The concept of fitness has generated a lot of discussion in philosophy of biology. There is, however, relative agreement about the need to distinguish at least two uses of the term: ecological fitness on the one hand, and population genetics fitness on the other. The goal of this paper is to give an explication of the concept of ecological fitness by providing a reconstruction of the theory of natural selection in which this concept was framed, that is, based on the (...) way the theory was put to use in Darwin’s main texts. I will contend that this reconstruction enables us to account for the current use of the theory of natural selection. The framework presupposed in the analysis will be that of metatheoretical structuralism. This framework will provide both a better understanding of the nature of ecological fitness and a more complete reconstruction of the theory. In particular, it will provide what I think is a better way of understanding how the concept of fitness is applied through heterogeneous cases. One of the major advantages of my way of thinking about natural selection theory is that it would not have the peculiar metatheoretical status that it has in other available views. I will argue that in order to achieve these goals it is necessary to make several concepts explicit, concepts that are frequently omitted in usual reconstructions. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to discuss and develop the diagnose of the Hardy-Weinberg law made by van Fraassen (1987, p. 110), according to which: 1) that law cannot be considered a law used as an axiom for the classical population genetics as a whole, since it is an equilibrium-law that holds only under certain special conditions; 2) it just determines a subclass of models; 3) its generalization shades off into logical vacuity; and 4) more complex variants of the (...) law can be deduced for more realistic assumptions. The discussion and development of such a diagnose will be carried out with the notions of another semantic conceptions of theories, related to that of van Fraassen, namely, the structuralist view of theories, and a rational reconstruction of classical population genetics made within the framework of such a metatheory, also presented in this paper. (shrink)

In this article the outlines are sketched of an empirical science of literature as close as possible to the model of the natural sciences. This raises the question of what the standards of an empirical science in the strictest sense should generally be. Practical relevance of its results soon turns up as the fundamental condition for an explanatory empirical science, if the ideology of nearing an empirical truth is no longer accepted and a mere pragmatic justification rejected as its insufficient (...) substitute. As a consequence the logical priority of scientific explanation over scientific description is considered irrefutable. The so-called "sciences of understanding" - among them a "science of literature" - are confronted with a special difficulty, if they want to become explanatory empirical sciences. Their practical problems to be solved are related to linguistically or semiotically coded facts. To empirically describe these problematic facts causes this difficulty, which the author tries to overcome with recourse to ideas from Wittgenstein. And the practical relevance, which may be achieved with the help of nomological explanations, here doesn't consist in predictions for better practical production of means, direct or indirect, for survival, but in the provision of rational understanding for better practical teaching or criticism. This practical relevance is shown in the explanation of valuing acts of readers of The Golden Bowl by Henry James. The meaning of a literary text is no longer taken as a possible object of scientific empirical explanation, nor its rational justification as a scientific goal that might be practically relevant. (shrink)

In the present paper the attempt is made for the first time to formalize the modern theory of elementary particles based on the structuralist approach. To this end, the description within the scope of the so-called standard model is considered. In the physics of elementary particles the term ‘standard model’ denotes the summary of theories which describe the various elementary building blocks of matter as well as their interactions between each other. This model represents one of the most successful theories (...) in physics, particularly because of the impressive experimental confirmation. Hence a structuralist reconstruction of it is a challenging task. (shrink)

In robustness analysis, hypotheses are supported to the extent that a result proves robust, and a result is robust to the extent that we detect it in diverse ways. But what precise sense of diversity is at work here? In this paper, I show that the formal explications of evidential diversity most often appealed to in work on robustness – which all draw in one way or another on probabilistic independence – fail to shed light on the notion of diversity (...) relevant to robustness analysis. I close by briefly outlining a promising alternative approach inspired by Horwich’s (1982) eliminative account of evidential diversity. (shrink)

