquiring new evidence, and increasing credence on the right answers to these questions. I close by considering the ramifications for philosophical progress, suggesting that my account supports rejecting the most negative views while allowing us to articulate different varieties of optimism and pessimism. (shrink)

Contemporary debate surrounding the nature of scientific progress has focused upon the precise role played by justification, with two realist accounts having dominated proceedings. Recently, however, a third realist account has been put forward, one which offers no role for justification at all. According to Finnur Dellsén’s (Stud Hist Philos Sci Part A 56:72–83, 2016) noetic account, science progresses when understanding increases, that is, when scientists grasp how to correctly explain or predict more aspects of the world that they could (...) before. In this paper, we argue that the noetic account is severely undermotivated. Dellsén provides three examples intended to show that understanding can increase absent the justification required for true belief to constitute knowledge. However, we demonstrate that a lack of clarity in each case allows for two contrasting interpretations, neither of which serves its intended purpose. On the first, the agent involved lacks both knowledge and understanding; and, on the second, the agent involved successfully gains both knowledge and understanding. While neither interpretation supports Dellsén’s claim that understanding can be prised apart from knowledge, we argue that, in general, agents in such cases ought to be attributed neither knowledge nor understanding. Given that the separability of knowledge and understanding is a necessary component of the noetic account, we conclude that there is little support for the idea that science progresses through increasing understanding rather than the accumulation of knowledge. (shrink)

At first glance, what scientific progress means seems to be a quickly answered question. It is not easy to think of the sciences without progress; sciences and the notion of progress seem identical in general. Describing the nature of scientific progress is an important task that will have practical and theoretical consequences. The approach, which argues that the background on which sciences are based does not have a historical or cultural character following the positivist interpretation, accepts sciences as testing the (...) validity of observation and experiment data to a large extent. On the other hand, the tendency that emphasizes that the complex functioning of the history of science has an indelible mark on scientific theories prefers to build sciences on a historical and social basis. How both major approaches ground the idea of scientific progress profoundly affects both our understanding of the nature of scientific knowledge and the way we do science. This paper aims to evaluate scientific progress based on the views of prominent philosophers of science in the twentieth century. (shrink)

The functional approach to scientific progress has been mainly developed by Kuhn, Lakatos, Popper, Laudan, and more recently by Shan. The basic idea is that science progresses if key functions of science are fulfilled in a better way. This chapter defends the function approach. It begins with an overview of the two old versions of the functional approach by examining the work of Kuhn, Laudan, Popper, and Lakatos. It then argues for Shan’s new functional approach, in which scientific progress is (...) defined as an increase of usefulness of exemplary practices. (shrink)

Scientific progress is a hot topic in the philosophy of science. However, as yet we lack a comprehensive philosophical examination of scientific progress. First, the recent debate pays too much attention to the epistemic approach and the semantic approach. Shan’s new functional approach and Dellsén’s noetic approach are still insufficiently assessed. Second, there is little in-depth analysis of the progress in the history of the sciences. Third, many related philosophical issues are still to be explored. For example, what are the (...) implications of scientific progress for the scientific realism/antirealism debate? Is the incommensurability thesis a challenge to scientific progress? What role does aesthetic values play in scientific progress? Does idealisation impede scientific progress? This book fills this gap. It offers a new assessment of the four main approaches to scientific progress (Part I). It also features eight historical case studies to investigate the notion of progress in different disciplines: physics, chemistry, evolutionary biology, seismology, psychology, sociology, economics, and medicine respectively (Part II). It discusses some issues related to scientific progress: scientific realism, incommensurability, values in science, idealisation, scientific speculation, interdisciplinarity, and scientific perspectivalism (Part III). (shrink)

In this editorial, I explain how Paul Feyerabend's Principle of Proliferation is adopted and adapted as a publication model for the Journal of Knowledge Structures and Systems (JKSS). Critical views on the limitations of both non-dynamic publishing models and government- and industry-based models of research are expressed.

What is scientific progress? This paper advances an interpretation of this question, and an account that serves to answer it. Roughly, the question is here understood to concern what type of cognitive change with respect to a topic X constitutes a scientific improvement with respect to X. The answer explored in the paper is that the requisite type of cognitive change occurs when scientific results are made publicly available so as to make it possible for anyone to increase their understanding (...) of X. This account is briefly compared to two rival accounts of scientific progress, based respectively on increasing truthlikeness and accumulating knowledge, and is argued to be preferable to both. (shrink)

Hermann von Helmholtz hat als Naturforscher sowohl die Physik als auch die Physiologie um eine beeindruckende Anzahl grundlegender Erkenntnisse bereichert, ihr heutiges Selbstverständnis entscheidend mitgeprägt, ihre Verfahren auf neue Gegenstandsbereiche angewendet und war führend an ihrem institutionellen Ausbau zu Laborwissenschaften beteiligt.

