El realismo estructural, como respuesta a la crítica de la llamada “metainducción pesimista”, postula la persistencia de la estructura matemática de las teorías en algunos casos cuando se producen cambios en la evolución de éstas, de tal modo que el éxito de las teorías posteriores se explica por la retención estructural de las teorías anteriores. Aunque en el estructuralismo metateórico no existe un punto de vista monolítico con relación al debate realismo/anti-realismo, en este trabajo se analizarán y discutirán, desde esta (...) propuesta modelística, la validez de los argumentos centrales del realismo estructural como alternativa al realismo científico estándar. Siguiendo la distinción trazada por Ladyman entre realismo estructural epistémico y realismo estructural óntico, en este trabajo se hará una caracterización general del primero, pero el análisis se focalizará principalmente en el análisis y la crítica del segundo. Para ello se echará mano de las herramientas teórico-conceptuales que proporciona la meta-teoría estructuralista en filosofía de la ciencia y, particularmente, de la identificación que en ella se hace de las teorías como clases o conjuntos de modelos y/o estructuras conjuntistas, a fin de clarificar, desde esta propuesta meta-teórica, los presupuestos básicos de lo que Sneed denomina el “realismo científico mínimo” y su variante, el realismo estructural epistemológico, en particular lo que se refiere a su noción de continuidad estructural y a la propuesta de algunos autores de apelar a la sentencia de Ramsey como justificación del realismo estructural sin referencia. (shrink)

Michael Friedman’s project both historically and systematically testifies to the importance of the relativized a priori. The importance of implicit definitions clearly emerges from Schlick’s General Theory of Knowledge . The main aim of this paper is to show the relationship between both and the relativized a priori through a detailed discussion of Friedman’s work. Succeeding with this will amount to a contribution to recent scholarship showing the importance of Hilbert for Logical Empiricism.

Scientists, philosophers, and other researchers commonly assert their theories. This is surprising, as there are good reasons for skepticism about theories in cutting-edge research. I propose a new account of assertion in research contexts that vindicates these assertions. This account appeals to a distinct propositional attitude called endorsement, which is the rational attitude of committed advocacy researchers have to their theories. The account also appeals to a theory of conversational pragmatics known as the Question Under Discussion model, or QUD. Hence, (...) I call the theory the EQUD model. Motivating this account is a recognition that the speech act of assertion has two roles to play in research contexts. The first is the advocacy role, in which researchers assert a theory in order to advocate for it. The second is the evidential role, which is used to add to the common stock of information available to a field of inquiry. The EQUD model provides an account of warranted assertion for both these roles in research contexts. This success provides support for the theory of endorsement. It also provides support for information updating accounts of assertion. (shrink)

This book presents a collection of studies by Romanian philosophers, addressing foundational issues currently debated in contemporary philosophy of science. It offers a historical survey of the tradition of scientific philosophy in Romania. It examines some problems in the foundations of logic, mathematics, linguistics, the natural and social sciences. Among the more specific topics, it discusses scientific explanation, models, and mechanisms, as well as memory, artifacts, and rules of research. The book is useful to those interested in the philosophy of (...) real science, but also to those interested in Romanian philosophy. (shrink)

Scientific realism is a doctrine that was both in and out of fashion several times during the twentieth century. I begin by noting three presuppositions of a succinct characterization of scientific realism offered initially by the foremost critic in the latter part of the century, Bas van Fraassen. The first presupposition is that there is a fundamental distinction to be made between what is “empirical” and what is “theoretical”. The second presupposition is that a genuine scientific realism is committed to (...) their being “a literally true story of what the world is like”. The third presupposition is that there are methods for justifying a belief in the empirical adequacy of a theory which do not also suffice to justify beliefs in its literal truth. Each of these presuppositions raises a number of problems, some of which are quite old and others rather newer. In each case, I briefly review some of the old problems and then elaborate the newer problems. (shrink)

Science and fiction seem to lie at opposite ends of the cognitive-epistemic spectrum. The former is typically seen as the study of hard, real-world facts in a rigorous manner. The latter is treated as an instrument of play and recreation, dealing in figments of the imagination. Initial appearances notwithstanding, several central features of scientific modeling in fact suggest a close connection with the imagination and recent philosophers have developed detailed accounts of models that treat them, in one way or another, (...) as akin to fictions. This chapter will critically discuss the fictions approach as an epistemology of scientific modeling. (shrink)

In contemporary philosophy of science, the no-miracles argument and the pessimistic induction are regarded as the strongest arguments for and against scientific realism, respectively. In this paper, I construct a new argument for scientific realism which I call the anti-induction for scientific realism. It holds that, since past theories were false, present theories are true. I provide an example from the history of science to show that anti-inductions sometimes work in science. The anti-induction for scientific realism has several advantages over (...) the no-miracles argument as a positive argument for scientific realism. (shrink)

This chapter argues that the general philosophy of science should learn metaphilosophical lessons from the case of metaphysical underdetermination, as it occurs in non-relativistic quantum mechanics. Section presents the traditional discussion of metaphysical underdetermination regarding the individuality and non-individuality of quantum particles. Section discusses three reactions to it found in the literature: eliminativism about individuality; conservatism about individuality; eliminativism about objects. Section wraps it all up with metametaphysical considerations regarding the epistemology of metaphysics of science.