Theory and Reality is about the connection between true theories and the world. A mathematical framefork for such connections is given, and it is shown how that framework can be used to infer facts about the structure of reality from facts about the structure of true theories, The book starts with an overview of various approaches to metaphysics. Beginning with Quine's programmatic "On what there is", the first chapter then discusses the perils involved in going from language to metaphysics. It (...) criticises contemporary intuition-driven metaphysics, comments on naturalistic approaches, and then presents the main proposition put forward in the thesis: we should base metaphysics on model theory. In chapters 2 to 5, mathematical treatments are given of concepts that we need: theories, metaphysics, necessitation and semantics. These are used in chapters 6 and 7 to prove that, seen from a certain informative view point, any true theory will give rise to an isomorphism between that theory and the world. This conclusion is similar to Wittgenstein's in the Tractatus, but differs in that it places the structural relationship on the level of whole theories, rather than single propositions. (shrink)

An early, very preliminary edition of this book was circulated in 1962 under the title Set-theoretical Structures in Science. There are many reasons for maintaining that such structures play a role in the philosophy of science. Perhaps the best is that they provide the right setting for investigating problems of representation and invariance in any systematic part of science, past or present. Examples are easy to cite. Sophisticated analysis of the nature of representation in perception is to be found already (...) in Plato and Aristotle. One of the great intellectual triumphs of the nineteenth century was the mechanical explanation of such familiar concepts as temperature and pressure by their representation in terms of the motion of particles. A more disturbing change of viewpoint was the realization at the beginning of the twentieth century that the separate invariant properties of space and time must be replaced by the space-time invariants of Einstein's special relativity. Another example, the focus of the longest chapter in this book, is controversy extending over several centuries on the proper representation of probability. The six major positions on this question are critically examined. Topics covered in other chapters include an unusually detailed treatment of theoretical and experimental work on visual space, the two senses of invariance represented by weak and strong reversibility of causal processes, and the representation of hidden variables in quantum mechanics. The final chapter concentrates on different kinds of representations of language, concluding with some empirical results on brain-wave representations of words and sentences. (shrink)

En este artículo se analiza la teoría humoral de la inmunidad propuesta por Paul Ehrlich en 1900, precedida de un conjunto de brillantes investigaciones que al tiempo que parecieran refutar a la teoría anterior –la teoría celular de la inmunidad– fueron el terreno privilegiado en el que se sustentó. Historiaremos esas teorías y experiencias previas, para presentar a continuación el artículo fundacional de la teoría humoral. Nos basaremos en estos hallazgos para caracterizar la estructura de la teoría, utilizando una versión (...) modificada de la concepción estructuralista. Mostraremos cómo teorías previas de otros campos son utilizadas por Ehrlich para proponer su propia teoría, y cómo las experiencias y teorías anteriores del campo inmunológico integran su base empírica. Al hacerlo incursionaremos en el contexto de descubrimiento de la inmunología, proponiendo que consiste en un proceso constructivo. Finalmente, mostraremos la forma que adopta la transición entre la teoría celular y la humoral de la inmunidad. (shrink)

Nella sua straordinaria opera scientifica, Franco Selleri si è sempre opposto alla rinuncia alla comprensione della struttura della realtà e della natura degli oggetti fisici, che egli considera come l’elemento caratterizzante delle principali teorie della fisica del Novecento e che è stata stigmatizzata da Karl Popper come tesi della “fine della strada in fisica”. Sin dalla fine degli anni ’60, egli ha sviluppato quella riflessione critica nei confronti delle teorie fondamentali della fisica moderna, in particolar modo della teoria delle particelle (...) elementari e della meccanica quantistica, e in un secondo tempo delle teorie relativistiche, che contraddistingue il suo programma di ricerca. Nel corso della sua intensa e infaticabile attività scientifica, Selleri è entrato in proficuo contatto con molti grandi fisici e filosofi della scienza, instaurando un intenso dialogo critico con Louis de Broglie, John Bell e Karl Popper. Le sue originali e non convenzionali ricerche lo hanno portato a risultati significativi non solo nell’ambito dei fondamenti della fisica, ma anche della storia e della filosofia della fisica. Per questo abbiamo voluto dedicare un numero speciale di Isonomia al nostro impareggiabile amico e collega, sia per la sua passione instancabile e la sua profonda conoscenza dei fondamenti formali, concettuali e filosofici delle teorie della fisica contemporanea, sia e forse ancor più come maestro di una prospettiva perennemente critica che egli ha sempre seguito e proposto con particolare rigore ed estrema determinazione. (shrink)