Academic freedom has often been defended in a progressivist manner: without academic freedom, creativity would be in peril, and with it the advancement of knowledge, i.e. the epistemic progress in science. In this paper, I want to critically discuss the limits of such a progressivist defense of academic freedom, also known under the label ‘argument from truth.’ The critique is offered, however, with a constructive goal in mind, namely to offer an alternative account that connects creativity and academic freedom in (...) a way that goes beyond mere reference to epistemic progress and involves reference to the freedom to think independently as the freedom we mean when we point to creativity and when we point to academic freedom. The resulting causal independence account is not only epistemologically stronger than a progressivist account, it also allows to counter the curbing of academic freedom in the name of progress. The latter becomes key, for instance, when authoritarian political regimes limit or negate academic freedom with reference to an epistemic progress suitably defined for that regime. (shrink)

According to Karl Popper, science cannot verify its theories empirically, but it can falsify them, and that suffices to account for scientific progress. For Popper, a law or theory remains a pure conjecture, probability equal to zero, however massively corroborated empirically it may be. But it does just seem to be the case that science does verify empirically laws and theories. We trust our lives to such verifications when we fly in aeroplanes, cross bridges and take modern medicines. We can (...) do some justice to this apparent capacity of science to verify if we make a number of improvements to Popper’s philosophy of science. The key step is to recognize that physics, in accepting unified theories only, thereby makes a big metaphysical assumption about the nature of the universe. The outcome is a conception of scientific method which facilitates the criticism and improvement of metaphysical assumptions of physics. This view provides, not verification, but a perfect simulacrum of verification indistinguishable from the real thing. (shrink)

Moral, social, political, and other “nonepistemic” values can lead to bias in science, from prioritizing certain topics over others to the rationalization of questionable research practices. Such values might seem particularly common or powerful in the social sciences, given their subject matter. However, I argue first that the well-documented phenomenon of motivated reasoning provides a useful framework for understanding when values guide scientific inquiry (in pernicious or productive ways). Second, this analysis reveals a parity thesis: values influence the social and (...) natural sciences about equally, particularly because both are so prominently affected by desires for social credit and status, including recognition and career advancement. Ultimately, bias in natural and social science is both natural and social— that is, a part of human nature and considerably motivated by a concern for social status (and its maintenance). Whether the pervasive influence of values is inimical to the sciences is a separate question. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to contribute to the debate over the nature of scientific progress in philosophy of science by taking a quantitative, corpus-based approach. By employing the methods of data science and corpus linguistics, the following philosophical accounts of scientific progress are tested empirically: the semantic account of scientific progress, the epistemic account of scientific progress, and the noetic account of scientific progress. Overall, the results of this quantitative, corpus-based study lend some empirical support to the epistemic (...) and the noetic accounts over the semantic account of scientific progress, for they suggest that practicing scientists use the terms ‘knowledge’ and ‘understanding’ significantly more often than the term ‘truth’ when they talk about the aims or goals of scientific research in their published works. But the results do not favor the epistemic account over the noetic account, or vice versa, for they reveal no significant differences between the frequency with which practicing scientists use the terms ‘knowledge’ and ‘understanding’ when they talk about the aims or goals of scientific research in their published works. (shrink)

