The Two Selves takes the position that the self is not a "thing" easily reduced to an object of scientific analysis. Rather, the self consists in a multiplicity of aspects, some of which have a neuro-cognitive basis (and thus are amenable to scientific inquiry) while other aspects are best construed as first-person subjectivity, lacking material instantiation. As a consequence of their potential immateriality, the subjective aspect of self cannot be taken as an object and therefore is not easily amenable to (...) treatment by current scientific methods. -/- Klein argues that to fully appreciate the self, its two aspects must be acknowledged, since it is only in virtue of their interaction that the self of everyday experience becomes a phenomenological reality. However, given their different metaphysical commitments (i.e., material and immaterial aspects of reality), a number of issues must be addressed. These include, but are not limited to, the possibility of interaction between metaphysically distinct aspects of reality, questions of causal closure under the physical, the principle of energy conservation. -/- After addressing these concerns, Klein presents evidence based on self-reports from case studies of individuals who suffer from a chronic or temporary loss of their sense of personal ownership of their mental states. Drawing on this evidence, he argues that personal ownership may be the factor that closes the metaphysical gap between the material and immaterial selves, linking these two disparate aspects of reality, thereby enabling us to experience a unified sense of self despite its underlying multiplicity. -/- . (shrink)

Like it or not, a big picture of the history of science is something which we cannot avoid. Big pictures are, of course, thoroughly out of fashion at the moment; those committed to specialist research find them simplistic and insufficiently complex and nuanced, while postmodernists regard them as simply impossible. But however specialist we may be in our research, however scornful of the immaturity of grand narratives, it is not so easy to escape from dependence – acknowledged or not – (...) on a big picture. When we define our research as part of the history of science, we implicitly invoke a big picture of that history to give identity and meaning to our specialism. When we teach the history of science, even if we do not present a big picture explicitly, our students already have a big picture of that history which they bring to our classes and into which they fit whatever we say, no matter how many complications and refinements and contradictions we put before them – unless we offer them an alternative big picture. (shrink)

What is the primary function of consciousness in the nervous system? The answer to this question remains enigmatic, not so much because of a lack of relevant data, but because of the lack of a conceptual framework with which to interpret the data. To this end, we have developed Passive Frame Theory, an internally coherent framework that, from an action-based perspective, synthesizes empirically supported hypotheses from diverse fields of investigation. The theory proposes that the primary function of consciousness is well-circumscribed, (...) serving the 'somatic nervous system[. For this system, consciousness serves as a frame that constrains and directs skeletal muscle output, thereby yielding adaptive behavior. The mechanism by which consciousness achieves this is more counterintuitive, passive, and “low level” than the kinds of functions that theorists have previously attributed to consciousness. Passive frame theory begins to illuminate (a) what consciousness contributes to nervous function, (b) how consciousness achieves this function, and (c) the neuroanatomical substrates of conscious processes. Our untraditional, action-based perspective focuses on olfaction instead of on vision and is 'descriptive' (describing the products of nature as they evolved to be) rather than 'normative' (construing processes in terms of how they should function). Passive frame theory begins to isolate the neuroanatomical, cognitive-mechanistic, and representational (e.g., conscious contents) processes associated with consciousness. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that much of the confusion and mystery surrounding the concept of "self" can be traced to a failure to appreciate the distinction between the self as a collection of diverse neural components that provide us with our beliefs, memories, desires, personality, emotions, etc (the epistemological self) and the self that is best conceived as subjective, unified awareness, a point of view in the first person (ontological self). While the former can, and indeed has, been extensively (...) studied by researchers of various disciplines in the human sciences, the latter most often has been ignored -- treated more as a place holder attached to a particular predicate of interest (e.g., concept, reference, deception, esteem, image, regulation, etc). These two aspects of the self, I contend, are not reducible -- one being an object (the epistemological self) and the other a subject (the ontological self). Until we appreciate the difficulties of applying scientific methods and analysis to what cannot be reduced to an object of inquiry without stripping it of its essential aspect (its status as subject), progress on the "self", taken as a pluralistic construct, will continue to address only one part of the problems we face in understanding this most fundamental aspect of human experience. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:This study examines whether the empirical evidence on the relationship between corporate social performance (CSP) and corporate financial performance (CFP) differs depending on the publication outlet in which that evidence appears. This moderator meta-analysis, based on a total sample size of 33,878 observations, suggests that published CSP-CFP findings have been shaped by differences in institutional logics in different subdisciplines of organization studies. In economics, finance, and accounting journals, the average correlations were only about half the magnitude of the findings published (...) in Social Issues in Management, Business Ethics, or Business and Society journals (mean corrected correlation coefficientof.22 vs..49, respectively). Specifically, economists did not find null or negative CSP-CFP correlations, and average findings published in general management outlets (=.41) were closer to Social Issues in Management, Business Ethics, and Business and Society results than to findings reported in economics, finance, and accounting journals. (shrink)

