In the article ”Against Physicalism-plus-God: How Creation Accounts for Divine Action in the World’, I defined a framework which allows us to make some progress in our understanding of how God acts in the world. In the present article, I apply this framework to the specific question of chance events. I show that chance does not provide an explanation for special divine action. Nevertheless, chance does not hamper God’s ability to act in the world, and creation provides a framework for (...) the understanding of chance, which is akin to what we see in modern science. (shrink)

In France, as in other European countries, especially Britain and Germany, the nineteenth century was a period of great progress and achievement in science. This would still have been true if Claude Bernard and Louis Pasteur had been the only outstanding French scientists of the nineteenth century, whereas there were, of course, many others apart from an impressive number of brilliant French mathematicians. Nevertheless, although it was a great century for French science there was perhaps something rather disappointing about it, (...) and something rather ingrowing about the attitude of French scientists towards scientific developments in other countries. For example, the French took it hard that the creator of the theory of evolution should have been an Englishman, remembering too late Darwin's predecessor Lamarck, and they certainly were very slow in accepting Darwin's theory of evolution.1 Again, the French may have felt that after the important contributions of French scientists such as Coulomb, Poisson, Biot and, above all, Ampère, the theory of electricity and magnetism which is today principally associated with the names of Faraday and Maxwell should have been created by a Frenchman. Once again this new theory was only accepted very slowly and hesitantly, and even unwillingly, in France—one thinks, for example, of the criticisms levelled at the theory by Pierre Duhem in his “The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory”.2 Of course it might be that if one knew how to weigh properly the various achievements of French scientists in different branches of science one would find that, allowing for her rather static population during the nineteenth century, thetotalcontribution of France compared well with those of Britain and Germany. Nevertheless, in one case at least, that of theoretical physics, there seems to have been an unmistakable failure to live up to the promise of the beginning of the century. The purpose of this paper is to advance possible reasons to explain this failure. (shrink)

Theoretical determinism, as it is usually ascribed to Laplace, is neither verifiable nor falsifiable and has therefore no real content. It is not the same as predictability of actually observable phenomena. On the other hand, predictability is not an abstract principle; rather it is true to a certain degree, depending on the phenomena considered. It can be discussed only by examining the scientific state of affairs. This is done in some detail for classical statistical mechanics. Much of a recently published (...) debate on determinism (Amsterdamski et al. 1990) is thereby obviated. (shrink)

The reference class problem arises when we want to assign a probability to a proposition (or sentence, or event) X, which may be classified in various ways, yet its probability can change depending on how it is classified. The problem is usually regarded as one specifically for the frequentist interpretation of probability and is often considered fatal to it. I argue that versions of the classical, logical, propensity and subjectivist interpretations also fall prey to their own variants of the reference (...) class problem. Other versions of these interpretations apparently evade the problem. But I contend that they are all “no-theory” theories of probability - accounts that leave quite obscure why probability should function as a guide to life, a suitable basis for rational inference and action. The reference class problem besets those theories that are genuinely informative and that plausibly constrain our inductive reasonings and decisions. I distinguish a “metaphysical” and an “epistemological” reference class problem. I submit that we can dissolve the former problem by recognizing that probability is fundamentally a two-place notion: conditional probability is the proper primitive of probability theory. However, I concede that the epistemological problem remains. (shrink)

This paper investigates the kind of empiricism combined with an operationalist perspective that, in the first decades of our Century, gave rise to a turning point in theoretical physics and in probability theory. While quantum mechanics was taking shape, the classical (Laplacian) interpretation of probability gave way to two divergent perspectives: frequentism and subjectivism. Frequentism gained wide acceptance among theoretical physicists. Subjectivism, on the other hand, was never held to be a serious candidate for application to physical theories, despite the (...) fact that its philosophical back-ground strongly resembles that underlying quantum mechanics, at least according to the Copenhagen interpretation. The reasons for this are explored. (shrink)