So far, various approaches have been proposed to explain the progress of science. These approaches, which fall under a fourfold classification, are as follows: semantic, functional, epistemic, and noetic approaches. Each of these approaches, based on the intended purpose of science, defines progress on the same basis. The semantic approach defines progress based on the approximation to the truth, the functional approach based on problem-solving, the epistemic approach based on knowledge accumulation, and the noetic approach based on increased understanding. With (...) a stratified description of the world, Roy Bhaskar sees science as the movement toward deeper layers aimed at discovering productive mechanisms. He also explains progress based on the layering and acquisition of knowledge of the underlying layers. But because he believes in the social nature of science and considers knowledge a social product and subject to change, he acknowledges the fallibility of cognition. Hence, it is believed that moving to a new layer does not necessarily lead to the progress of science. However, it is possible that by acquiring knowledge about the new layer, our previous knowledge will be revised and corrected. In this article, while expressing the Bhaskar theory of scientific progress and explaining its contingency with respect to the fallibility of cognition, we pursue a basic goal. This goal is summarized in the review of all four approaches in order to show their lack of attention to the fallibility of cognition and its effect on explaining progress. What has been done in this article is based on two phases: explaining the contingency of the progress of science for Bhaskar and examining the four approaches to the progress of science in order to show their inattention to the fallibility of cognition. In his philosophy, referring to the two dimensions of transitive and intransitive, Roy Bhaskar considers the purpose of science to be the acquisition of knowledge about intransitive objects, and this knowledge is achieved through a social activity. Since this cognition is a social product and belongs to the transitive dimension of science, it will be fallible and subject to change. Bhaskar concludes with philosophical arguments that the world contains generative mechanisms, but that it is the task of science to discover their nature and exactly what mechanisms are at work. This requires work in two theoretical dimensions, namely the use of conceptual tools and a practical dimension, that is, the use of experimental tools. Now, as the theoretical and technical conditions under which cognition is formed and evaluated are themselves expanding and subject to change and modification, our knowledge may also be expanded or corrected. In this study, it was found that the semantic approach is unaware of the effect of fallibility on the evidence used to estimate the approximation to the truth and, consequently, progress. The functional approach ignores this effect in solving the problems posed by theories. The epistemic approach does not take into account the fallibility of evidence used to justify and validate the evidence, and finally, the noetic approach neglects the effect of the fallibility on what the explanation and prediction are based on. These have led to these approaches, which consider the satisfaction of the criteria in question necessarily leads to progress. (shrink)

El propósito del ensayo es ofrecer una reflexión sobre la profesión del investigador novel desde la experiencia del autor a la luz de las ideas y reflexiones ofrecidas por Pierre Bourdieu en su obra “El oficio de científico” con cuestiones actuales y retos a los que se enfrentan la comunidad científica en el ámbito de las ciencias de la educación. El texto se articula con relación a los temas que surgen de la lectura del libro de Bourdieu que se irán (...) nutriendo de los aportes de otros textos y artículos relacionados con la materia. Como señala Martel (2016), se pretende aportar un trozo de este espejo roto que es la profesión del investigador para reconstruirlo a modo de aviso para navegantes para los que vienen detrás desde la experiencia del investigador novel. (shrink)

In the process of scientific discovery, knowledge ampliation is pursued by means of non-deductive inferences. When ampliative reasoning is performed, probabilities cannot be assigned objectively. One of the reasons is that we face the problem of the unconceived alternatives: we are unable to explore the space of all the possible alternatives to a given hypothesis, because we do not know how this space is shaped. So, if we want to adequately account for the process of knowledge ampliation, we need to (...) develop an account of the process of scientific discovery which is not exclusively based on probability calculus. We argue that the analytic view of the method of science advocated by Cellucci is interestingly suited to this goal, since it rests on the concept of plausibility. In this perspective, in order to account for how probabilities are in fact assigned in uncertain contexts and knowledge ampliation is really pursued, we have to take into account plausibility-based considerations. (shrink)

This paper offers a new angle on the common idea that the process of science does not support epistemic diversity. Under minimal assumptions on the nature of journal editing, we prove that editorial procedures, even when impartial in themselves, disadvantage less prominent research programs. This purely statistical bias in article selection further skews existing differences in the success rate and hence attractiveness of research programs, and exacerbates the reputation difference between the programs. After a discussion of the modeling assumptions, the (...) paper ends with a number of recommendations that may help promote scientific diversity through editorial decision making. (shrink)

* Einige Gemeinplätze über Tatsachen und Wissenschaft * Postfaktische Kommunikation und »alternative Fakten« * Ist nur Unumstößliches Tatsache? * Woran starb Ramses II.? * Ist der naive Realismus nicht seit Kant überwunden?

This paper argues that philosophers of science have before them an important new task that they urgently need to take up. It is to convince the scientific community to adopt and implement a new philosophy of science that does better justice to the deeply problematic basic intellectual aims of science than that which we have at present. Problematic aims evolve with evolving knowledge, that part of philosophy of science concerned with aims and methods thus becoming an integral part of science (...) itself. The outcome of putting this new philosophy into scientific practice would be a new kind of science, both more intellectually rigorous and one that does better justice to the best interests of humanity. (shrink)

I present a recent historical case from cosmology—the story of inflationary cosmology—and on its basis argue that solving explanatory problems is a reliable method for making progress in science. In particular, I claim that the success of inflationary theory at solving its predecessor’s explanatory problems justified the theory epistemically, even in advance of the development of novel predictions from the theory and the later confirmation of those predictions.