This paper comments on Maria Baghramian’s ‘The Virtues of Relativism’. We agree that some relativist positions are naturally couched as ‘stances’ and that it is fruitful to connect relativism to virtue epistemology. But I find Baghramian’s preferred rendering of relativism uncharitable.

This article situates current debates about transdisciplinarity within the deeper history of academic disciplinarity, in its difference from the notions of inter- and multi-disciplinarity. It offers a brief typology and history of established conceptions of transdisciplinarity within science and technology studies. It then goes on to raise the question of the conceptual structure of transdisciplinary generality in the humanities, with respect to the incorporation of the 19th- and 20th-century German and French philosophical traditions into the anglophone humanities, under the name (...) of ‘theory’. It identifies two distinct – dialectical and anti-dialectical, or dialectical and transversal – transdisciplinary trajectories. It locates the various contributions to the special issue of which it is the introduction within this conceptual field, drawing attention to the distinct contribution of the French debates about structuralism and its aftermath – those by Serres, Foucault, Derrida, Guattari and Latour, in particular. It concludes with an appendix on Foucault’s place within current debates about disciplinarity and academic disciplines. (shrink)

The paper takes a fresh look at two essays that Adam Smith wrote at the very beginning of his career. In these essays, Smith explains his philosophy of science, which is social constructivist. A social constructivist reading of Smith strengthens the scholarly consensus that The Wealth of Nations needs to be interpreted in light of the general moral theory he explicates in The Theory of Moral Sentiments, as the two essays and TMS stress the importance of the same concepts: e.g., (...) moral imagination, the socially embedded individual, and humility. The connecting tissue between all three works is made up of sentiments and values. Smith regards the socially embedded human as the agent in all three realms, and humans are always driven by values. Smith not only conceives of economics as an applied moral philosophy, but also bases both research areas on a view of knowledge creation that stresses specific epistemic values. If mainstream economic theory wants to have any claim to Adam Smith, it would have to change not only what it argues but also how it argues. Economists would have to replace the language of mathematics with the language and logic of moral philosophy and give values centre stage. (shrink)

A large part of the controversy surrounding the publication of DSM-5 stems from the possibility of replacing the purely descriptive approach to classification favored by the DSM since 1980. This paper examines the question of how mental disorders should be classified, focusing on the issue of whether the DSM should adopt a purely descriptive or theoretical approach. I argue that the DSM should replace its purely descriptive approach with a theoretical approach that integrates causal information into the DSM’s descriptive diagnostic (...) categories. The paper proceeds in three sections. In the first section, I examine the goals (viz., guiding treatment, facilitating research, and improving communication) associated with the DSM’s purely descriptive approach. In the second section, I suggest that the DSM’s purely descriptive approach is best suited for improving communication among mental health professionals; however, theoretical approaches would be superior for purposes of treatment and research. In the third section, I outline steps required to move the DSM towards a hybrid system of classification that can accommodate the benefits of descriptive and theoretical approaches, and I discuss how the DSM’s descriptive categories could be revised to incorporate theoretical information regarding the causes of disorders. I argue that the DSM should reconceive of its goals more narrowly such that it functions primarily as an epistemic hub that mediates among various contexts of use in which definitions of mental disorders appear. My analysis emphasizes the importance of pluralism as a methodological means for avoiding theoretical dogmatism and ensuring that the DSM is a reflexive and self-correcting manual. (shrink)

1. A Historical Look at Unity 2. Field Guide to Modern Concepts of Reduction and Unity 3. Kitcher's Revisionist Account of Unification 4. Critics of Unity 5. Integration Instead of Unity 6. Reduction via Mechanisms 7. Case Studies in Reduction and Unification across the Disciplines.