According to the principle of indifference, when a set of possibilities is evidentially symmetric for you – when your evidence no more supports any one of the possibilities over any other – you're required to distribute your credences uniformly among them. Despite its intuitive appeal, the principle of indifference is often thought to be unsustainable due to the problem of multiple partitions: Depending on how a set of possibilities is divided, it seems that sometimes, applying indifference reasoning can require you (...) to assign incompatible credences to equivalent possibilities. This paper defends the principle of indifference from the problem of multiple partitions by offering two guides for how to respond. The first is for permissivists about rationality, and is modeled on permissivists' arguments for the claim that a body of evidence sometimes does not uniquely determine a fully rational credence function. The second is for impermissivists about rationality, and is modeled on impermissivists' arguments for the claim that a body of evidence does always uniquely determine a fully rational credence function. What appears to be a decisive objection against the principle of indifference is in fact an instance of a general challenge taking different forms familiar to both permissivists and impermissivists. (shrink)

In this paper Venn's account of probability inference and induction is examined, tracing their differences as well as how they ‘co-operate’ in inferences from particulars to particulars. We discuss the role of mathematical idealizations in making probability inferences, the celebrated rule of succession and we delve into the nature of the reference class problem arguing that for Venn it is a common problem for both induction and inference in probability. Our approach is both historical and philosophical attempting to sketch Venn's (...) position both in the philosophy of probability and induction of his time and in relation to the twentieth-century frequentism. (shrink)

Jurado: Mario Gómez-Torrente (presidente), Miguel Ángel Fernández Vargas (vocal), Santiago Echeverri Saldarriaga (secretario). [Graduado con Mención Honorífica.].

One of the central criteria for free will is “Could I have done otherwise?” But because of a temporal asymmetry in human choice, the question makes no sense. The question is backward-looking, while human choices are forward-looking. At the time when any choice is actually made, there is as of yet no action to do otherwise. Expectation is the only thing to contradict (do other than). So the ability to do something not expected by the ultimate expecter, Laplace’s demon, is (...) a better criterion for free will. If human action is fundamentally unpredictable, then we have free will. Scientists have studied a form of fundamental unpredictability, known as undecidability. The features that make a system capable of undecidable dynamics have been identified: program-data duality; potential to access an infinite computational medium; and the ability to implement negation. Humans have all three of these features, so we very likely are fundamentally unpredictable, so we have free will. (shrink)

Determinism and unpredictability are compatible since deterministic flows can produce, if sensitive to initial conditions, unpredictable behaviors. Within this perspective, the notion of scenario to chaos transition offers a new form of predictability for the behavior of sensitive to initial condition systems under the variation of a control parameter. In this paper I first shed light on the genesis of this notion, based on a dynamical systems approach and on considerations of structural stability. I then suggest a link to the (...) figure of epigenetic landscape, partially inspired by a dynamical systems perspective, and offering a theoretical framework to apprehend developmental noise. (shrink)

A presente obra assume-se como um projeto genuinamente interdisciplinar de reflexão ética, interrogando os seus fundamentos e explorando as suas interseções com diversas áreas das Ciências Humanas e Sociais. Reunindo especialistas de distintas áreas, oriundos de países diferentes, o livro tem como fio condutor um diálogo polifónico com o pensamento ético contemporâneo, enraizando-se na tradição crítica que procura refundar a racionalidade prática na construção humana de sentido e, por conseguinte, refutar o niilismo e o relativismo axiológico absoluto.

Charles Sanders Peirce wrote the article “The probability of induction” in 1878. It was the fourth article of the series “Illustrations of the Logic of Science” which comprised a total of six articles. According to Peirce, to get a clear idea of the conception of probability, one has ‘to consider what real and sensible difference there is between one degree of probability and another.’ He endorsed what John Venn had called the ‘materialistic view’ of the subject, namely that probability is (...) the proportion of times in which an occurrence of one kind is accompanied by an occurrence of another kind. On the other hand, Peirce recognized the existence of a different interpretation of probability, which was termed by Venn the ‘conceptualistic view’, namely the degree of belief that ought to be attached to a proposition. Peirce’s intent on writing this article seems to be to inquire about the claims of the conceptualists concerning the problem of induction. After reasoning on some examples, he concluded on the impossibility of assigning probability for induction. We show here that the arguments advanced in his article are not sufficient to support such conclusion. Peirce’s thoughts on the probability of induction surely may have influenced statisticians and research scientists of the 20th century in shaping data analysis. (shrink)