Lyons (2016, 2017, 2018) formulates Laudan’s (1981) historical objection to scientific realism as a modus tollens. I present a better formulation of Laudan’s objection, and then argue that Lyons’s formulation is supererogatory. Lyons rejects scientific realism (Putnam, 1975) on the grounds that some successful past theories were (completely) false. I reply that scientific realism is not the categorical hypothesis that all successful scientific theories are (approximately) true, but rather the statistical hypothesis that most successful scientific theories are (approximately) true. Lyons (...) rejects selectivism (Kitcher, 1993; Psillos, 1999) on the grounds that some working assumptions were (completely) false in the history of science. I reply that selectivists would say not that all working assumptions are (approximately) true, but rather that most working assumptions are (approximately) true. (shrink)

This article develops and defends a new functional approach to scientific progress. I begin with a review of the problems of the traditional functional approach. Then I propose a new functional account of scientific progress, in which scientific progress is defined in terms of usefulness of problem defining and problem solving. I illustrate and defend my account by applying it to the history of genetics. Finally, I highlight the advantages of my new functional approach over the epistemic and semantic approaches (...) and dismiss some potential objections to my approach. (shrink)

Scientists are constantly making observations, carrying out experiments, and analyzing empirical data. Meanwhile, scientific theories are routinely being adopted, revised, discarded, and replaced. But when are such changes to the content of science improvements on what came before? This is the question of scientific progress. One answer is that progress occurs when scientific theories ‘get closer to the truth’, i.e. increase their degree of truthlikeness. A second answer is that progress consists in increasing theories’ effectiveness for solving scientific problems. A (...) third answer is that progress occurs when the stock of scientific knowledge accumulates. A fourth and final answer is that scientific progress consists in increasing scientific understanding, i.e. the capacity to correctly explain and reliably predict relevant phenomena. This paper compares and contrasts these four accounts of scientific progress, considers some of the most prominent arguments for and against each account, and briefly explores connections to different forms of scientific realism. (shrink)

Dellsén has recently argued for an understanding-based account of scientific progress, the noetic account, according to which science makes cognitive progress precisely when it increases our understanding of some aspect of the world. I contrast this account with Bird’s ; epistemic account, according to which such progress is made precisely when our knowledge of the world is increased or accumulated. In a recent paper, Park criticizes various aspects of my account and his arguments in favor of the noetic account as (...) against Bird’s epistemic account. This paper responds to Park’s objections. An important upshot of the paper is that we should distinguish between episodes that constitute and promote scientific progress, and evaluate account of scientific progress in terms of how they classify different episodes with respect to these categories. (shrink)

On the historical origins of technological fixes and their wider social and political implications.

Steven Pinker's book Enlightenment NOW is in many ways a terrific book, from which I have learnt much. But it is also deeply flawed. Science and reason are at the heart of the book, but the conceptions that Steven Pinker defends are damagingly irrational. And these defective conceptions of science and reason, as a result of being associated with the Enlightenment Programme for the past two or three centuries, have been responsible, in part, for the genesis of the global problems (...) we now suffer from, and our current inability to deal with them properly. There is not a glimmering of an awareness of any of this in Pinker’s book. This flaw in Enlightenment NOW is serious indeed. (shrink)

Natural science, properly understood, provides us with the methodological key to the salvation of humanity. First, we need to acknowledge that the actual aims of science are profoundly problematic, in that they make problematic assumptions about metaphysics, values and the social use of science. Then we need to represent these aims in the form of a hierarchy of aims, which become increasingly unproblematic as one goes up the hierarchy; as result we create a framework of relatively unproblematic aims and methods, (...) high up in the hierarchy, within which much more problematic aims and methods, low down in the hierarchy, may be improved as scientific knowledge improves. Then, we need to generalize this hierarchical, aims-and-methods-improving methodology so that it becomes fruitfully applicable to any worthwhile endeavour with problematic aims. Finally, we need to apply this methodology to the immensely problematic task of making progress towards as good a world as feasible. (shrink)

After decades of intense debate over the old pessimistic induction (Laudan, 1977; Putnam, 1978), it has now become clear that it has at least the following four problems. First, it overlooks the fact that present theories are more successful than past theories. Second, it commits the fallacy of biased statistics. Third, it erroneously groups together past theories from different fields of science. Four, it misses the fact that some theoretical components of past theories were preserved. I argue that these four (...) problems entitle us to construct what I call the grand pessimistic induction that since the old pessimistic induction has infinitely many hidden problems, the new pessimistic induction (Stanford, 2006) also has infinitely many hidden problems. (shrink)

There are three main accounts of scientific progress: 1) the epistemic account, according to which an episode in science constitutes progress when there is an increase in knowledge; 2) the semantic account, according to which progress is made when the number of truths increases; 3) the problem-solving account, according to which progress is made when the number of problems that we are able to solve increases. Each of these accounts has received several criticisms in the last decades. Nevertheless, some authors (...) think that the epistemic account is to be preferred if one takes a realist stance. Recently, Dellsén proposed the noetic account, according to which an episode in science constitutes progress when scientists achieve increased understanding of a phenomenon. Dellsén claims that the noetic account is a more adequate realist account of scientific progress than the epistemic account. This paper aims precisely at assessing whether the noetic account is a more adequate realist account of progress than the epistemic account. (shrink)