In the last two sections of Structure, Thomas Kuhn first develops his famous threefold conception of the incommensurability of scientific paradigms and, subsequently, a conception of scientific progress as growth of empirical strength. The latter conception seems to be at odds with the former in that semantic incommensurability appears to imply the existence of situations where scientific progress in Kuhns sense can no longer exist. In contrast to this seeming inconsistency of Kuhns conception, we will try to show in this (...) study that the semantic incommensurability of scientific terms appears to be fully compatible with scientific progress. Our argumentation is based on an improved version of the formalization of Kuhns conception as developed in the 1970s by Joseph Sneed and Wolfgang Stegmüller: In order to be comparable, incommensurable theories need the specification of relations that refer to the concrete ontologies of these theories and involve certain truth claims. The original structuralist account of reduction fails to provide such relations, because (1) it is too structural and (2) it is too wide. Moreover, the original structuralist account also fails to cover important cases of incommensurable theories in being too restrictive for them. In this paper, we develop an improved notion of “reduction” that allows us to avoid these shortcomings by means of a more flexible device for the formalization of (partially reductive) relations between theories. For that purpose, we use a framework of rigid logic, i.e., logic that is based on a fixed collection of objects. (shrink)

La discusión acerca de funciones es de larga data en filosofía. Normalmente se describe a la revolución científica del siglo XVII como eliminando las causas finales y la teleología de la física. Sin embargo, el lenguaje funcional cumple un papel central en ciertas áreas de la práctica biológica. Esto ha llevado a muchos filósofos a intentar elucidar el concepto de función, en algunos casos para defender la relevancia de estos usos, en otros para mostrar que se trata de meras formas (...) de hablar que podrían ser eliminadas sin pérdida de ningún tipo de información relevante. El objetivo principal de este trabajo es mostrar la necesidad de apelar a conceptos funcionales para una reconstrucción adecuada de la teoría de la selección natural darwiniana. Pues, se utiliza lenguaje funcional en la conceptualización del campo de aplicación de esta teoría, y tal campo debe ser determinable con independencia la teoría de la selección natural. (shrink)

Primarily addressed to readers unfamiliar with the structuralist approach in philosophy of science, we introduce the basic concepts that the contributions to this special issue presuppose. By means of examples, we briefly review set-theoretic structures and predicates, the potential and actual models of an empirical theory, intended applications, as well as links and specializations that are applied, among others, in reconstructing the empirical claim associated with a theory element.

In the Kuhnian and Post-Kuhnian Philosophy of Science, it is widely accepted that scientific revolutions always involve the replacement of an old paradigm by a new paradigm. This article attempts to refute this assumption by showing that there are paradigm-constellations that conform to the relation of a scientific revolution in a Kuhnian sense without a paradigm-replacement occurring. The paradigms investigated here are the linguistic paradigms of Generative Grammar and Construction Grammar that, contrary to Kuhn’s conception of a sequence of paradigm-replacements, (...) are reconstructed as coexisting competing paradigms. By choosing linguistic paradigms, Kuhn’s assumption that paradigm-led research takes place only in the natural sciences is implicitly challenged, and an insight into linguistic theory-construction largely underrepresented in the philosophy of science is given. (shrink)

