This paper intends to critically consider the idea put forward by Johan Gamper that the principle of causal closure can be reconciled with the possibility of pluralism. This idea is based on redefining causal closure and on the introduction of so-called interfaces between the universes. By reconstructing and analyzing the author's argumentative steps, we will try to show that this approach is methodologically and explanatory unfounded. Firstly, this way of redefining the principle of causal closure is inconsistent with the very (...) reasons why this principle was introduced. Secondly, the proposed view does not bring the explanatory benefits it promises, that is, it cannot solve difficulties such as the problem of the first cause. Moreover, the position itself produces many additional concerns and perplexities that remain unresolved. The conclusion of our analysis is that certain aspects of the proposed position may be sustainable and plausible, but only if novel arguments should be offered. (shrink)

Two opposing uses of the term ‘Scientific Ontology’ reflect attitudes towards the relation between science and philosophical ontology. On the one side we can try to understand the broader picture by looking at the empirical details. On the other side we can try to find overarching principles that explain our observations. I am deeply aware of the history of this subject but—as we all know—history repeats itself. Perhaps it is time now for, actually, deduction to take more place in science. (...) Perhaps—which of course is my own belief—we have reached the end of the road of so much depending on empirical observations. The natural sciences have reached beyond what is possible to empirically detect. My own research is an attempt to redefine our ontological starting point and to really test if the world only is physical. In this Reply I put Tambassi’s reply in the explicit context of my definition of scientific ontology. The outcome is that scientific ontology cannot settle the debate in the geographical sciences as to whether the geographical world is mind-dependent or not, but that the geographical universe, in that case, as a universe, belongs to the domain of scientific ontology. (shrink)

According to Gamper, one function of science is to determine how the world is. Science, Gamper continues, rests on a set of basic assumptions, and the gap between basic assumptions and science should be filled by ontological frameworks that accommodates the modal properties of such assumptions. Different frameworks may surely suggest different modal properties. Thus, in so far as we use different basic assumptions, we can have different ontologies with different modal properties. Ontologies affect, in turn, science, which, however, has (...) the power to falsify the ontological frameworks. The aim of this article is to show a possible trouble of Gamper's proposal, here considered as applied to the geographical debate. (shrink)