Unter einigenWissenschaftlern ist die Vorstellung verbreitet, dass Paradoxien Anzeichen von Fortschritt sein können. Es ist jedoch unklar, wie dies zu deuten ist. Dieser Essay stellt ein subjekt-relatives Verständnis von Paradoxikalität vor, das Paradoxien als »Dissonanzen der Zustimmung« (Rescher 2001) charakterisiert und dadurch erlaubt, sie als Katalysator wissenschaftlichen Fortschritts zu rekonstruieren: Durch ihre Struktur haben Problemstellungen in Form von Paradoxien wenigstens fünf fortschrittsfördernde Eigenschaften, die sie Problemstellungen in Form von Fragen voraushaben. Dadurch können Paradoxien als Angelpunkte theoretischen Fortschritts gesehen werden. Dies (...) legt eine Forderung nahe: Wenn wir theoretischen Fortschritt in den Wissenschaften fördern wollen, so sollten wir den Bau von Paradoxien aktiv verfolgen, gemäß dem Credo: Progress by Paradox! (shrink)

"Understanding Scientific Progress constitutes a potentially enormous and revolutionary advancement in philosophy of science. It deserves to be read and studied by everyone with any interest in or connection with physics or the theory of science. Maxwell cites the work of Hume, Kant, J.S. Mill, Ludwig Bolzmann, Pierre Duhem, Einstein, Henri Poincaré, C.S. Peirce, Whitehead, Russell, Carnap, A.J. Ayer, Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn, Imre Lakatos, Paul Feyerabend, Nelson Goodman, Bas van Fraassen, and numerous others. He lauds Popper for advancing beyond (...) verificationism and Hume’s problem of induction, but faults both Kuhn and Popper for being unable to show that and how their work could lead nearer to the truth." —Dr. LLOYD EBY teaches philosophy at The George Washington University and The Catholic University of America, in Washington, DC "Maxwell's aim-oriented empiricism is in my opinion a very significant contribution to the philosophy of science. I hope that it will be widely discussed and debated." – ALAN SOKAL, Professor of Physics, New York University "Maxwell takes up the philosophical challenge of how natural science makes progress and provides a superb treatment of the problem in terms of the contrast between traditional conceptions and his own scientifically-informed theory—aim-oriented empiricism. This clear and rigorously-argued work deserves the attention of scientists and philosophers alike, especially those who believe that it is the accumulation of knowledge and technology that answers the question."—LEEMON McHENRY, California State University, Northridge "Maxwell has distilled the finest essence of the scientific enterprise. Science is about making the world a better place. Sometimes science loses its way. The future depends on scientists doing the right things for the right reasons. Maxwell's Aim-Oriented Empiricism is a map to put science back on the right track."—TIMOTHY McGETTIGAN, Professor of Sociology, Colorado State University - Pueblo "Maxwell has a great deal to offer with these important ideas, and deserves to be much more widely recognised than he is. Readers with a background in philosophy of science will appreciate the rigour and thoroughness of his argument, while more general readers will find his aim-oriented rationality a promising way forward in terms of a future sustainable and wise social order."—David Lorimer, Paradigm Explorer, 2017/2 "This is a book about the very core problems of the philosophy of science. The idea of replacing Standard Empiricism with Aim-Oriented Empiricism is understood by Maxwell as the key to the solution of these central problems. Maxwell handles his main tool masterfully, producing a fascinating and important reading to his colleagues in the field. However, Nicholas Maxwell is much more than just a philosopher of science. In the closing part of the book he lets the reader know about his deep concern and possible solutions of the biggest problems humanity is facing."—Professor PEETER MŰŰREPP, Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia “For many years, Maxwell has been arguing that fundamental philosophical problems about scientific progress, especially the problem of induction, cannot be solved granted standard empiricism (SE), a doctrine which, he thinks, most scientists and philosophers of science take for granted. A key tenet of SE is that no permanent thesis about the world can be accepted as a part of scientific knowledge independent of evidence. For a number of reasons, Maxwell argues, we need to adopt a rather different conception of science which he calls aim-oriented empiricism (AOE). This holds that we need to construe physics as accepting, as a part of theoretical scientific knowledge, a hierarchy of metaphysical theses about the comprehensibility and knowability of the universe, which become increasingly insubstantial as we go up the hierarchy. In his book “Understanding Scientific Progress: Aim-Oriented Empiricism”, Maxwell gives a concise and excellent illustration of this view and the arguments supporting it… Maxwell’s book is a potentially important contribution to our understanding of scientific progress and philosophy of science more generally. Maybe it is the time for scientists and philosophers to acknowledge that science has to make metaphysical assumptions concerning the knowability and comprehensibility of the universe. Fundamental philosophical problems about scientific progress, which cannot be solved granted SE, may be solved granted AOE.” Professor SHAN GAO, Shanxi University, China . (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis discussion note aims to contribute to the ongoing debate over the nature of scientific progress. I argue against the semantic view of scientific progress, according to which scientific progress consists in approximation to truth or increasing verisimilitude. If the semantic view of scientific progress were correct, then scientists would make scientific progress simply by arbitrarily adding true disjuncts to their hypotheses or theories. Given that it is not the case that scientists could make scientific progress simply by arbitrarily adding (...) true disjuncts to their hypotheses or theories, it follows that the semantic view of scientific progress is incorrect. (shrink)