This paper is concerned with connections between scientific and metaphysical realism. It is not difficult to show that scientific realism, as expounded by Psillos (1999) clearly qualifies as a kind of metaphysical realism in the sense of Putnam (1980). The statement of scientific realism therefore must not only deal with underdetermination and the dynamics of scientific theories but also answer the semantic challenges to metaphysical realism. As will be argued, the common core of these challenges is the proposition that a (...) (metaphysical) realist semantics leads to semantic agnosticism in the sense that we are unable to grasp the proper meanings and referents of our linguistic expressions. Having established this, I will focus more specifically on the question of whether scientific realism—in its state-of-the-art account—has the resources to make reference to scientific concepts intelligible such that the semantic challenges can be answered. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss the problem of scientific laws in general and laws of biology in particular. After reviewing the debate around the existence of laws in biology, I examine the subject in the light of the structuralist notion of a fundamental law and argue for the law of matching as the fundamental law of genetics.

This dissertation consists of three parts. Part I is a defense of an artificial language methodology in philosophy and a historical and systematic defense of the logical empiricists' application of an artificial language methodology to scientific theories. These defenses provide a justification for the presumptions of a host of criteria of empirical significance, which I analyze, compare, and develop in part II. On the basis of this analysis, in part III I use a variety of criteria to evaluate the scientific (...) status of intelligent design, and further discuss confirmation, reduction, and concept formation. (shrink)

Everything you always wanted to know about structural realism but were afraid to ask Content Type Journal Article Pages 227-276 DOI 10.1007/s13194-011-0025-7 Authors Roman Frigg, Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, London School of Economics and Political Science, Houghton Street, London, WC2A 2AE UK Ioannis Votsis, Philosophisches Institut, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf, Universitätsstraße 1, Geb. 23.21/04.86, 40225 Düsseldorf, Germany Journal European Journal for Philosophy of Science Online ISSN 1879-4920 Print ISSN 1879-4912 Journal Volume Volume 1 Journal Issue Volume 1, Number 2.

The sheer multitude of criteria of empirical significance has been taken as evidence that the pre-analytic notion being explicated is too vague to be useful. I show instead that a significant number of these criteria—by Ayer, Popper, Przełęcki, Suppes, and David Lewis, among others—not only form a coherent whole, but also connect directly to the theory of definition, the notion of empirical content as explicated by Ramsey sentences, and the theory of measurement; two criteria by Carnap and Sober are trivial, (...) but can be saved and connected to the other criteria by slight modifications. A corollary is that the ordinary language defense of Lewis, the conceptual arguments by Ayer and Popper, the theoretical considerations by Przełęcki, and the practical considerations by Suppes all apply to the same criterion or closely related criteria. Furthermore, the equivalence of some criteria allows for their individual justifications to be taken cumulatively and, together with the entailment relations between nonequivalent criteria, suggest criteria for general auxiliary assumptions, comparative criteria, and more liberal conceptions of observation. (shrink)

Some think that issues to do with scientific method are last century's stale debate; Popper was an advocate of methodology, but Kuhn, Feyerabend, and others are alleged to have brought the debate about its status to an end. The papers in this volume show that issues in methodology are still very much alive. Some of the papers reinvestigate issues in the debate over methodology, while others set out new ways in which the debate has developed in the last decade. The (...) book will be of interest to philosophers and scientists alike in the reassessment it provides of earlier debates about method and current directions of research. (shrink)

The focus of this paper is the recent revival of interest in structuralist approaches to science and, in particular, the structural realist position in philosophy of science . The challenge facing scientific structuralists is three-fold: i) to characterize scientific theories in ‘structural’ terms, and to use this characterization ii) to establish a theory-world connection (including an explanation of applicability) and iii) to address the relationship of ‘structural continuity’ between predecessor and successor theories. Our aim is to appeal to the notion (...) of shared structure between models to reconsider all of these challenges, and, in so doing, to classify the varieties of scientific structuralism and to offer a ‘minimal’ construal that is best viewed from a methodological stance. (shrink)