Recent debates in philosophy of science have witnessed the rise of two major proposals. On the one hand, regarding the conceptual structure of scientific theories, some believe that they exhibit constitutive elements. The constitutive elements of a theory are the components that play the role of laying the foundations of empirical meaningfulness, and whose acceptance is prior to empirical research. On the other hand, as for the nature of scientific knowledge and its relation to nature, perspectival realism has pursued a (...) middle ground in classic debates between realism and antirealism, by assuming that although knowledge is always situated both historically and culturally, scientific statements have truth values and constitute genuine claims about a mind-independent world. In this paper, I argue that these two lines of research are not only compatible but complement each other, and provide a common view of science. I contend that a theoretical perspective is a set of constitutive elements where models and representations may develop, and stress that both constitutivism and perspectivism have numerous shared characteristics, such as their vindication of the historicity of scientific knowledge, their recognition of human epistemic limits, and a very similar conception of truth. (shrink)

QBism is an agent-centered interpretation of quantum theory. It rejects the notion that quantum theory provides a God’s eye description of reality and claims instead that it imposes constraints on agents’ subjective degrees of belief. QBism’s emphasis on subjective belief has led critics to dismiss it as antirealism or instrumentalism, or even, idealism or solipsism. The aim of this paper is to consider the relation of QBism to scientific realism. I argue that while QBism is an unhappy fit with a (...) standard way of thinking about scientific realism, an alternative conception I call “perspectival normative realism” may allow for a reconciliation. (shrink)

This paper argues against the view that the standard explanation of phase transitions in statistical mechanics may be considered a causal explanation, a distortion that can nevertheless successfully represent causal relations.

Tight correlations between mental states and brain states have been observed time and again within the ethology of biologically ingrained animal behaviors, the comparative psychology of animal minds, the evolutionary psychology of mental adaptations, the behavioral genetics of inherited mental traits, the developmental psychology of the maturing mind, the psychopharmacology of mind-altering substances, and cognitive neuroscience more generally. They imply that our mental lives are only made possible because of brain activity—that having a functioning brain is a necessary condition for (...) having conscious experiences. This mind-brain dependence thesis yields predictions that have been spectacularly confirmed by the evidence, whereas its antithesis has been massively disconfirmed—at least so long as it is not formulated so vaguely as to yield no specific empirical consequences at all. Dualists are thus forced to make a difficult choice: either retain a belief in personal survival at the expense of ignoring or dismissing the implications of our best evidence, or accept those implications at the expense of acknowledging that the prospects for personal survival are extremely dim. -/- 1. Introduction: A Probabilistic Argument -- 2. Scientific Reasoning I: Mill’s Methods and Modern Epidemiological Principles - 2.1 When Correlation Indicates Causation -- 3. Scientific Reasoning II: Inference to the Best Explanation, Testability, and Predictive Success - 3.1 Parsimony: Tempering Explanations to Minimize False Beliefs - 3.2 Plausibility: Harmonizing Explanations with Background Knowledge - 3.3 Testability and Confirmation: Checking Hypotheses Against the Data - 3.3.1 Confirmation of the Dependence Thesis from Failed Attempts to Falsify It - 3.3.2 Confirmation of the Dependence Thesis from the Falsification of its Rival - 3.4 Scope: Bringing Disparate Facts Together - 3.5 Fertility: Generating New Lines of Research - 3.6 Overview -- 4. Scientific Reasoning III: Bayesian and Information-Theoretic Approaches - 4.1 Bayesian Probability - 4.2 Bayesian Confirmation Theory - 4.3 A Bayesian Approach to the Dependence and Independence Theses - 4.4 The Probabilistic Price of Ad Hoc Accommodation: Simplicity vs. Goodness of Fit - 4.4.1 Simplicity Reflected in the Likelihood - 4.4.2 Simplicity Reflected in the Prior Probability - 4.5 Prediction vs. Accommodation - 4.6 Bayesian Analysis of the Dependence and Independence Theses -- 5. The Dualist’s Dilemma: Reject Science, or Reject Personal Survival? - 5.1 What’s Left for a Soul to Do? -- 6. Conclusion. (shrink)

