A crucial challenge in terms of research methods in philosophy of education is that of combining philosophical ways of analyzing and arguing, with the dialogical and pluralist way of thinking needed in educational research. In this article I describe how I dealt with this challenge in my research project focusing on educational implications of the positions defended in the debate on constructivism and realism between Israel Scheffler and Nelson Goodman. The key to my methodological approach is an emphasis on the (...) role of a thoroughgoing process of analysis and synthesis. I see this process as the prerequisite for profound philosophical dialogue on education. (shrink)

This paper considers two philosophical problems and their relation to science education. The first involves the rationality of science; it is argued here that the traditional view, according to which science is rational because of its adherence to (a non-standard conception of) scientific method, successfully answers one central question concerning science''s rationality. The second involves the aims of education; here it is argued that a fundamental educational aim is the fostering of rationality, or its educational cognate, critical thinking. The ramifications (...) of these two philosophical theses for science education are then considered, and a science education which takes reasons in science as its fundamental feature is sketched. (shrink)

Unlike more standard non-normative naturalizations of epistemology and philosophy of science, Larry Laudan's naturalized philosophy of science explicitly maintains a normative dimension. This paper critically assesses Laudan's normative naturalism. After summarizing Laudan's position, the paper examines (1) Laudan's construal of methodological rules as 'instrumentalities' connecting methodological means and cognitive ends; (2) Laudan's instrumental conception of scientific rationality; (3) Laudan's naturalistic account of the axiology of science; and (4) the extent to which a normative philosophy of science can be naturalized. It (...) is concluded that Laudan's normative naturalism is as problematic as its non-normative naturalist cousins. (shrink)

This paper examines whether philosophers of argument, in spite of their disavowing ‘timeless principles’, nevertheless embrace a set of principles, or axioms, to underlie argumentation theory. First, it reviews the thinking of some prominent philosophers of argument; second, it extracts some principles common to their philosophies; and third, it draws out possible consequences for argumentation theory and asks whether such theory has an underlying political posture.

Argumentation logicians have recognized a specter of relativism to haunt their philosophy of argument. However, their attempts to dispel pernicious relativism by invoking notions of a universal audience or a community of model interlocutors have not been entirely successful. In fact, their various discussions of a universal audience invoke the context-eschewing formalism of Kant’s categorical imperative. Moreover, they embrace the Kantian method for resolving the antinomies that continually vacillates between opposing extremes – here between a transcendent universal audience and a (...) context-embedded particular audience. This tack ironically restores the very external mediation they thought to obviate in their aim to ‘dethrone’ the absolutism and totalitarianism of formal logic with a democratic turn to audience adherence, the acceptability of premises and inferential links, and a contextual, or participant-relative, notion of cogency. (shrink)

In the present paper, I try to defend a coherent interpretation of Goodman’s relativism by responding to the main objections of the critics. I also discuss the significance of his pluralism by relating it to the notion of construction. This will show the relevance of Goodman’s philosophy for the present days.