In 1958, to refute the argument known as the theoretician's dilemma, Hempel suggested that theoretical terms might be logically indispensable for inductive systematization of observational statements. This thesis, in some form or another, has later been supported by Scheffler, Lehrer, and Tuomela, and opposed by Bohnert, Hooker, Stegmüller, and Cornman. In this paper, a critical survey of this discussion is given. Several different putative definitions of the crucial notion inductive systematization achieved by a theory are discussed by reference to the (...) properties of inductive inference. The consequences of the following differences between deductive and inductive inference are emphasized: the lack of simple transitivity properties (even in a modified sense) of inductive inference, and the failure of the inductive analogue of the converse of The Deduction Theorem. The main conclusions are: (i) Hempel's original thesis may very well be right but his argument for it is unsatisfactory, (ii) theoretical terms can be logically indispensable for a non-Hempelian kind of inductive systematization, relative to both Craigian and Ramseyan elimination, (iii) Lehrer's attempt to prove the indispensability of theoretical terms for inductive-probabilistic systematization is, as a modification of Hempelian kind of inductive-deterministic systematization, unsatisfactory, and (iv) there does not seem to be much hope of escaping the conclusion (ii), if it is true, by extending the Craigian replacement programme along the lines suggested by Cornman. (shrink)

Applied mathematics often operates by way of shakily rationalizedexpedients that can neither be understood in a deductive-nomological nor in an anti-realist setting.Rather do these complexities, so a recent paper of Mark Wilson argues, indicate some element in ourmathematical descriptions that is alien to the physical world. In this vein the mathematical opportunistopenly seeks or engineers appropriate conditions for mathematics to get hold on a given problem.Honest mathematical optimists, instead, try to liberalize mathematical ontology so as to include all physicalsolutions. Following (...) John von Neumann, the present paper argues that the axiomatization of a scientifictheory can be performed in a rather opportunistic fashion, such that optimism and opportunism appear as twomodes of a single strategy whose relative weight is determined by the status of the field to beinvestigated. Wilson's promising approach may thus be reformulated so as to avoid precarious talk about a physicalworld that is void of mathematical structure. This also makes the appraisal of the axiomatic method inapplied matthematics less dependent upon foundationalist issues. (shrink)

The likelihood theory of evidence (LTE) says, roughly, that all the information relevant to the bearing of data on hypotheses (or models) is contained in the likelihoods. There exist counterexamples in which one can tell which of two hypotheses is true from the full data, but not from the likelihoods alone. These examples suggest that some forms of scientific reasoning, such as the consilience of inductions (Whewell, 1858. In Novum organon renovatum (Part II of the 3rd ed.). The philosophy of (...) the inductive sciences. London: Cass, 1967), cannot be represented within Bayesian and Likelihoodist philosophies of science. (shrink)

A classification of models of reduction into three categories — theory reductionism, explanatory reductionism, and constitutive reductionism — is presented. It is shown that this classification helps clarify the relations between various explications of reduction that have been offered in the past, especially if a distinction is maintained between the various epistemological and ontological issues that arise. A relatively new model of explanatory reduction, one that emphasizes that reduction is the explanation of a whole in terms of its parts is (...) also presented in detail. Finally, the classification is used to clarify the debate over reductionism in molecular biology. It is argued there that while no model from the category of theory reduction might be applicable in that case, models of explanatory reduction might yet capture the structure of the relevant explanations. (shrink)