A scientific theory is successful, according to Stanford (2000), because it is suficiently observationally similar to its corresponding true theory. The Ptolemaic theory, for example, is successful because it is sufficiently similar to the Copernican theory at the observational level. The suggestion meets the scientific realists' request to explain the success of science without committing to the (approximate) truth of successful scientific theories. I argue that Stanford's proposal has a conceptual flaw. A conceptually sound explanation, I claim, respects the ontological (...) order between properties. A dependent property is to be explained in terms of its underlying property, not the other way around. The applicability of this point goes well beyond the realm of the debate between scientific realists and antirealists. Any philosophers should keep the point in mind when they attempt to give an explanation of a property in their field whatever it may be. (shrink)

Localism is the view that the unit of evaluation in the scientific realism debate is a single scientific discipline, sub-discipline, or claim, whereas individualism is the view that the unit of evaluation is a single scientific theory. Localism is compatible, while individualism is not, with a local pessimistic induction and a local selective induction. Asay (2016) presents several arguments to support localism and undercut globalism, according to which the unit of evaluation is the set of all scientific disciplines. I argue (...) that some of his arguments clash with localism as well as with globalism and support individualism, and that individualism goes hand in hand, while localism does not, with the basic rule of how to evaluate an argument. (shrink)

Carnap's mature philosophy of science is an attempt to dissolve the scientific realism debate altogether as a philosophical pseudo-question. His argument depends upon a logico-semantic thesis regarding the structure of a scientific theory, and more importantly, a meta-ontological thesis regarding the explication of existence claims. The latter commits Carnap to a distinction between the analytic and the synthetic, which was allegedly refuted by Quine. The contemporary philosophy of science has therefore sought to distance itself from logico-semantic considerations, and has pursued (...) the scientific realism debate as an essentially epistemological thesis. I show however that one of the most prominent positions in this recent debate—van Fraassen's constructive empiricism—not only ends up in very close proximity to Carnap's attempted dissolution, but even provides the resources for extending and refining his programme. Rather than a historical footnote, Carnap's mature philosophy of science offers a live-option in the current debate. (shrink)

I argue that molecules may not have structure in isolation. I support this by investigating how quantum models identify structure for isolated molecules. Specifically, I distinguish between two sets of models: those that identify structure in isolation and those that do not. The former identify structure because they presuppose structural information about the target system via the Born- Oppenheimer approximation. However, it is an idealisation to assume structure in isolation because there is no empirical evidence of this. In fact, whenever (...) structure is empirically examined it is always partially determined by factors that are absent in isolation. Together with the growing empirical evidence that isolated molecules behave in non-classical ways, this shows that the quantum models that do not identify structure are more faithful representations of isolated molecules. (shrink)

This book examines the philosophical conception of abductive reasoning as developed by Charles S. Peirce, the founder of American pragmatism. It explores the historical and systematic connections of Peirce's original ideas and debates about their interpretations. Abduction is understood in a broad sense which covers the discovery and pursuit of hypotheses and inference to the best explanation. The analysis presents fresh insights into this notion of reasoning, which derives from effects to causes or from surprising observations to explanatory theories. The (...) author outlines some logical and AI approaches to abduction as well as studies various kinds of inverse problems in astronomy, physics, medicine, biology, and human sciences to provide examples of retroductions and abductions. The discussion covers also everyday examples with the implication of this notion in detective stories, one of Peirce’s own favorite themes. The author uses Bayesian probabilities to argue that explanatory abduction is a method of confirmation. He uses his own account of truth approximation to reformulate abduction as inference which leads to the truthlikeness of its conclusion. This allows a powerful abductive defense of scientific realism. This up-to-date survey and defense of the Peircean view of abduction may very well help researchers, students, and philosophers better understand the logic of truth-seeking. (shrink)

Scientific revolution has been one of the most controversial topics in the history and philosophy of science. Yet it has been no consensus on what is the best unit of analysis in the historiography of scientific revolutions. Nor is there a consensus on what best explains the nature of scientific revolutions. This chapter provides a critical examination of the historiography of scientific revolutions. It begins with a brief introduction to the historical development of the concept of scientific revolution, followed by (...) an overview of the five main philosophical accounts of scientific revolutions. It then challenges two historiographical assumptions of the philosophical analyses of scientific revolutions. (shrink)

In Logik der Forschung (1934) and later works, Karl Popper proposed a set of methodological rules for scientists. Among these were requirements that theories should evolve in the direction of increasing content, and that new theories should only be accepted if some of their novel predictions are experimentally confirmed. There are currently two, viable theories of cosmology: the standard cosmological model, and a theory due to Mordehai Milgrom called MOND. Both theories can point to successes and failures, but only MOND (...) has repeatedly made novel predictions that were subsequently found to be correct. Standard-model cosmologists, by contrast, have almost always responded to new observations in a post-hoc manner, adjusting or augmenting their theory as needed to obtain correspondence with the facts. I argue that these methodological differences render a comparison of the two theories in terms of their ‘truthlikeness’ or ‘verisimilitude’ essentially impossible since the two groups of scientists achieve correspondence with the facts in fundamentally different ways, and I suggest that a better guide to the theories’ progress toward the truth might be the methodologies themselves. (shrink)