Bird argues that scientific progress consists in increasing knowledge. Dellsén objects that increasing knowledge is neither necessary nor sufficient for scientific progress, and argues that scientific progress rather consists in increasing understanding. Dellsén also contends that unlike Bird’s view, his view can account for the scientific practices of using idealizations and of choosing simple theories over complex ones. I argue that Dellsén’s criticisms against Bird’s view fail, and that increasing understanding cannot account for scientific progress, if acceptance, as opposed to (...) belief, is required for scientific understanding. (shrink)

Aus dem vielfältigen Werk von Hermann von Helmholtz versammelt diese Ausgabe die im engeren Sinne philosophischen Abhandlungen, vor allem zur Wissenschaftsphilosophie und Erkenntnistheorie, sowie Vorträge und Reden, bei denen der Autor seine Ausnahmestellung im Wissenschaftsbetrieb nutzte, um die Wissenschaften und ihre Institutionen in der bestehenden Form zu repräsentieren und zu begründen. Ein Philosoph wollte Helmholtz nicht sein, aber er legte der philosophischen Reflexion wissenschaftlicher Erkenntnis und wissenschaftlichen Handelns große Bedeutung bei. Vor allem bezog er, in der Regel ausgehend von seinen (...) fachwissenschaftlichen Forschungen, in den verschiedensten Kontexten zu erkenntnistheoretischen und methodologischen Problemen der Wissenschaften Stellung. Bereits »Ueber die Erhaltung der Kraft« (1847) lässt erkennen, wie verwoben naturwissenschaftliche Grundlagenforschung und philosophische Grundlagenreflexion in seinem Werk sind. Die aus den frühen sinnesphysiologischen Forschungen hervorgegangene empiristische Wahrnehmungslehre trug ihm den Ruf ein, ein maßgeblicher Vertreter des Neukantianismus zu sein. Spätere Arbeiten v.a. zur Geometrie und Arithmetik – das zeigt die vorliegende Ausgabe – stellen jedoch eine radikale Absage an den konstitutiven Kern des Kantianismus (nämlich die Existenz synthetischer Urteile a priori) dar. Helmholtz’ philosophische Beiträge sind bisher in ihrer Vollständigkeit nicht annähernd so gut zugänglich wie sein naturwissenschaftliches Werk. Die Ausgabe enthält außerdem bibliographische Vorberichte zur Einordnung, detaillierte Namens- und Sachregister sowie mit 575 Einträgen für den Zeitraum zwischen 1842 und 2012 die erste umfassende Bibliographie von Helmholtz verfasster Werke überhaupt. »Ich glaube, dass der Philosophie nur wieder aufzuhelfen ist, wenn sie sich mit Ernst und Eifer der Untersuchung der Erkenntnissprocesse und der wissenschaftlichen Methode zuwendet. Da hat sie eine wirkliche und berechtigte Aufgabe.« Helmholtz in einem Brief um 1875. (shrink)

Le principali concezioni del progresso scientifico sono tre: la concezione epistemica, secondo cui il progresso si verifica quando si verifica un incremento della conoscenza; la concezione semantica, secondo cui il progresso si verifica quando vi è un incremento delle verità; la concezione problem-solving, secondo cui il progresso si verifica quando si verifica un incremento del numero dei problemi che si è in grado di risolvere. La concezione epistemica è ritenuta la più compatibile con una prospettiva realista. Di recente, Dellsén ha (...) proposto la concezione “noetica”, secondo cui il progresso si verifica quando vi è un incremento dell’understanding di un fenomeno da parte degli scienziati. Dellsén sostiene che la concezione noetica sia una concezione realista del progresso più adeguata di quella epistemica. Scopo di questo articolo è valutare se la concezione noetica sia più adeguata della concezione epistemica. (shrink)