This thesis focuses on models of conceptual change in science and philosophy. In particular, I developed a new bootstrapping methodology for studying conceptual change, centered around the formalization of several popular models of conceptual change and the collective assessment of their improved formal versions via nine evaluative dimensions. Among the models of conceptual change treated in the thesis are Carnap’s explication, Lakatos’ concept-stretching, Toulmin’s conceptual populations, Waismann’s open texture, Mark Wilson’s patches and facades, Sneed’s structuralism, and Paul Thagard’s conceptual revolutions. (...) -/- In order to analyze and compare the conception of conceptual change provided by these different models, I rely on several historical reconstructions of episodes of scientific conceptual change. The historical episodes of scientific change that figure in this work include the emergence of the morphological concept of fish in biological taxonomies, the development of scientific conceptions of temperature, the Church-Turing thesis and related axiomatizations of effective calculability, the history of the concept of polyhedron in 17th and 18th century mathematics, Hamilton’s invention of the quaternions, the history of the pre-abstract group concepts in 18th and 19th century mathematics, the expansion of Newtonian mechanics to viscous fluids forces phenomena, and the chemical revolution. I will also present five different formal and informal improvements of four specific models of conceptual change. I will first present two different improvements of Carnapian explication, a formal and an informal one. My informal improvement of Carnapian explication will consist of a more fine-grained version of the procedure that adds an intermediate, third step to the two steps of Carnapian explication. I will show how this novel three-step version of explication is more suitable than its traditional two-step relative to handle complex cases of explications. My second, formal improvement of Carnapian explication will be a full explication of the concept of explication itself within the theory of conceptual spaces. By virtue of this formal improvement, the whole procedure of explication together with its application procedures and its pragmatic desiderata will be reconceptualized as a precise procedure involving topological and geometrical constraints inside the theory of conceptual spaces. My third improved model of conceptual change will consist of a formal explication of Darwinian models of conceptual change that will make vast use of Godfrey-Smith’s population-based Darwinism for targeting explicitly mathematical conceptual change. My fourth improvement will be dedicated instead to Wilson’s indeterminate model of conceptual change. I will show how Wilson’s very informal framework can be explicated within a modified version of the structuralist model-theoretic reconstructions of scientific theories. Finally, the fifth improved model of conceptual change will be a belief-revision-like logical framework that reconstructs Thagard’s model of conceptual revolution as specific revision and contraction operations that work on conceptual structures. -/- At the end of this work, a general conception of conceptual change in science and philosophy emerges, thanks to the combined action of the three layers of my methodology. This conception takes conceptual change to be a multi-faceted phenomenon centered around the dynamics of groups of concepts. According to this conception, concepts are best reconstructed as plastic and inter-subjective entities equipped with a non-trivial internal structure and subject to a certain degree of localized holism. Furthermore, conceptual dynamics can be judged from a weakly normative perspective, bound to be dependent on shared values and goals. Conceptual change is then best understood, according to this conception, as a ubiquitous phenomenon underlying all of our intellectual activities, from science to ordinary linguistic practices. As such, conceptual change does not pose any particular problem to value-laden notions of scientific progress, objectivity, and realism. At the same time, this conception prompts all our concept-driven intellectual activities, including philosophical and metaphilosophical reflections, to take into serious consideration the phenomenon of conceptual change. An important consequence of this conception, and of the analysis that generated it, is in fact that an adequate understanding of the dynamics of philosophical concepts is a prerequisite for analytic philosophy to develop a realistic and non-idealized depiction of itself and its activities. (shrink)

The project of integrated HPS has occupied philosophers of science in one form or another since at least the 1960s. Yet, despite this substantial interest in bringing together philosophical and historical reflections on the nature of science, history of science and formal philosophy of science remain as divided as ever. In this paper, I will argue that the continuing separation between historical and formal philosophy of science is ill-founded. I will argue for this in both abstract and concrete terms. At (...) the abstract level, I reconstruct two possible arguments for the incompatibility of historical and formal philosophy of science and argue that they are both wanting. At the concrete level, I discuss how historical and formal philosophy of science have been brought together in practice, namely: in the form of a largely forgotten research tradition that I will refer to here as the study of formalized macro-units. After a brief exposition, I argue that this research tradition has been unduly overlooked by historically minded philosophers of science. Bringing together these observations, I argue that the divide between historical and formal philosophy of science is not grounded in any substantive arguments, but can be primarily attributed to disciplinary happenstance. (shrink)