Este artigo é uma breve introdução à filosofia da linguagem. Ele se concentra nos problemas que surgem a partir de dois conceitos centrais: referência e significado. Em particular, o foco central é no problema fundacional da referência e no problema descritivo do significado, assim como a relação entre eles. Embora esta de modo algum seja uma introdução exaustiva ao tema, muitos conceitos centrais são clarificados, como por exemplo teoria da referência, termo singular, termo geral, teoria do significado, composicionalidade, conteúdo, significado (...) linguístico, implicatura conversacional, vagueza, etc. Espera-se que sirva como um primeiro contato com a disciplina, principalmente voltado a estudantes de filosofia, filosofia da linguagem e áreas afins. (shrink)

Deployment Realism resists Laudan’s and Lyons’ objections to the “No Miracle Argument” by arguing that a hypothesis is most probably true when it is deployed essentially in a novel prediction. However, Lyons criticized Psillos’ criterion of essentiality, maintaining that Deployment Realism should be committed to all the actually deployed assumptions. But since many actually deployed assumptions proved false, he concludes that the No Miracle Argument and Deployment Realism fail. I reply that the essentiality condition is required by Occam’s razor. In (...) fact, there is a simpler formulation of essentiality which escapes Lyons’ criticisms and rescues the No Miracle Argument and Deployment Realism from their purported historical counterexamples: a hypothesis is essential when it has no proper parts (in Yablo’s sense) sufficient to derive the same prediction. Although essentiality so conceived cannot be detected prospectively, this is just natural, and it is not a problem but an advantage for Deployment Realism. (shrink)

Scientific realism is the view that our best scientific theories can be regarded as (approximately) true. This is connected with the view that science, physics in particular, and metaphysics could (and should) inform one another: on the one hand, science tells us what the world is like, and on the other hand, metaphysical principles allow us to select between the various possible theories which are underdetermined by the data. Nonetheless, quantum mechanics has always been regarded as, at best, puzzling, if (...) not contradictory. As such, it has been considered for a long time at odds with scientific realism, and thus a naturalized quantum metaphysics was deemed impossible. Luckily, now we have many quantum theories compatible with a realist interpretation. However, scientific realists assumed that the wave-function, regarded as the principal ingredient of quantum theories, had to represent a physical entity, and because of this they struggled with quantum superpositions. In this paper I discuss a particular approach which makes quantum mechanics compatible with scientific realism without doing that. In this approach, the wave-function does not represent matter which is instead represented by some spatio-temporal entity dubbed the primitive ontology: point-particles, continuous matter fields, space-time events. I argue how within this framework one develops a distinctive theory-construction schema, which allows to perform a more informed theory evaluation by analyzing the various ingredients of the approach and their inter-relations. (shrink)

The Higgs model was developed using purely formal analogies to models of superconductivity. This is in contrast to historical case studies such as the development of electromagnetism, which employed physical analogies. As a result, quantum case studies such as the development of the Higgs model carry new lessons for the scientific realism--anti-realism debate. I argue that, by breaking the connection between success and approximate truth, the use of purely formal analogies is a counterexample to two prominent versions of the 'No (...) Miracles' Argument for scientific realism, Psillos' refined explanationist defence of realism and the Argument from History of Science for structural realism. The NMA is undermined, but the success of the Higgs model is not miraculous because there is a naturalistically acceptable explanation for its success that does not invoke approximate truth. I also suggest some possible strategies for adapting to the counterexample for scientific realists who wish to hold on to the NMA in some form. (shrink)

Retail realists advocate abandoning wholesale arguments, which concern the reality of theoretical entities in general, and embracing retail arguments, which concern the reality of particular kinds of theoretical entities. They can thus be realists about some and anti-realists about others. But realism about a kind of entity can take different forms depending on how retail realists individuate kinds of entities. This chapter introduces the notion of the inclusiveness of individuation: the more inclusively we individuate a kind of entity, the more (...) theories there are in which it appears. The form of realism that retail realists accept regarding a particular kind of entity can be more selective or more encompassing depending on how inclusively they individuate that kind of entity. This chapter illustrates these ideas in terms of a case from the history of chemistry involving the hypothetical component of hydrochloric acid known as the muriatic radical. (shrink)

Arguments for the effectiveness, and even the indispensability, of mathematics in scientific explanation rely on the claim that mathematics is an effective or even a necessary component in successful scientific predictions and explanations. Well-known accounts of successful mathematical explanation in physical science appeals to scientists’ ability to solve equations directly in key domains. But there are spectacular physical theories, including general relativity and fluid dynamics, in which the equations of the theory cannot be solved directly in target domains, and yet (...) scientists and mathematicians do effective work there (McLarty 2023, Elder 2023). Building on extant accounts of structural scientific explanation (Bokulich 2011, Leng 2021), I argue that philosophical accounts of the role of equations in scientific explanation need not rely on scientists’ ability to solve equations independently of their understanding of the empirical or experimental context. For instance, the process of formulating solutions to equations can involve significant appeal to information about experimental contexts (Curiel 2010) or of physically similar systems (Sterrett 2023). Working from a close analysis of work in fluid mechanics by Martin Bazant and Keith Moffatt (2005), I propose an account of heuristic structural explanation in mathematics (Einstein 1921, Pincock 2021), which explains how physical explanations can be constructed even in domains where basic equations cannot be solved directly. (shrink)