Over the last decades, science has grown increasingly collaborative and interdisciplinary and has come to depart in important ways from the classical analyses of the development of science that were developed by historically inclined philosophers of science half a century ago. In this paper, I shall provide a new account of the structure and development of contemporary science based on analyses of, first, cognitive resources and their relations to domains, and second of the distribution of cognitive resources among collaborators and (...) the epistemic dependence that this distribution implies. On this background I shall describe different ideal types of research activities and analyze how they differ. Finally, analyzing values that drive science towards different kinds of research activities, I shall sketch the main mechanisms underlying the perceived tension between disciplines and interdisciplinarity and argue for a redefinition of accountability and quality control for interdisciplinary and collaborative science. (shrink)

Interest in the concept of objectivity is part of the legacy of Modern Philosophy, tracing back to a new way of understanding the starting point of philosophical reflection. It traces back to an “epistemological turn” that attended the development of New Science of the 16th and 17th Century. These origins are an indication that what a thinker takes as the starting point of philosophical reflection deeply affects how they approach key philosophical concepts, including truth, knowledge, and objectivity. Chapter 1 Introduces (...) this key concept in philosophy, and some of the history of its use. (shrink)

What is scientific progress? On Alexander Bird’s epistemic account of scientific progress, an episode in science is progressive precisely when there is more scientific knowledge at the end of the episode than at the beginning. Using Bird’s epistemic account as a foil, this paper develops an alternative understanding-based account on which an episode in science is progressive precisely when scientists grasp how to correctly explain or predict more aspects of the world at the end of the episode than at the (...) beginning. This account is shown to be superior to the epistemic account by examining cases in which knowledge and understanding come apart. In these cases, it is argued that scientific progress matches increases in scientific understanding rather than accumulations of knowledge. In addition, considerations having to do with minimalist idealizations, pragmatic virtues, and epistemic value all favor this understanding-based account over its epistemic counterpart. (shrink)

This article examines two questions about scientists’ search for knowledge. First, which search strategies generate discoveries effectively? Second, is it advantageous to diversify search strategies? We argue pace Weisberg and Muldoon, “Epistemic Landscapes and the Division of Cognitive Labor”, that, on the first question, a search strategy that deliberately seeks novel research approaches need not be optimal. On the second question, we argue they have not shown epistemic reasons exist for the division of cognitive labor, identifying the errors that led (...) to their conclusions. Furthermore, we generalize the epistemic landscape model, showing that one should be skeptical about the benefits of social learning in epistemically complex environments. (shrink)

For four decades it has been argued that we need to adopt a new conception of science called aim-oriented empiricism. This has far-reaching implications and repercussions for science, the philosophy of science, academic inquiry in general, conception of rationality, and how we go about attempting to make progress towards as good a world as possible. Despite these far-reaching repercussions, aim-oriented empiricism has so far received scant attention from philosophers of science. Here, sixteen objections to the validity of the argument for (...) aim-oriented empiricism are subjected to critical scrutiny. (shrink)

First, I argue that scientific progress is possible in the absence of increasing verisimilitude in science’s theories. Second, I argue that increasing theoretical verisimilitude is not the central, or primary, dimension of scientific progress. Third, I defend my previous argument that unjustified changes in scientific belief may be progressive. Fourth, I illustrate how false beliefs can promote scientific progress in ways that cannot be explicated by appeal to verisimilitude.

In this paper, three theories of progress and the aim of science are discussed: the theory of progress as increasing explanatory power, advocated by Popper in The logic of scientific discovery ; the theory of progress as approximation to the truth, introduced by Popper in Conjectures and refutations ; the theory of progress as a steady increase of competing alternatives, which Feyerabend put forward in the essay “Reply to criticism. Comments on Smart, Sellars and Putnam” and defended as late as (...) the last edition of Against method. It is argued that, contrary to what Feyerabend scholars have predominantly assumed, Feyerabend's changing attitude towards falsificationism—which he often advocated at the beginning of his career, and vociferously attacked in the 1970s and 1980s—must be explained by taking into account not only Feyerabend's very peculiar view of the aim of science, but also Popper's changing account of progress. (shrink)