In this paper, we aim to explore connections between a Carnapian semantics of theoretical terms and an eliminative structuralist approach in the philosophy of mathematics. Specifically, we will interpret the language of Peano arithmetic by applying the modal semantics of theoretical terms introduced in Andreas (Synthese 174(3):367–383, 2010). We will thereby show that the application to Peano arithmetic yields a formal semantics of universal structuralism, i.e., the view that ordinary mathematical statements in arithmetic express general claims about all admissible interpretations (...) of the Peano axioms. Moreover, we compare this application with the modal structuralism by Hellman (Mathematics without numbers: towards a modal-structural interpretation. Oxford University Press: Oxford, 1989), arguing that it provides us with an easier epistemology of statements in arithmetic. (shrink)

CAMILO, Bruno. Aspectos metafísicos na física de Newton: Deus. In: DUTRA, Luiz Henrique de Araújo; LUZ, Alexandre Meyer (org.). Temas de filosofia do conhecimento. Florianópolis: NEL/UFSC, 2011. p. 186-201. (Coleção rumos da epistemologia; 11). Através da análise do pensamento de Isaac Newton (1642-1727) encontramos os postulados metafísicos que fundamentam a sua mecânica natural. Ao deduzir causa de efeito, ele acreditava chegar a uma causa primeira de todas as coisas. A essa primeira causa de tudo, onde toda a ordem e leis (...) tiveram início, a qual para ele assume um caráter divino, Newton aponta para um Deus sábio e poderoso e responsável pela ordem inteligente e pela a harmonia das leis físicas e universais de tudo o que existe – Deus como criador e preservador da ordem do universo. Há ainda a analogia do conceito de Deus com o espaço e o tempo, na medida em que ambos comunicam infinitude e onipresença. Por fim, nas considerações finais apontarei a importância de Newton para a metafísica moderna e como os seus estudos contribuíram para uma visão posterior do universo e suas leis e do homem enquanto ser pensante. (shrink)

Three metascientific concepts that have been object of philosophical analysis are the concepts oflaw, model and theory. The aim ofthis article is to present the explication of these concepts, and of their relationships, made within the framework of Sneedean or Metatheoretical Structuralism (Balzer et al. 1987), and of their application to a case from the realm of biology: Population Dynamics. The analysis carried out will make it possible to support, contrary to what some philosophers of science in general and of (...) biology in particular hold, the following claims: a) there are "laws" in biological sciences, b) many of the heterogeneous and different "models" of biology can be accommodated under some "theory", and c) this is exactly what confers great unifying power to biological theories. (shrink)

There has been a growing trend to include non-causal models in accounts of scientific explanation. A worry addressed in this paper is that without a higher threshold for explanation there are no tools for distinguishing between models that provide genuine explanations and those that provide merely potential explanations. To remedy this, a condition is introduced that extends a veridicality requirement to models that are empirically underdetermined, highly-idealised, or otherwise non-causal. This condition is applied to models of electroweak symmetry breaking beyond (...) the Standard Model. (shrink)

There is nowadays consensus in the community of didactics of science regarding the need to include the philosophy of science in didactical research, science teacher education, curriculum design, and the practice of science education in all educational levels. Some authors have identified an ever-increasing use of the concept of ‘theoretical model’, stemming from the so-called semantic view of scientific theories. However, it can be recognised that, in didactics of science, there are over-simplified transpositions of the idea of model. In this (...) sense, contemporary philosophy of science is often blurred or distorted in the science education literature. In this paper, we address the discussion around some meta-theoretical concepts that are introduced into didactics of science due to their perceived educational value. We argue for the existence of a ‘semantic family’, and we characterise four different versions of semantic views existing within the family. In particular, we seek to contribute to establishing a model-based didactics of science mainly supported in this semantic family. (shrink)