This chapter examines the status of inference to the best explanation in naturalistic metaphysics. The methodology of inference to the best explanation in metaphysics is studied from the perspective of contemporary views on scientific explanation and explanatory inferences in the history and philosophy of science. This reveals serious shortcomings in prevalent attempts to vindicate metaphysical "explanationism" by reference to similarities between science and naturalistic metaphysics. This critique is brought out by considering a common gambit of methodological unity: (1) Both metaphysics (...) and science employ inference to the best explanation. (2) One has no reason to think that if explanationism is truth-conducive in science, it is not so in metaphysics. (3) One has a positive reason to think that if explanationism is truth-conducive in science, it is also so in metaphysics. (shrink)

The relatively recent trend seems to be to move away from General Philosophy of Science and towards the philosophies of the individual sciences and to relocate whatever content GPoS is supposed to have to the philosophies of the sciences. I argue that scepticism or pessimism about the prospects of GPoS is unwarranted. I also argue that there can be no philosophies of the various sciences without GPoS. Defending these two claims is the main target of this chapter. I will show, (...) however, that there is osmosis between GPoS and the Philosphies of the Sciences and that this osmosis is grounded on what I will call‘Science in general’ and the two important functions GPoS plays vis-à-vis Science-in-general: an explicative function and a critical function. (shrink)

This article endeavors to identify the strongest versions of the two primary arguments against epistemic scientific realism: the historical argument—generally dubbed “the pessimistic meta-induction”—and the argument from underdetermination. It is shown that, contrary to the literature, both can be understood as historically informed but logically validmodus tollensarguments. After specifying the question relevant to underdetermination and showing why empirical equivalence is unnecessary, two types of competitors to contemporary scientific theories are identified, both of which are informed by science itself. With the (...) content and structure of the two nonrealist arguments clarified, novel relations between them are uncovered, revealing the severity of their collective threat against epistemic realism and its “no-miracles” argument. The final section proposes, however, that the realist’s axiological tenet “science seeks truth” is not blocked. An attempt is made to indicate the promise for a nonepistemic, purely axiological scientific realism—here dubbed “Socratic scientific realism.”. (shrink)

Se propone una aproximación al realismo científico desde la perspectiva de Zubiri, para quien, por un lado, la realidad es el modo “de suyo” en que se actualizan los contenidos “en” la aprehensión y, por otro lado, la verdad es la misma realidad en cuanto que “actualizada”. Como la realidad ya se da en la aprehensión, no es un logro de la ciencia, mientras lo postulado solo puede ser erróneo en un proceso de verificaciónEn la medida en que el error (...) es posible por la verdad, los fracasos de la ciencia, en lugarde ser una prueba a favor del antirrealismo, son un indicio que apoya al realismo. (shrink)

RESUMEN Se propone una aproximación al realismo científico desde la perspectiva de Zubiri, para quien, por un lado, la realidad es el modo "de suyo" en que se actualizan los contenidos "en" la aprehensión y, por otro lado, la verdad es la misma realidad en cuanto que "actualizada". Como la realidad ya se da en la aprehensión, no es un logro de la ciencia, mientras lo postulado solo puede ser erróneo en un proceso de verificación. En la medida en que (...) el error es posible por la verdad, los fracasos de la ciencia, en lugar de ser una prueba a favor del antirrealismo, son un indicio que apoya al realismo. ABSTRACT The article addresses scientific realism from the perspective of Zubiri, for whom reality is the intrinsic way in which contents are actualized "in" apprehension, on the one hand, and truth is that same reality inasmuch as it is "actualized", on the other. Since reality is already present in apprehension, it is not an achievement of science, while the postulates of scientific theories can only prove to be erroneous in a process of verification. Insofar as error is possible in the search for truth, the failures of science would support realism, rather than provide evidence of antirealism. (shrink)