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)

What is it about relativism that justifies, or at least explains, its continued appeal in the face of relentless attacks through the history of philosophy? This paper explores a new answer to this old question, casting the response in metaphilosophical terms. § i introduces the problem. § ii argues that one part of the answer is that some of the well-known defences of relativism take it to be a philosophical stance—that is, a broad perspective or orientation with normative consequences—rather than (...) a doctrine or a thesis. § iii draws attention to an assumption, not always explicitly stated by its proponents, that the relativist stance leads to the cultivation of some key intellectual virtues. Open-mindedness, tolerance, intellectual humility, and curiosity are examples of the intellectual virtues that relativism can foster. § iv argues that the defence of relativism on the basis of the virtues that are assumed to follow from it, at best, is only partially successful. Moreover, there is a range of epistemic vices, resulting from the stance, that undercuts the virtue-based defence presented in § iii. (shrink)

There has been a great deal of skepticism towards the value of the realism/anti-realism debate. More specifically, many have argued that plausible formulations of realism and anti-realism do not differ substantially in any way. In this paper, I argue against this trend by demonstrating how a hypothetical resolution of the debate, through deeper engagement with the historical record, has important implications for our criterion of theory pursuit and science policy. I do this by revisiting Arthur Fine’s ‘small handful’ argument for (...) realism and show how the debate centers on whether continuity should be an indicator for the future fruitfulness of a theory. I then demonstrate how these debates work in practice by considering the case of the Human Brain Project. I close by considering some potential practical considerations of formulating meta-inductions. By doing this, I contribute three insights to the current debate: 1) demonstrate how the realism/anti-realism debate is a substantive debate, 2) connect debates about realism/anti-realism to debates about theory choice and pursuit, and 3) show the practical significance of meta-inductions. (shrink)

Neo-positivism is dead. Let that imperfect designation stand for the project that dominated and defined the philosophy of science, especially in its Anglophone form, during the fifty or so years following the end of the Second World War. While its critics were many,1 its death was slow, and some think still to find a pulse.2 But die it did in the cul-de-sac into which it was led by its own faulty compass.

Researchers misunderstand their role in creating ethical problems when they allow dogmas to purportedly divorce scientists and scientific practices from the values that they embody. Cortina, Edwards, and Powell help us clarify and further develop our position by responding to our critique of, and alternatives to, this misleading separation. In this rebuttal, we explore how the desire to achieve the separation of facts and values is unscientific on the very terms endorsed by its advocates—this separation is refuted by empirical observation. (...) We show that positivists like Cortina and Edwards offer no rigorous theoretical or empirical justifications to substantiate their claims, let alone critique ours. Following Powell, we point to how classical pragmatism understands ‘purpose’ in scientific pursuits while also providing an alternative to the dogmas of positivism and related philosophical positions. In place of dogmatic, unscientific cries about an abstract and therefore always-unobservable ‘reality,’ we invite all organizational scholars to join us in shifting the discussion about quantitative research towards empirically grounded scientific inquiry. This makes the ethics of actual people and their practices central to quantitative research, including the thoughts, discourses, and behaviors of researchers who are always in particular places doing particular things. We propose that quantitative researchers can thus start to think about their research practices as a kind of work, rather than having the status of a kind of dogma. We conclude with some implications that this has for future research and education, including the relevance of research and research methods. (shrink)

Although critics often argue that the new atheists are arrogant, dogmatic, closed-minded and so on, there is currently no philosophical analysis of this complaint - which I will call 'the vice charge' - and no assessment of whether it is merely a rhetorical aside or a substantive objection in its own right. This Chapter therefore uses the resources of virtue epistemology to articulate this ' vice charge' and to argue that critics are right to imply that new atheism is intrinsically (...) epistemically vicious, and it ends with some remarks about the rationality of allowing such intrinsically vicious doctrines to feature within public debate about important matters concerning science, religion, and politics. (shrink)