Im ersten Teil verorte ich den historischen Kontext des Umbruchprozesses der Wissenschaft des 19. Jahrhunderts im Hinblick auf die Physik. Vom Beginn der Neuzeit bis weit ins 20. Jahrhundert hinein war die Physik die Leitwissenschaft in den Naturwissenschaften. Der Wandlungsprozess der auf sie bezogenen Wissenschaftsauffassungen setzt im 19. Jahrhundert bislang unangetastete, von der Antike herrührende Geltungsansprüche außer Kraft. Im zweiten Teil vergleiche ich Nietzsches Charakterisierung der Wissenschaften exemplarisch mit der von Hermann von Helmholtz. Helmholtz kann als ein herausragender Vertreter der (...) Naturforschung des 19. Jahrhunderts angesehen werden. Er entwickelte seine erste bahnbrechende wissenschaftliche Leistung noch ganz im Rahmen einer auf Wahrheit und Einheit fokussierten Wissenschaftsauffassung. Im Verlauf seiner weiteren Arbeiten relativierten sich seine Geltungsansprüche zunehmend. In systematischer Hinsicht näherte sich Helmholtz damit nicht nur der Position an, die Nietzsche immer schon eingenommen hat, sondern er übertraf sie sogar in bestimmter Hinsicht. -/- Im dritten Teil setze ich mich kritisch mit einem Aspekt der Rezeption des historischen Verhältnisses von Nietzsche und Helmholtz auseinander. Helmholtz gehörte zu den wenigen repräsentativen Naturwissenschaftlern, von denen man annimmt, dass ihre Forschungen auf das Denken Nietzsches Einfluss hatten. Bemerkenswerterweise stammen die betreffenden Arbeiten aus der ersten Phase von Helmholtz’ Wissenschaftsauffassung. Während Helmholtz mit seinen Forschungen einen traditionellen Wahrheitsanspruch bestätigt sah, bezog sich Nietzsche auf sie, um sie umgekehrt zur Destruktion dieses Anspruches einzusetzen. Wo der Rezeption diese Konstellation entgangen ist, hat sie dazu beigetragen, die Aktualität von Nietzsches Wissenschaftskritik zu überschätzen. (shrink)

Do the changes that have taken place in the structures and methods of the production of scientific knowledge and in our understanding of science over the past fifty years justify speaking of an epochal break in the development of science? Gregor Schiemann addresses this issues through the notion of a scientific revolution and claims that at present we are not witnessing a new scientific revolution. Instead, Schiemann argues that after the so-called Scientific Revolution in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, a (...) caesura occurred in the course of the nineteenth century that constituted a departure from the early modern origins of science. This change was characterized by the loss of certainty on the part of the scientists, by the steadily increasing importance of scientific communities (rather than individuals), and by the systematic intertwinement of scientific and societal development. As to present science, Schiemann admits that important changes have occurred, but he denies the conflation of nature and culture: even the OncoMouse is a natural organism, though a seriously damaged one. (shrink)

Mit Robotik, Digitalisierung, softwaregesteuerten Präzisionsinstrumenten und hochkomplexen Simulationsverfahren wird heute Technik zur treibenden Kraft der wissenschaftlichen Forschungspraxis. Gleichzeitig sieht sich die universitäre Forschung wachsenden gesellschaftlichen Einflüssen ausgesetzt und nähert sich selbst immer mehr der Industrieforschung an, woraus sich neue Fragen nach den Werten und der Objektivität der Wissenschaft ergeben. Derartig weitreichende Veränderungen haben zahlreiche Spekulationen darüber provoziert, ob sich in der Wissenschaftsgeschichte gegenwärtig ein Epochenbruch vollzieht. Dieser Sammelband setzt sich aus philosophischen, historischen und kulturwissenschaftlichen Perspektiven mit den Epochenbruchthesen auseinander, bestätigt (...) und bestreitet ihn. Die Beiträge in diesem Band setzen sich mit der These vom Epochenbruch vor dem Hintergrund verschiedener Disziplinen auseinander, darunter Wissenschaftsphilosophie und -geschichte, sozialwissenschaftliche Untersuchungen über Wissenschaft sowie kultur- und medientheoretische Studien zu Wissenschaft und Technik. Die erste Gruppe der Beiträge versucht, die These von einem Epochenbruch im Ganzen zu beurteilen. Den Anfang bilden mehrere Beiträge, die die Debatte eröffnen, indem sie starke Thesen für oder gegen die Vorstellung vorlegen, dass sich das wissenschaftliche Unterfangen in den letzten Jahrzehnten völlig neu orientiert hat. Die Autoren in der zweiten Gruppe setzen sich unter einem spezifischen Gesichtspunkt mit der These auseinander. Sie stellen bestimmte Konzepte in den Mittelpunkt, greifen spezifische technische Entwicklungen heraus oder betrachten einzelne Praktiken und Anwendungskontexte. Diese spezifischen Konzepte, Technologien und Praxisbereiche dienen als Testfeld für die umfassendere These. (shrink)