A general insight of 20th-century philosophy of science is that the acceptance of a scientific theory is grounded, not merely on a theory's relation to data, but on its status as having no, or being superior to its, competitors. I explore the ways in which scientific realists might be thought to utilise this insight, have in fact utilised it, and can legitimately utilise it. In more detail, I point out that, barring a natural but mistaken characterisation of scientific realism, traditional (...) realism has not utilised that insight regarding scientific theories, i.e., has not explicitly factored that insight into, and invoked it as justification for, what realists believe. Nonetheless, a new form of realism has. In response to a key historical threat, two of the most thoroughly developed contemporary versions of realism—one put forward by Jarrett Leplin, another by Stathis Psillos—are anchored on the sensible tactic of requiring that the theories to which realists commit themselves have no competitors. I argue, however, that the particular kind of non-competitor condition they invoke is illegitimate in the context of the realism debate. I contend further that invoking a non-competitor condition that is legitimate, sensible, and even, as it turns out, required in the context of the debate threatens to eliminate the possibility of scientific realism altogether. (shrink)

De um modo geral, queríamos mostrar que a filosofia tem suas próprias áreas, mas tem também subáreas em interdisciplinaridade com as ciências. As ciências e as disciplinas acadêmicas em geral têm problemas, cuja a solução pode ser encontrada empiricamente, por meio de experimentos, entrevistas, documentos, ou formalmente, por meio de cálculos etc, porém os problemas das filosofias dessas disciplinas são justamente os problemas mais fundamentais dessas disciplinas, que fundam o quadro conceitual e de pesquisa das mesmas, e que só poderiam (...) ser respondidos por meio de uma extensa argumentação. A filosofia de cada uma dessas disciplinas é uma mistura (a) de metafísica da disciplina, perguntando-se qual a natureza e justificação das entidades que formam o quadro teórico da disciplina, i.e., quais delas realmente existem na realidade (não sendo meros instrumentos para obter resultados) e quais as suas categorizações fundamentais, naturezas e funções teóricas, (b) de epistemologia dessa disciplina, ao nos perguntarmos sobre como tal área poderia obter conhecimento de modo confiável e se ela de fato o faz, e (c) de teorias do valor, ao nos perguntarmos, por exemplo, sobre qual o valor moral do desenvolvimento de uma certa disciplina e, finalmente, (d) a lógica, que perpassa tudo, ao nos perguntarmos sobre a consistência das teses assumidas pela disciplina. Não é à toa que falamos que a filosofia é mãe de todas as ciências. Ela é mãe tanto num sentido geracional, pois a maioria das ciências foram desenvolvimentos particulares, empíricos ou de cálculo, das questões filosóficas sobre um certo tema, quanto num sentido fundamental, pois é a filosofia que fornece os fundamentos mais gerais, metafísicos, epistêmicos, valorativos e lógicos, na construção do quadro teórico de cada ciência e na qualidade dos métodos para se aproximar da verdade que a disciplina utiliza. A biologia, por exemplo, foi criada por Aristóteles, tal como os primeiros desenvolvimentos da meteorologia (na verdade, esta começa com os pré-socráticos), e grande parte do fundamento da física atual jaz nas discussões de filosofia da física. Sendo você filósofo ou cientista de outra área, a filosofia promete te dar as bases para uma reflexão geral ou sobre sua área, que seja muito mais informada e profunda do que aquilo que você poderia realizar sem ela. /// In general, we wanted to show that philosophy has its own areas, but it also has subareas in interdisciplinarity with the sciences. The sciences and academic disciplines in general have problems, the solution of which can be found empirically, through experiments, interviews, documents, or formally, through calculations etc., but the problems of the philosophies of these disciplines are precisely the most fundamental problems. of these disciplines, which build their conceptual and research framework, and which could only be answered through extensive argumentation. The philosophy of each of these disciplines is a mixture (a) of metaphysics of the discipline, asking what is the nature and justification of the entities that form the theoretical framework of the discipline, ie, which ones really exist in reality (not being mere instruments for achieving results) and what are its fundamental categorizations, natures and theoretical functions, (b) the epistemology of this discipline, when we ask ourselves how such an area could obtain knowledge reliably and if it does, and (c) theories of value, when we ask ourselves, for example, about the moral value of the development of a certain discipline and, finally, (d) the logic, which permeates everything, when we ask ourselves about the consistency of the theses assumed by the discipline. It is not for nothing that we say that philosophy is the mother of all sciences. It is a mother both in a generational sense, as most sciences were particular empirical or formal developments of philosophical questions on a certain topic, and in a fundamental sense, as it is philosophy that provides the most general, metaphysical, epistemic, evaluative and logical foundations, in the construction of the theoretical framework of each science and in the quality of the methods to approach the truth that the discipline uses. Biology, for example, was created by Aristotle, like the first developments in meteorology (in fact, it starts with the pre-Socratics), and much of the foundation of current physics lies in discussions of the philosophy of physics. Whether you are a philosopher or scientist from another area, philosophy promises to give you the basis for a general reflection or about your area, which is much more informed and profound than what you could accomplish without it. (shrink)