This paper investigates the historical origins of the notion of incommensurability in contemporary philosophy of science. The aim is not to establish claims of priority, but to enhance our understanding of the notion by illuminating the various issues that contributed to its development. Kuhn developed his notion of incommensurability primarily under the influence of Fleck, Polanyi, and Köhler. Feyerabend, who had developed his notion more than a decade earlier, drew directly from Duhem, who had developed a notion of incommensurability in (...) 1906. The idea is that in the course of scientific advance, when fundamental theories change, meanings change, which can result in a new conception of the nature of reality. Feyerabend repeatedly used this notion of incommensurability to attack various forms of conceptual conservativism. These include the logical positivists’ foundational use of protocol statements, Heisenberg’s methodological principle that established results must be presupposed by all further research, attempts to separate philosophical accounts of ontology from physics, Bohr’s principle of complementarity, and logical empiricist accounts of reduction and explanation. Focusing on the function of the notion of incommensurability common to Feyerabend’s various critiques explicates Feyerabend’s early philosophy as a series of challenges to forms of conceptual conservativism.Keywords: Incommensurability ; Paul Feyerabend; Thomas Kuhn; Pierre Duhem; Wolfgang Köhler; Ludwik Fleck. (shrink)

Understanding nature of science is widely considered an important educational objective and views of NOS are closely linked to science teaching and learning. Thus there is a lively discussion about what understanding NOS means and how it is reached. As a result of analyses in educational, philosophical, sociological and historical research, a worldwide consensus about the content of NOS teaching is said to be reached. This consensus content is listed as a general statement of science, which students are supposed to (...) understand during their education. Unfortunately, decades of research has demonstrated that teachers and students alike do not possess an appropriate understanding of NOS, at least as far as it is defined at the general level. One reason for such failure might be that formal statements about the NOS and scientific knowledge can really be understood after having been contextualized in the actual cases. Typically NOS is studied as contextualized in the reconstructed historical case stories. When the objective is to educate scientifically and technologically literate citizens, as well as scientists of the near future, studying NOS in the contexts of contemporary science is encouraged. Such contextualizations call for revision of the characterization of NOS and the goals of teaching about NOS. As a consequence, this article gives two examples for studying NOS in the contexts of scientific practices with practicing scientists: an interview study with nanomodellers considering NOS in the context of their actual practices and a course on nature of scientific modelling for science teachers employing the same interview method as a studying method. Such scrutinization opens rarely discussed areas and viewpoints to NOS as well as aspects that practising scientists consider as important. (shrink)

Scientificity is essentially methodology. The use of information technology as methodological instruments in science has been increasing for decades, this raises the question: Does this transform science? This question is the subject of the Special Issue in Minds and Machines “The epistemological significance of methods in computer simulation and machine learning”. We show that there is a technological change in this area that has three methodological and epistemic consequences: methodological opacity, reproducibility issues, and altered forms of justification.

Multiple simultaneous independent discoveries, so well enunciated by Robert K. Merton in the early 1960s but already discussed for several hundreds of years, is a classic concept in the sociology of science. In this paper, the concept of multiple simultaneous independent errors is proposed, analyzed, and discussed. The concept of Selective Pessimistic Induction is proposed and used to connect MIDs with MIEs. Five types of MIEs are discussed: multiple errors in the interpretation of experimental data or computational results; multiple misjudgments (...) of the value of another’s research results or conclusions; multiple cases of false anticipation of achieving a certain experimental result; multiples of ignoring or omitting relevant precedents; and multiple instances of failure due to a not-yet-conceived scientific concept or principle. Causal MIDs and MIEs are those that can be traced directly to antecedent knowledge. Acausal MIDs and MIEs are those involving a consequential and identifiable leap from antecedent knowledge. Examples of causal and acausal MIEs are provided, mostly but not exclusively from the discipline of chemistry. Comparisons are made between MIDs and MIEs. Topics for future research are discussed and implications of these concepts are proposed. (shrink)

In order for theology to have a cognitive dimension, it is necessary to have procedures for testing and critically evaluating theological models. We make use of certain features of scientific models to show how science has been able to move beyond the poles of foundationalism, represented by logical positivism, and antifoundationalism or relativism, represented by the sociologists of knowledge. These ideas are generalized to show that constructing and testing theological models similarly offers a means by which theology can move beyond (...) confessionalism and postmodernism. Our starting point is Paul Tillich's concept of God as the ground of being and the different levels of consciousness and thinking that accompany his understanding of theology. The ontological argument of Anselm is shown to play a key role, not as a proof for the existence of God but as a means for testing theological models. An example of a theological model, drawn from the domain of philosophy of science, is presented to show how theological models are constructed and tested. (shrink)