Justified by spectacular achievements facilitated through applied deep learning methodology, the “Everything is possible” view dominates this new hour in the “boom and bust” curve of AI performance. The optimistic view collides head on with the “It is not possible”—ascertainments often originating in a skewed understanding of both AI and medicine. The meaning of the conflicting views can be assessed only by addressing the nature of medicine. Specifically: Which part of medicine, if any, can and should be entrusted to AI—now (...) or at some moment in the future? AI or not, medicine should incorporate the anticipation perspective in providing care. (shrink)

Non-Archimedean probability functions allow us to combine regularity with perfect additivity. We discuss the philosophical motivation for a particular choice of axioms for a non-Archimedean probability theory and answer some philosophical objections that have been raised against infinitesimal probabilities in general.

I show how classical and quantum physics approach the problem of randomness and probability. Contrary to popular opinions, neither we can prove that classical mechanics is a deterministic theory, nor that quantum mechanics is a nondeterministic one. In other words it is not possible to show that randomness in classical mechanics has a purely epistemic character and that of quantum mechanics an ontic one. Nevertheless, recent developments of quantum theory and increasing experimental possibilities to check its predictions call for returning (...) to the problem of comparing possibilities given by classical and quantum physics to accommodate and prove the existence of a `genuine randomness'. Recent results concerning `amplification of randomness' show that, in certain sense, quantum physics is in fact ‘more random’ that classical and outperforms it in producing a `truly random process'. (shrink)

The primary aim of this chapter is to explain the nature of evidential reasoning, the characteristic difficulties encountered, and the tools to address these difficulties. Our focus is on evidential reasoning in criminal cases. There is an extensive scholarly literature on these topics, and it is a secondary aim of the chapter to provide readers the means to find their way in historical and ongoing debates.

It is argued that the many-worlds interpretation is by far the best interpretation of quantum mechanics. The key points of this view are viewing the wave functions of worlds in three dimensions and understanding probability through self-locating uncertainty.

From the very beginning of ancient Greek philosophy up to the present day a puzzling correlation is found between rationality and reality. In this study this relation is examined with emphasis on the philosophical tradition of Aristotle and Aquinas. A comparison is made with the virtual reality created by computers and actual reality of our universe. The view expressed in the scientific neopositivism of Jordan and Mach is found to be an adequate approach to avoid contradictions in the interpretation of (...) modern physics. A challenging hypothesis is made by updating the Laplacian Demon by a powerful creative intellect in line with Judeo-Christian tradition. With this hypothesis a new light is shed on several fundamental issues in modern science. (shrink)

The claim of the freedom of the will (understood as an individual who is transcendent to Nature) in the name of XXth century scientific knowledge, against the perspective of XVIIIth-XIXth century scientific materialism, is analysed and refuted in the present paper. The hypothesis of reductionism finds no obstacle within contemporary natural sciences. Determinism in classical physics is irrefutable, unless classical physics is itself refuted. From quantum mechanics, some authors argue that free will is possible because there is an ontological indeterminism (...) in the natural laws, and that the mind is responsible for the wave function collapse of matter, which leads to a choice among the different possibilities for the body. However, here I defend the opposite thesis because indeterminism does not imply free will, and because the considerations about an autonomous mind sending orders to the body is against neuroscience or evolutionary theories about human beings. The quantum theory of measurement can be interpreted without the intervention of human minds, but other fields of science cannot contemplate the mentalist scenario. A fatalistic or materialist view, which denies the possibility of a free will, makes much more sense in scientific terms. (shrink)