'Reason, Causation and Compatibility with the Phenomena' strives to give answers to the philosophical problem of the interplay between realism, explanation and experience. This book is a compilation of essays that recollect significant conceptions of rival terms such as determinism and freedom, reason and appearance, power and knowledge. This title discusses the progress made in epistemology and natural philosophy, especially the steps that led from the ancient theory of atomism to the modern quantum theory, and from mathematization to analytic philosophy. (...) Moreover, it provides possible gateways from modern deadlocks of theory either through approaches to consciousness or through historical critique of intellectual authorities. This work will be of interest to those either researching or studying in colleges and universities, especially in the departments of philosophy, history of science, philosophy of science, philosophy of physics and quantum mechanics, history of ideas and culture. Greek and Latin Literature students and instructors may also find this book to be both a fascinating and valuable point of reference. (shrink)

This paper offers an intellectual history of the scientific realism debate during the twentieth century. The telling of the tale will explain the philosophical significance and the prospects of the scientific realism debate, through the major turns it went through. The emphasis will be on the relations between empiricism and scientific realism and on the swing from metaphysics-hostile to metaphysics-friendly versions of realism.

REVIEW (1): "Jeff Kochan’s book offers both an original reading of Martin Heidegger’s early writings on science and a powerful defense of the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) research program. Science as Social Existence weaves together a compelling argument for the thesis that SSK and Heidegger’s existential phenomenology should be thought of as mutually supporting research programs." (Julian Kiverstein, in Isis) ---- REVIEW (2): "I cannot in the space of this review do justice to the richness and range of Kochan's (...) discussion [...]. There is a great deal in this foundational portion of Kochan's discussion that I find tremendously interesting and engaging [...]." (David R. Cerbone, in Studies in History and Philosophy of Science) ---- REVIEW (3): "Science as Social Existence will be of interest not only to Heidegger scholars but to anyone engaged in science and technology studies. [...] This is an informative and original book. Kochan should be praised for his clear, pleasant-to-read prose." (Michael Butler, in CHOICE). (shrink)

This paper aims to defend scientific realism against two versions of agnostic empiricism: a naive agnostic position, which suggests that the only rational option is to remain agnostic as to the truth of theoretical assertions, and van Fraassen's more sophisticated agnostic empiricism - which may be called "Hypercritical Empiricism". It first argues that given semantic realism, naive agnostic empiricism cannot be maintained: there is no relevant epistemic difference between theoretical assertions and observational ones. It then focuses on van Fraassen's more (...) sophisticated alternative to scientific realism and suggests that an attitude towards science which involves less than aiming at theoretical truth and believing in theories would be, in some concrete respect that empiricists should recognize, worse off than the recommended realist attitude. To this end, the paper develops the so-called conjunction argument into a diachronic argument for scientific realism. (shrink)

In this paper I develop five worries concerning Cartwright’s realism about entities and capacities. The first is that while she was right to insist on the ontic commitment that flows from causal explanation, she was wrong to tie these commitments solely to the entities that do the causal explaining. This move obscured the nature of causal explanation and its connection to laws. The second worry is that when she turned her attention to causal inference, by insisting on the motto of (...) ‘the most likely cause’, she underplayed her powerful argument for realism. For she focused her attention on an extrinsic feature of causal inference (or, indeed, of any ampliative inference), that is the demand of high probability, leaving behind the intrinsic qualities that causal explanation should have in order to provide the required understanding. The third worry is that her objections to Inference to the Best Explanation were unnecessarily tied to her objections about the falsity of fundamental laws. The fourth worry is that though her argument for positing capacities and being realist about them was supposed to take strength from its parallel with Sellars’s powerful argument for the indispensable explanatory role of positing unobservable entities, there are important disanalogies between the two arguments which cast doubt on the indispensability of capacities. The final (fifth) worry is that laws—perhaps brute regularities—might well have to come back from the front door, since they are still the most plausible candidates for explaining why objects have the capacities to do what they can do. (shrink)

When we think of scientific realism, there seem to be to ways to conceive of what it is about. The first is to see it as a view about scientific theories; the second is to see it as a view about the world. Some philosophers, most typically from Australia, think that the second way is the correct way. Scientific realism, they argue, is a metaphysical thesis: it asserts the reality of some types of entity, most typically, unobservable entities. I agree (...) that scientific realism has a metaphysical dimension, but I have insisted that it has other dimensions too. In my (1999), I took scientific realism to consist of three theses (or stances). (shrink)

Parsimony considerations are ubiquitous in the literature concerning the nature of mental states. Other things being equal, physicalist views are preferred over dualist accounts on the grounds of the fact that they do not posit new fundamental properties in addition to the physical ones. This paper calls into question the widespread assumption that parsimony can provide reasons for believing that physicalism is a better candidate than dualism for solving the mind–body problem. After presenting the theoretical core of physicalism and dualism, (...) I make explicit the meta-metaphysical assumptions the physicalist relies on when leveraging parsimony to support her view. In particular, the physicalist takes for granted that parsimony has an epistemic value in metaphysics. This point, however, is rather controversial. I argue that the most promising way to account for the epistemic value of parsimony is to ground it in the epistemic value of modesty, a higher-level theoretical virtue that has to do with the epistemic risk of a theory. Unfortunately for the physicalist, the modesty rationale does not ultimately favour physicalism over dualism. (shrink)