John Preston has claimed that we must understand Paul Feyerabend's later, post-1970, philosophy in terms of a disappointed Popperianism: that Feyerabend became a sceptical, relativistic, literal anarchist because of his perception of the failure of Popper's philosophy. I argue that this claim cannot be supported and trace the development of Feyerabend's philosophy in terms of a commitment to the central Popperian themes of criticism and critical explanatory progress. This commitment led Feyerabend to reject Popper's specific methodology in favour of a (...) pluralistic methodology, but the commitment to the central values of criticism and critical explanatory progress remained . Moreover, methodological pluralism does not imply scepticism, relativism, or literal anarchism. Feyerabend was not a disappointed Popperian, but, in many respects, a die-hard pluralistic Popperian. (shrink)

Recently, some philosophers of science (e.g., Gürol Irzik, Michael Friedman) have challenged the ‘received view’ on the relationship between Rudolf Carnap and Thomas Kuhn, suggesting that there is a close affinity (rather than opposition) between their philosophical views. In support of this argument, these authors cite Carnap and Kuhn’s similar views on incommensurability, theory-choice, and scientific revolutions. Against this revisionist view, I argue that the philosophical relationship between Carnap and Kuhn should be regarded as opposed rather than complementary. In particular, (...) I argue that a consideration of the fundamentally disparate nature of the broader philosophical projects of Carnap (logic of science) and Kuhn (providing a theory of scientific revolutions)renders the alleged similarities between their views superficial in comparison to their fundamental differences. In defense of the received view, I suggest that Carnap and Kuhn are model representatives of two contrasting styles of doing philosophy of science, viz., logical analysis and historical analysis respectively. This analysis clarifies the role played by Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions in the demise of logical empiricism in the second half of the twentieth-century. (shrink)

The ArgumentDespite the enormous historical attention psychoanalysis has attracted, its popularization in Britain (as opposed to the United States) in the wake of the Great War has been largely overlooked. The present paper explores the sources and fate of the sudden “craze” for psychoanalysis after 1918, examining the content of the books through which the doctrine became widely known, along with the roles played by religious interests and the popular press. The percolation of Freudian and related language into everyday English (...) was effectively complete by the 1930s. Crucially, it is argued that in Britain the character of psychoanalytic theory itself demonstrably converged with the psychological needs of the British population in the postwar period. The situation in Britain was clearly different in many respects from that in the United States. This episode bears on numerous questions about scientific popularization, the distinctiveness of British psychoanalysis, and though it is treated here only peripherally the epistemological status or nature of psychoanalysis. More generally the present paper may be read as an exercise in reflexive disciplinary historiography, in which the levels of discipline (“Psychology”) and subject matter (“psychology”) are viewed as interpenetrating and mutually constitutive. (shrink)

Our EcoDialogue Center is an educational space for human sustainability within the University of Veracruz. We propose that creating sustainable knowledge requires re-thinking how we conceive ourselves as human beings. This requires paying attention to what we call “the quality of being,” which means caring about and attending to the physical–emotional–mental–spiritual as the foundation of education. This way we can create a space where we can dialogue contemplatively where all dimensions of our lives interact; the physical, the emotional, the communitarian, (...) the social politic, the planetarium, and the spiritual being act with social–environmental responsibility. (shrink)

The following overview of the present situation and recent trends in the philosophy of science in the USA brings together bibliographical and institutional evidence to document the last stages of the supersession of logical positivism, the emergence of the historical school , its widespread influence upon other fields as well as within philosophy of science, and finally some of the reactions to it, many of which envision their endeavors as mediations between the historical school and the older logical approaches As (...) well as recording pertinent institutional trends, the report provides a series of capsule summaries of representative work from the extant literature primarily from 1966 to the present. (shrink)

