In the methodology of scientific research programs (MSRP) there are important features on the problem of prediction, especially regarding novel facts. In his approach, Imre Lakatos proposed three different levels on prediction: aim, process, and assessment. Chapter 5 pays attention to the characterization of prediction in the methodology of research programs. Thus, it takes into account several features: (1) its pragmatic characterization, (2) the logical perspective as a proposition, (3) the epistemological component, (4) its role in the appraisal of research (...) programs, and (5) its place as a value for scientific research. -/- The notion of “novel facts” is highly relevant in his conception, where several aspects are involved: the directions of novel facts, the different kinds of novelty, and the transition from six possible options of “novel facts” to four choices. Thereafter, the prediction of novel facts as the criterion of appraisal is considered. On the one hand, this requires analyzing the theoretical, empirical, and heuristic possibilities of appraisal; and, on the other, whether there is an overemphasis on the role of prediction in methodology of scientific research programs. As a consequence, there is an analysis of Lakatos’ criterion of appraisal in MSRP and economics. (shrink)

One prominent aspect of recent developments in science studies has been the increasing employment of economic concepts and models in the depiction of science, including the notion of a free market for scientific ideas. This gives rise to the issue of the adequacy of the conceptual resources of economics for this purpose. This paper suggests an adequacy test by putting a version of free market economics to a self-referential scrutiny. The outcome is that either free market economics is self-defeating, or (...) else there must be two different concepts of free market, one for the ordinary economy, the other for science. Both conclusions will impose limits on the applicability of the ordinary economic concept of the market to the study of science. (shrink)

The cultural and epistemic status of science is under attack. Social and cultural studies of science are widely perceived to offer evidence and arguments in support of an anti-science campaign. They portray science as a mundane social endeavour, akin to religion and politics, with no privileged access to truthful information about the real world. Science is under threat and needs defence. Old philosophical legitimations have lost their bite. Alarm bells ring, new troops have to be mobilised. Call economics, the good (...) old friend of the status quo depicting it as a generally beneficial social order while accommodating a rather mundane picture of human behaviour. In contrast to constructivist and relativist sociology of scientific knowledge, economic accounts of science seek to provide a rigorous defence of the cultural and epistemic legitimacy of science by accommodating plausible elements in the sociological accounts and by embedding them in invisible-hand arguments about the functioning of some market-like structure within science. Viewed through economic spectacles, science re-emerges from the ashes as stronger and more beautiful than ever. A spectator raises an innocent question: is economics itself strong and beautiful enough to offer such alleviating services? In order to examine the emerging issue of disciplinary credibility, we need to look at economics itself more closely, and we need to address traditional issues in the philosophy of science as well as less traditional issues of reflexivity. We will see that the above caricature concerning the role of economics in the science wars calls for heavy qualifications if not wholesale rejection. (shrink)

The relationship between economics and the philosophy of natural science has changed substantially during the last few years. What was once exclusively a one-way relationship from philosophy to economics now seems to be much closer to bilateral exchange. The purpose of this paper is to examine this new relationship. First, I document the change. Second, I examine the situation within contemporary philosophy of science in order to explain why economics might have its current appeal. Third, I consider some of the (...) issues that might jeopardize the success of this philosophical project. (shrink)

Charles Sanders Peirce was one of the United States’ most original and profound thinkers, and a prolific writer. Peirce’s game theory-based approaches to the semantics and pragmatics of signs and language, to the theory of communication, and to the evolutionary emergence of signs, provide a toolkit for contemporary scholars and philosophers. Drawing on unpublished manuscripts, the book offers a rich, fresh picture of the achievements of a remarkable man.

Charles Peirce had significant interests in economics. He reworked the mathematical economic models of Cournot and Jevons in the 1870s. He conceived of the transitive axiom of consumer preferences in 1874. Peirce also developed a thesis of the cognitive efficiency of the human mind, abduction. He criticized Newcomb's economic writings. These forays into economics affected the six essays on pragmatism. These interests in economics are integrated with the meaning of the pragmatic maxim in Peirce's 1903 Harvard Lectures.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 1991.

University of North Carolina at Greensboro Most approaches to the philosophy of the natural and social sciences are basedon completed scientific investigations. However, there are many importantcases in science in which testing is incomplete. These cases are termed suspendedtrials and are particularly significant in biomedical and allied health fields. Initially,the authors' interest in suspended trials was piqued by a controversialmethod for assisting autistic children known as facilitated communication. Thisarticle examines facilitated communication and other examples of suspendedtrials from the perspective of (...) an economics of science and game theory. Themodel is consistent with recent evolutionary approaches to the philosophy ofthe natural and social sciences and with recent contributions to an economicunderstanding of science. Key Words: clinical trials • innovative therapies • economics of science • suspended trials • facilitated communication • economics of clinical research. (shrink)

This paper draws a connection between recentdevelopments in naturalized philosophyof science and the Buchanan research programin economics. Economic approaches innaturalized philosophy of science canbe combined to form an economic philosophy ofscience. After giving an overview of someof these approaches, I lay out the fundamentalsof the Buchanan research program. I arguethat its main elements are a theory of interactionsand a normative foundation in consensus whichhelp to answer some important criticismsof economic philosophy of science.

Economic forms of analysis have penetrated to many disciplines in the last 30 years: political science, sociology, law, social and political philosophy, and so forth. We wish to extend the economic paradigm to certain problems in epistemology and the philosophy of science. Scientific agents, and scholarly inquirers generally, act in some ways like vendors, trying to "sell" their findings, theories, analyses, or arguments to an audience of prospective "buyers". The analogy with the marketplace is imperfect. The ideas or discoveries that (...) a scientist offers are not private goods in the economist's sense. Nonetheless, there are parallels with the marketplace that are worth exploring. (shrink)