Including the perspectives of scientists about the nature and process of science is important for an authentic and nuanced portrayal of science in science education. The small number of studies that have explored scientists’ worldviews about science has thus far generated contradictory findings, with recent studies claiming that scientists simultaneously hold contradictory sophisticated and naïve views. This article reports on an exploratory study that uses the framework of Bhaskar’s critical realism to elicit and separately analyse academic scientists’ ontological and epistemological (...) views about science in semi-structured interviews. When the views of scientists are analysed through the lens of critical realism, it is clear that it is possible to hold a realist ontological commitment about what knowledge is of, simultaneously with a fallibilist epistemological commitment about knowledge itself. The apparent incongruence of scientists’ so-called naïve and sophisticated views about science is resolved when analysed using a critical realist framework. Critical realism offers a simple and coherent framework for science educators that avoids many of the problems of positivism and social constructivism by finding a middle ground between them. The three pillars of critical realism: ontological realism, epistemological fallibilism and judgmental rationality help to make sense of how socially constructed scientific knowledge can be anchored in an independent reality. (shrink)

The ontic structural realist stance is motivated by a desire to do philosophical justice to the success of science, whilst withstanding the metaphysical undermining generated by the various species of ontological underdetermination. We are, however, as yet in want of general principles to provide a scaffold for the explicit construction of structural ontologies. Here we will attempt to bridge this gap by utilizing the formal procedure of quantization as a guide to ontic structure of modern physical theory. The example of (...) non-relativistic particle mechanics will be considered and, for that case, it will be shown that a viable candidate for an ontic structural realism framework can be constituted in terms of the combination of a state-space with Poisson bracket structure, and a set of observables, with Lie algebra structure. 1 Introduction2 Formulation Underdetermination and Structural Ontologies3 Quantization and Structural Ontologies4 The Case of Non-relativistic Particle Mechanics4.1 Formulation underdetermination4.2 The classical ontology4.3 Quantum theory and the generalized structural ontology4.4 Interpretation of results5 Conclusion and Prospects. (shrink)

My aim is to evaluate a new realist strategy for addressing the pessimistic induction, Ludwig Fahrbach’s (Synthese 180:139–155, 2011) appeal to the exponential growth of science. Fahrbach aims to show that, given the exponential growth of science, the history of science supports realism. I argue that Fahrbach is mistaken. I aim to show that earlier generations of scientists could construct a similar argument, but one that aims to show that the theories that they accepted are likely true. The problem with (...) this is that from our perspective on the history of science we know their argument is flawed. Consequently, we should not be impressed or persuaded by Fahrbach’s argument. Fahrbach has failed to identify a difference that matters between today’s theories and past theories. But realists need to find such a difference if they are to undermine the pessimistic induction. (shrink)

This is a reply piece to a series of book symposium contributions to my book, Resisting Scientific Realism. The contributions were by Steven French, Peter Vickers, Stathis Psillos, and Kyle Stanford.

The pessimistic induction plays an important role in the contemporary realism/anti-realism debate in philosophy of science. But there is some disagreement about the structure and aim of the argument. And a number of scholars have noted that there is more than one type of PI in the philosophical literature. I review four different versions of the PI. I aim to show that PIs have been appealed to by philosophers of science for a variety of reasons. Even some realists have appealed (...) to a PI. My goal is to advance our understanding of what the various PIs can teach us about science and the threat posed by PIs to scientific realism. (shrink)

Van Fraassen believes our current best theories enable us to make accurate predictions because they have been subjected to a selection process similar to natural selection. His explanation for the predictive success of our best theories has been subjected to extensive criticism from realists. I aim to clarify the nature of van Fraassen’s selectionist explanation for the success of science. Contrary to what the critics claim, the selectionist can explain why it is that we have successful theories, as well as (...) why it is reasonable to expect past successful theories to be successful in the future. I also argue that the plausibility of the realists’ explanation rests on an inaccurate understanding of the nature of predictive success . The predictive success of our best theories is a relative success. (shrink)

I aim to clarify the relationship between the success of a theory and the truth of that theory. This has been a central issue in the debates between realists and anti-realists. Realists assume that success is a reliable indicator of truth, but the details about the respects in which success is a reliable indicator or test of truth have been largely left to our intuitions. Lewis (Synthese 129:371–380, 2001) provides a clear proposal of how success and truth might be connected, (...) comparing a test of success of our theories to medical tests with low rates of false positives and false negatives. But, contrary to what Lewis claims, I argue that it is not enough for the realist to undercut the claim that success is not a reliable indicator of truth. Rather, the realist must show that our current best theories are likely true. Further, I argue that tests in science are unlike medical tests in a number of important ways. (shrink)