When Paul Hirst and Wilfred Carr squared up to each other a few years ago on the issue of the role of philosophical theory in educational practice, it became clear that theory itself had become a troubled term. The very fact that Wilfred Carr could argue for the end of educational theory recalls Paul Feyerabend's fiery argument for the end of theory in natural science and simply deepened the attack that had already appeared in Carr and Kemmis's book, Becoming Critical (...) (1986). In response, Hirst insisted that theory, and particularly the philosophical theory of education, should be defined as a discrete area of study in itself, governed and structured by the axioms of logic. In this way, he argued, the philosophy of education would be no different from philosophy in general (at least in its analytic formulation). Carr, on the other hand, preferred to consider educational theory as a flexible event that took its shape from the landscape explored, and hence precisely not the kind of study that Hirst supported, but one based in action research and reflective practitioner experience. This debate is as yet unresolved. In this piece I begin by making several remarks about the current context for raising the question Hirst and Carr address, and I go on to consider other possible understandings of theoria in a Greek sense before developing this idea through a reading of Aristotle. I eventually conclude that each of the protagonists in the debate has taken a step too far. (shrink)

This article seeks to elaborate the step of epistemological affirmation that exists within every movement of learning. My epistemological method is rooted in philosophical hermeneutics in contrast to empirical or rationalist traditions. I argue that any movement of learning is based upon an entry into a hermeneutical circle: one is thrown into, or leaps into, an interpretation which in some sense has to be temporarily affirmed or adopted in order to be either absorbed and integrated, or overcome and rejected. I (...) illustrate this process through a retrieval of the concept of submission in pedagogy, particularly with reference to submission in Eastern traditions, as well as pre-modern Christian thought. These other traditions are introduced to contrast with the modern liberal Western perspective in which the role of submission has been almost entirely lost. (shrink)

Tarski’s conceptual analysis of the notion of logical consequence is one of the pinnacles of the process of defining the metamathematical foundations of mathematics in the tradition of his predecessors Euclid, Frege, Russell and Hilbert, and his contemporaries Carnap, Gödel, Gentzen and Turing. However, he also notes that in defining the concept of consequence “efforts were made to adhere to the common usage of the language of every day life.” This paper addresses the issue of what relationship Tarski’s analysis, and (...) Béziau’s further generalization of it in universal logic, have to reasoning in the everyday lives of ordinary people from the cognitive processes of children through to those of specialists in the empirical and deductive sciences. It surveys a selection of relevant research in a range of disciplines providing theoretical and empirical studies of human reasoning, discusses the value of adopting a universal logic perspective, answers the questions posed in the call for this special issue, and suggests some specific research challenges. (shrink)

Throughout his career David Hull has sought to bring the philosophy of science into closer contact with science and especially with biological science (Hull 1969, 1997b). This effort has taken many forms. Sometimes it has meant ‘either explaining basic biology to philosophers or explaining basic philosophy to biologists’ (Hull 1996, p. 77). The first of these tasks, simple as it sounds, has been responsible for revolutionary changes. It is well known that traditional philosophy of science, modeled as it was on (...) theoretical physics, proved inadequate when philosophers turned their attention to biological science. Biological examples have driven major revisions of accounts of reduction (Hull 1974; Schaffner 1993, Ch. 9), laws of nature (Beatty et al. 1997), theories (Lloyd 1988) and natural kinds (Wilson 1999, Part III). Nor is explaining basic philosophy to biologists a task to be looked down upon. It is useful, not because philosophy has all the answers, but because scientists must think about how to do science, that is doing philosophy of science and scientists frequently reinvent philosophical views with known flaws. Early in his career Hull found biological systematists in the grip of a crude operationalism about scientific concepts and said so in the pages of Systematic Zoology (Hull 1968). For the next thirty years, as biologists debated the nature of species and the correct principles of classification, Hull added a philosophical note at the same congresses and in the same journals (Hull 1970, 1976, 1980, 1997a, 1999). (shrink)

This is an essay review of two textbooks on quantum gravity by Carlo Rovelli and Claus Kiefer.

Wilfred Carr; Can Educational Research be Scientific?, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 17, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 35–43, https://doi.org/10.1111.