The essay revisits the puzzle of the ‘passage’ of time in relation to EPR-type measurements and asks what philosophical consequences can be drawn from them. Some argue that the lack of invariance of temporal order in the measurement of a space-like related EPR pair, under relativistic motion, casts serious doubts on the ‘reality’ of the lapse of time. Others argue thatcertain features of quantum mechanics establisha tensed theory of time – understood here as Possibilism or the growing block universe. The (...) paper analyzes the employment of frame-invariant entropic clocks in a relativistic setting and argues that tenselessness does not imply timelessness. But this conclusion does not support a tensed theory of time, which requires a preferred foliation. It is argued that the only reliable inference from the EPR example and the use of entropic clocks is an inference not just to a Leibnizian order of the succession of events but a frame-invariant order according to some selected clocks. (shrink)

This paper argues that the innovation of an ordering source parameter in the standard Lewis-Kratzer semantics for modals was a mistake, at least for English auxiliaries like ‘ought’, and that a simpler dyadic semantics (as proposed in my earlier work) provides a superior account of normative uses of modals. I programmatically investigate problems arising from (i) instrumental conditionals, (ii) gradability and “weak necessity”, (iii) information-sensitivity, and (iv) conflicts, and show how the simpler semantics provides intuitive solutions given three basic moves: (...) (1) an end-relational analysis of normative modality, (2) a “most” analysis of “weak necessity”, and (3) well-motivated appeals to pragmatics. I conclude with metasemantic observations about the desiderata for a semantics for ‘ought’. (shrink)

The anti-causal prophecies of last century have been disproved. Causality is neither a ‘relic of a bygone’ nor ‘another fetish of modern science’; it still occupies a large part of the current debate in philosophy and the sciences. This investigation into causal modelling presents the rationale of causality, i.e. the notion that guides causal reasoning in causal modelling. It is argued that causal models are regimented by a rationale of variation, nor of regularity neither invariance, thus breaking down the dominant (...) Human paradigm. The notion of variation is shown to be embedded in the scheme of reasoning behind various causal models: e.g. Rubin’s model, contingency tables, and multilevel analysis. It is also shown to be latent – yet fundamental – in many philosophical accounts. Moreover, it has significant consequences for methodological issues: the warranty of the causal interpretation of causal models, the levels of causation, the characterisation of mechanisms, and the interpretation of probability. This book offers a novel philosophical and methodological approach to causal reasoning in causal modelling and provides the reader with the tools to be up to date about various issues causality rises in social science. (shrink)

The metamathematical tradition, tracing back to Hilbert, employs syntactic modeling to study the methods of contemporary mathematics. A central goal has been, in particular, to explore the extent to which infinitary methods can be understood in computational or otherwise explicit terms. Ergodic theory provides rich opportunities for such analysis. Although the field has its origins in seventeenth century dynamics and nineteenth century statistical mechanics, it employs infinitary, nonconstructive, and structural methods that are characteristically modern. At the same time, computational concerns (...) and recent applications to combinatorics and number theory force us to reconsider the constructive character of the theory and its methods. This paper surveys some recent contributions to the metamathematical study of ergodic theory, focusing on the mean and pointwise ergodic theorems and the Furstenberg structure theorem for measure preserving systems. In particular, I characterize the extent to which these theorems are nonconstructive, and explain how proof-theoretic methods can be used to locate their "constructive content.". (shrink)

I argue here for a number of ways that modern computational science requires a change in the way we represent the relationship between theory and applications. It requires a switch away from logical reconstruction of theories in order to take surface mathematical syntax seriously. In addition, syntactically different versions of the same theory have important differences for applications, and this shows that the semantic account of theories is inappropriate for some purposes. I also argue against formalist approaches in the philosophy (...) of science and for a greater role for perceptual knowledge rather than propositional knowledge in scientific empiricism. (shrink)

The article presents, develops, and defends a non-reductionist model of the generation of knowledge from multiple testimonies. It distinguishes the generation of knowledge from multiple testimonies from the transmission of knowledge by a single testimony. The reiteration of the generation of knowledge from multiple testimonies generates social knowledge.Critical examination of the literature about the coherence of multiple testimonies, their reliability, and independence argues in particular against conditional and causal interpretations and attempts to overcome the limitations of exclusively conceptual and formal (...) epistemologies. Instead, the article introduces an analysis of the generation of knowledge from multiple testimonies in terms of tracing information flows. The article presents a new three-stage modular model of knowledge generation from multiple testimonies that fits the actual veritistic best practices of institutionally embedded professionals like intelligence analysts, detectives, investigat.. (shrink)

In this paper, a concept of chance is introduced that is compatible with deterministic physical laws, yet does justice to our use of chance-talk in connection with typical games of chance. We take our cue from what Poincaré called "the method of arbitrary functions," and elaborate upon a suggestion made by Savage in connection with this. Comparison is made between this notion of chance, and David Lewis' conception.

Based on Kolchinsky and Wolpert’s work on the semantics of autonomous agents, I propose an application of Mathematical Logic and Probability to model cognitive processes. In this work, I will follow Bateson’s insights on the hierarchy of learning in complex organisms and formalize his idea of applying Russell’s Type Theory. Following Weaver’s three levels for the communication problem, I link the Kolchinsky–Wolpert model to Bateson’s insights, and I reach a semantic and conceptual hierarchy in living systems as an explicative model (...) of some adaptive constraints. Due to the generality of Kolchinsky and Wolpert’s hypotheses, I highlight some fundamental gaps between the results in current Artificial Intelligence and the semantic structures in human beings. In light of the consequences of my model, I conclude the paper by proposing a general definition of knowledge in probabilistic terms, overturning de Finetti’s Subjectivist Definition of Probability. (shrink)

Inductive reasoning aims at constructing rules and models of general applicability from a restricted set of observations. Induction is a keystone in natural sciences, and it influences diverse application fields such as engineering, medicine and economics. More generally, induction plays a major role in the way humans learn and operate in their everyday life. The level of reliability that a model achieves depends on how informative the observations are relative to the flexibility of the process by which the model is (...) constructed. When the process is articulated so that the model can incorporate descriptive details and subtleties, a large set of informative observations are required to reliably tune the model, whereas models obtained from simple procedures can be tuned with fewer observations. This article introduces the concept of “dominance”, which refers to the situation in which a reduced subset of observations suffices to reconstruct the model. A mathematical framework is presented to quantify the reliability of learning procedures as a function of the size of the subset of dominant observations. Although limited in scope, we believe that our study can contribute to the understanding of some fundamental mechanisms by which knowledge is generated from observations in inductive reasoning. (shrink)

For years, experimental philosophers have attempted to discern whether laypeople find free will compatible with a scientifically deterministic understanding of the universe, yet no consensus has emerged. The present work provides one potential explanation for these discrepant findings: People are strongly motivated to preserve free will and moral responsibility, and thus do not have stable, logically rigorous notions of free will. Seven studies support this hypothesis by demonstrating that a variety of logically irrelevant (but motivationally relevant) features influence compatibilist judgments. (...) In Study 1, participants who were asked to consider the possibility that our universe is deterministic were more compatibilist than those not asked to consider this possibility, suggesting that determinism poses a threat to moral responsibility, which increases compatibilist responding (thus reducing the threat). In Study 2, participants who considered concrete instances of moral behavior found compatibilist free will more sufficient for moral responsibility than participants who were asked about moral responsibility more generally. In Study 3a, the order in which participants read free will and determinism descriptions influenced their compatibilist judgments—and only when the descriptions had moral significance: Participants were more likely to report that determinism was compatible with free will than that free will was compatible with determinism. In Study 3b, participants who read the free will description first (the more compatibilist group) were particularly likely to confess that their beliefs in free will and moral responsibility and their disbelief in determinism influenced their conclusion. In Study 4, participants reduced their compatibilist beliefs after reading a passage that argued that moral responsibility could be preserved even in the absence of free will. Participants also reported that immaterial souls were compatible with scientific determinism, most strongly among immaterial soul believers (Study 5), and evaluated information about the capacities of primates in a biased manner favoring the existence of human free will (Study 6). These results suggest that people do not have one intuition about whether free will is compatible with determinism. Instead, people report that free will is compatible with determinism when desiring to uphold moral responsibility. Recommendations for future work are discussed. (shrink)