According to a standard view, quantum mechanics is a contextual theory and quantum probability does not satisfy Kolmogorov’s axioms. We show, by considering the macroscopic contexts associated with measurement procedures and the microscopic contexts underlying them, that one can interpret quantum probability as epistemic, despite its non-Kolmogorovian structure. To attain this result we introduce a predicate language L, a classical probability measure on it and a family of classical probability measures on sets of μ-contexts, each element of the family corresponding (...) to a measurement procedure. By using only Kolmogorovian probability measures we can thus define mean conditional probabilities on the set of properties of any quantum system that admit an epistemic interpretation but are not bound to satisfy Kolmogorov’s axioms. The generalized probability measures associated with states in QM can then be seen as special cases of these mean probabilities, which explains how they can be non-classical and provides them with an epistemic interpretation. Moreover, the distinction between compatible and incompatible properties is explained in a natural way, and purely theoretical classical conditional probabilities coexist with empirically testable quantum conditional probabilities. (shrink)

The paper reviews criteria which have been used to distinguish science from nonscience and from pseudo–science, and it examines the extent to which they can usefully be applied to “creation science.” These criteria do not force a clear decision, especially as creation science resembles important eighteenth–century forms of orthodox science. Nevertheless, the proponents of creation science may be accused of pious fraud in failing to concede in their political battles that their “science” is tentative and tendentious and will continue to (...) be so while it remains archaic and poorly integrated into the rest of science. (shrink)

Scholars concerned with the foundations of quantum mechanics (QM) usually think that contextuality (hence nonobjectivity of physical properties, which implies numerous problems and paradoxes) is an unavoidable feature of QM which directly follows from the mathematical apparatus of QM. Based on some previous papers on this issue, we criticize this view and supply a new informal presentation of the extended semantic realism (ESR) model which embodies the formalism of QM into a broader mathematical formalism and reinterprets quantum probabilities as conditional (...) on detection rather than absolute. Because of this reinterpretation a hidden variables theory can be constructed which justifies the assumptions introduced in the ESR model and proves its objectivity. When applied to special cases the ESR model settles long-standing conflicts (it reconciles Bell’s inequalities with QM), provides a general framework in which previous results obtained by other authors (as local interpretations of the GHZ experiment) are recovered and explained, and supports an interpretation of quantum logic which avoids the introduction of the problematic notion of quantum truth. (shrink)

Cultural anthropologists and sociobiologists developed initially incommensurable approaches to explaining cooperation and altruism in human societies. When understood as complex cultural adaptations, however, scientific research programs are subject to piecemeal changes in the research programs driving scientific research. The emergence of new research programs in cultural evolution and group selection resulted. This transformation is examined with a focus on explanations for the origin and maintenance of human inequality. The transmission, modification, and selection of the complex cultural packages underlying egalitarianism and (...) hereditary inequality challenge both the focus on biological roots of hierarchy and the autonomous construction of cultures. (shrink)

Amedeo Giorgi has published a review article devoted to Phenomenology as Qualitative Research: A Critical Analysis of Meaning Attribution. However, anyone reading this article, but unfamiliar with the book, will get a distorted view of what it is about, whom it is addressed to, what it seeks to achieve and how it goes about presenting its arguments. Not mildly distorted, in need of the odd correction here and there, but systematically misrepresented. The article is a study in misreading. Giorgi misreads (...) the book's mise en scène; he misreads its narrative arc; he misreads individual arguments; he misreads short, simple passages; he misreads the philosophy of the science literature; he misreads his own data; he misreads the title; he misreads the blurb; he misreads the acknowledgements. In addition, there are serious failures of scholarship (ironically, he demonstrates how unacquainted he is with the relevant literature at the very moment he is accusing me of being ill‐informed). In this reply, I provide several examples of these errors, but my primary aim is to understand why Giorgi's misreading is as ubiquitous as it is. To this end, I explain his mistakes by reference to the hermetic epistemology within which he is confined. (shrink)

This essay examines critically two related claims: first, that postmodernism and philosophy of science depend on each other in a manner similar to the Enlightenment and Romanticism, that is, they respond and dispute each other's claims; and second, that what underlies and emanates from both postmodernism and philosophy of science is a political perspective and commitment. These claims suggest not only the possibility of translating from one area to the other when they are critically engaged with each other but also (...) the potential for using both areas simultaneously to transform and possibly improve the human condition. By emphasizing the similarities between science/philosophy of science and postmodernism the essay explores the ways in which these two enterprises or groups of people can learn from one another and benefit from each other's insight. (shrink)