There are many ontologies of the world or of specific phenomena such as time, matter, space, and quantum mechanics1. However, ontologies of information are rather rare. One of the reasons behind this is that information is most frequently associated with communication and computing, and not with ‘the furniture of the world’. But what would be the nature of an ontology of information? For it to be of significant import it should be amenable to formalization in a logico-grammatical formalism. A candidate (...) ontology satisfying such a requirement can be found in some of the ideas of K. Turek, presented in this paper. Turek outlines the ontology of information conceived of as a part of nature, and provides the ‘missing link’ to the Z axiomatic set theory, offering a proposal for developing a formal ontology of information both in its philosophical and logicogrammatical representations. (shrink)

The prospects of a causal interpretation of probability are examined. Various accounts both from the history of scientific method and from recent developments in the tradition of the method of arbitrary functions, in particular by Strevens, Rosenthal, and Abrams, are briefly introduced and assessed. I then present a specific account of causal probability with the following features: First, the link between causal probability and a particular account of induction and causation is established, namely eliminative induction and the related difference-making account (...) of causation in the tradition of Bacon, Herschel, and Mill. Second, it is shown how a causal approach is useful beyond applications of the method of arbitrary functions and is able to deal with various shades of both ontic and epistemic probabilities. Furthermore, I clarify the notion of causal symmetry as a central element of an objective version of the principle of indifference and relate probabilistic independence to causal irrelevance. (shrink)

In this review article we present different formal frameworks for the description of generalized probabilities in statistical theories. We discuss the particular cases of probabilities appearing in classical and quantum mechanics, possible generalizations of the approaches of A. N. Kolmogorov and R. T. Cox to non-commutative models, and the approach to generalized probabilities based on convex sets.

It is commonly thought that before the introduction of quantum mechanics, determinism was a straightforward consequence of the laws of mechanics. However, around the nineteenth century, many physicists, for various reasons, did not regard determinism as a provable feature of physics. This is not to say that physicists in this period were not committed to determinism; there were some physicists who argued for fundamental indeterminism, but most were committed to determinism in some sense. However, for them, determinism was often not (...) a provable feature of physical theory, but rather an a priori principle or a methodological presupposition. Determinism was strongly connected with principles of causality and continuity and the principle of sufficient reason; this thesis examines the relevance of these principles in the history of physics. Moreover, the history of determinism in this period shows that there were essential changes in the relation between mathematics and physics: whereas in the eighteenth century, there were metaphysical arguments which lent support to differential calculus, by the early twentieth century the development of rigorous foundations of differential calculus led to concerns about its applicability in physics. The thesis consists of six papers. In the first paper, "On the origins and foundations of Laplacian determinism", I argue that Laplace, who is usually pointed out as the first major proponent of scientific determinism, did not derive his statement of determinism directly from the laws of mechanics; rather, his determinism has a background in eighteenth century Leibnizian metaphysics, and is ultimately based on the law of continuity and the principle of sufficient reason. These principles also provided a basis for the idea that one can find laws of nature in the form of differential equations which uniquely determine natural processes. In "The Norton dome and the nineteenth century foundations of determinism", I argue that an example of indeterminism in classical physics which has attracted attention in philosophy of physics in recent years, namely the Norton come, was already discussed during the nineteenth century. However, the significance which this type of indeterminism had back then is very different from the significance which the Norton dome currently has in philosophy of physics. This is explained by the fact that determinism was conceived of in an essentially different way: in particular, the nineteenth century authors who wrote about this type of indeterminism regarded determinism as an a priori principle rather than as a property of the equations of physics. In "Vital instability: life and free will in physics and physiology, 1860-1880", I show how Maxwell, Cournot, Stewart and Boussinesq used the possibility of unstable or indeterministic mechanical systems to argue that the will or a vital principle can intervene in organic processes without violating the laws of physics, so that a strictly dualist account of life and the mind is possible. Moreover, I show that their ideas can be understood as a reaction to the law of conservation of energy and to the way it was used in physiology to exclude vital and mental causes. In "The nineteenth century conflict between mechanism and irreversibility", I show that in the late nineteenth century, there was a widespread conflict between the aim of reducing physical processes to mechanics and the recognition that certain processes are irreversible. Whereas the so-called reversibility objection is known as an objection that was made to the kinetic theory of gases, it in fact appeared in a wide range of arguments, and was susceptible to very different interpretations. It was only when the project of reducing all of physics to mechanics lost favor, in the late nineteenth century, that the reversibility objection came to be used as an argument against mechanism and against the kinetic theory of gases. In "Continuity in nature and in mathematics: Boltzmann and Poincaré", I show that the development of rigorous foundations of differential calculus in the nineteenth century led to concerns about its applicability in physics: through this development, differential calculus was made independent of empirical and intuitive notions of continuity and was instead based on mathematical continuity conditions, and for Boltzmann and Poincaré, the applicability of differential calculus in physics depended on whether these continuity conditions could be given a foundation in intuition or experience. In the final paper, "Determinism around 1900", I briefly discuss the implications of the developments described in the previous two papers for the history of determinism in physics, through a discussion of determinism in Mach, Poincaré and Boltzmann. I show that neither of them regards determinism as a property of the laws of mechanics; rather, for them, determinism is a precondition for science, which can be verified to the extent that science is successful. (shrink)

The goal of this paper is to provide a detailed reading of John Venn's Logic of Chance as a work of logic or, more specifically, as a specific portion of the general system of so-called ‘material’ logic developed in his Principles of Empirical or Inductive Logic and to discuss it against the background of his Boolean-inspired views on the connection between logic and mathematics. It is by means of this situating of Venn 1866 [The Logic of Chance. An Essay on (...) the Foundations and Province of the Theory of Probability. With Especial Reference to Its Application to Moral and Social Science, London: Macmillan] within the entirety of his oeuvre that it becomes both possible to revisit and necessary to re-articulate its place in the history of the frequency interpretation of probability. For it is clear that if Venn's approach to logic not only allowed him to establish its foundations on the basis of a process of idealization and define it as consisting of so-called hypothetical infinite series, bu.. (shrink)

The history of the mathematical probability includes two phases: 1) From Pascal and Fermat to Laplace, the theory gained in application fields; 2) In the first half of the 20th Century, two competing axiomatic systems were respectively proposed by von Mises in 1919 and Kolmogorov in 1933. This paper places this historical sketch in the context of the philosophical complexity of the probability concept and explains the resounding success of Kolmogorov’s theory through its ability to avoid direct interpretation. Indeed, unlike (...) experimental sciences, and despite its numerous applications, probability theory cannot be tested per se. Rather it relates to practical matters by means of transition hypotheses or bridging principles that match the structure of practical problems with abstract theory. In this respect probability theory has a very special status among scientific disciplines. (shrink)

This paper addresses the question of how we should regard the probability distributions introduced into statistical mechanics. It will be argued that it is problematic to take them either as purely ontic, or purely epistemic. I will propose a third alternative: they are almost objective probabilities, or epistemic chances. The definition of such probabilities involves an interweaving of epistemic and physical considerations, and thus they cannot be classified as either purely epistemic or purely ontic. This conception, it will be argued, (...) resolves some of the puzzles associated with statistical mechanical probabilities: it explains how probabilistic posits introduced on the basis of incomplete knowledge can yield testable predictions, and it also bypasses the problem of disastrous retrodictions, that is, the fact the standard equilibrium measures yield high probability of the system being in equilibrium in the recent past, even when we know otherwise. As the problem does not arise on the conception of probabilities considered here, there is no need to invoke a Past Hypothesis as a special posit to avoid it. (shrink)

There are three main kinds of causal connections between two events: the transfer of energy, the transfer of information and the triggering of the transfer of one of them or both. There are also other kinds of causal connections.

Ludwig Boltzmann is one of the foremost responsible for the development of modern atomism in thermodynamics. His proposition was revolutionary not only because it brought a new vision for Thermodynamics, merging a statistical approach with Newtonian physics, but also because he produced an entirely new perspective on the way of thinking about and describing physical phenomena. Boltzmann dared to flirt with constructivism and realism simultaneously, by hypothesizing the reality of atoms and claiming an inherent probabilistic nature related to many particles (...) systems. Boltzmann faced criticism from the positivists, who rejected the hypothesis of the atom as a matter of principle, and also from physicists, who rejected the idea of a classical bounded system that does not follow deterministic mechanical laws. We consider that Boltzmann thermodynamics has emerged as a systemic theory that deals with macroscopic bodies using collective variables; it was reformulated to a kinetic theory of gases, and subsequently to statistical mechanics. From the theoretical physical point of view, Boltzmann advocates an approach to thermodynamics based on mechanics and was one of the founders of statistical mechanics, together with ideas by Maxwell, Clausius and Gibbs. Subsequently, statistical mechanics has also influenced the development of quantum mechanics and information theory. Using an evolutionary epistemological perspective as a metaphor to describe the physical entities claimed in Boltzmann propositions, we interpret his work as a selected theory that gained attributes of reality and “survived” during a scientific-contextual competition to be more adapted, in the sense that it was able to better explain physical phenomena, and also generated “descendants”. (shrink)

In this essay we argue that the notion of machine necessarily includes its being designed for a purpose. Therefore, being a mechanical system is not enough for being a machine. Since the experimental scientific method excludes any consideration of finality on methodological grounds, it is then also insufficient to fully understand what machines are. Instead in order to understand a machine it is first required to understand its purpose, along with its structure, in clear parallel with Aristotle’s final and formal (...) causes. Obviously, purpose and structure are not machine components that can physically interact with other components; nonetheless they are essential to understanding their operation. This casts an interesting light on the relationship between mind and body: for just as an artifact’s finality and structure explain its operation, so also consciousness is the explanation—not the efficient cause—of specifically human behavior. What machines and human beings have in common is that, in order to understand them, it is necessary to appeal to the principle of finality. Yet while finality is given and extrinsic in the case of machines, we human beings are characterized by the ability to self-propose our own ends. Since the principle of finality is essential to understanding the production of machines, the traditional view in modern Western philosophy that finality lies beyond the scope of objective/scientific knowledge should be rectified to allow for a genuine science of the artificial. We think a correct understanding of final causality will overcome current resistance to this principle. (shrink)

La métaphysique de Leibniz revue par Wolff est débattue dans la correspondance qu'entretiennent Voltaire et Frédéric, futur Frédéric II. Ce dernier tente d'initier et de convertir Voltaire au wolffisme. Même s'il la prétend remarquable, Voltaire estime peu la méthode wolffienne. Refusant le fidéisme à la Bayle, Frédéric ne se résout pas à renoncer volontairement aux connaissances que l'on peut acquérir par le raisonnement. Selon Voltaire, les vérités métaphysiques demeurent inaccessibles. La seule position défendable s'avère donc être le scepticisme métaphysique. Frédéric (...) l'admet: après avoir étudié les sciences et observé l'esprit des hommes, l'inclination au scepticisme est naturelle. Ainsi, le débat sur les monades a conduit Frédéric à dénier son wolffisme antérieur: il est prêt à devenir le parfait despote pragmatique et réaliste, disciple des Lumières françaises. (shrink)

This paper addresses the question of how we should regard the probability distributions introduced into statistical mechanics. It will be argued that it is problematic to take them either as purely subjective credences, or as objective chances. I will propose a third alternative: they are "almost objective" probabilities, or "epistemic chances". The definition of such probabilities involves an interweaving of epistemic and physical considerations, and so cannot be classified as either purely subjective or purely objective. This conception, it will be (...) argued, resolves some of the puzzles associated with statistical mechanical probabilities; it explains how probabilistic posits introduced on the basis of incomplete knowledge can yield testable predictions, and it also bypasses the problem of disastrous retrodictions, that is, the fact the standard equilibrium measures yield high probability of the system being in equilibrium in the recent past, even when we know otherwise. As the problem does not arise on the conception of probabilities considered here, there is no need to invoke a Past Hypothesis as a special posit to avoid it. (shrink)