Este trabajo constituye una primera aproximación a la teoría del origen en común tal como aparece en On the Origin of Species, de Charles Darwin. Luego de exponer las diferencias entre esta teoría y la teoría de la selección natural y la teoría de la evolución, se presentan algunos debates en torno a la determinación de homologías, el vocabulario de la teoría y su ley fundamental. Finalmente, se discute la TOC-teoricidad de los términos involucrados y los candidatos a especializaciones de (...) TOC. (shrink)

El presente trabajo tiene como objetivo central realizar aportes a la historia de la filosofía de la ciencia en general, y de la Concepción Estructural en particular, resaltando las contribuciones que desde esta última se han realizado en el campo de la pragmática; como también evaluar dichos logros, y señalar los límites y potencialidades de las propuestas analizadas en marco de la CE. En una primer etapa se comentarán los primeros desarrollos de las ideas pragmáticas en la CE, en integración (...) con la propuesta kuhniana ; para proseguir con los desarrollos posteriores en esta línea de trabajo ; Balzer, Moulines, y Sneed 1987). Finalmente, se evaluará el “intento conciliatorio” entre enfoques socio-históricos y enfoques formales en relación a los aportes a una pragmática de la ciencia dentro de la CE y se cuestionará la visión de la “historia heredada” de la filosofía de la ciencia. (shrink)

This paper is a conceptual analysis of the theory debate in psychology, as carried out by cognitivists and radical behaviorists. The debate has focused on the necessity of theories in psychology. However, the logically primary issue is the nature of theories, or what theories are. This claim stems from the fact that cognitivists and radical behaviorists adopt disparate accounts of the nature of theories. The cognitivists' account is closely akin to the received view from logical positivism, where theories are collections (...) of statements and theoretical terms are restricted to designate unobservable entities. Radical behaviorists also conceive theories as collections of statements, but restrict theoretical terms in psychology to designate observable entities. If each side approaches the necessity issue with its preferred account, both agree that theories are necessary in psychology. Hence, there is no disagreement over the necessity of theories in psychology per se, only over the nature of theories. The received view, however, has been shown to suffer from irreparable difficulties that have led to its total rejection in post-positivistic philosophy of science. Alternative accounts, like the structuralist and semantic views, do not raise the issue of whether theories are necessary in psychology. (shrink)

I present a case for a rapprochement between aspects of rationalism and scientific realism, by way of a general framework employing modal epistemology and elements of 2-dimensional semantics (2DS). My overall argument strategy is meta-inductive: The bulk of this paper establishes a “base case,” i.e., a concretely constructive example by which I demonstrate this linkage. The base case or constructive example acts as the exemplar for generating, in a constructively ‘bottom-up’ fashion, a more generally rigorous case for rationalism-realism qua modal (...) epistemology. The exemple I choose in D. Chalmers’ (2002) modal rationalism and R. Giere’s (1985, 1988) constructive realism. I show by way of a thorough analysis how Giere’s claims concerning modal scope are characterized as instances of Chalmers’ modal rationalism, both weak and strong. In essence, as I demonstrate via Chalmers’ notions, ceteris paribus the constructive realist ultimately opts for a comparatively wider gate, characterized by modal reasoning, to lead from the rooms of conceivability qua thought experiments and models, to the pastures of metaphysical possibility. Chalmers likewise tries to erect such a wider gate, in his general conceivability-possibility theses. Anti-realists, on the other hand, see a narrower passage and my contention herein is that they suffer from modal myopia, which hopefully the ‘corrective vision’ of Chalmers’ modal rationalism can restore. In the introduction and concluding sections I sketch out suggestions of constructing ‘inductive steps’ from my base case, to generate more extensively general claims regarding realism qua rationalism. -/- . (shrink)

Syntactic approaches in the philosophy of science, which are based on formalizations in predicate logic, are often considered in principle inferior to semantic approaches, which are based on formalizations with the help of structures. To compare the two kinds of approach, I identify some ambiguities in common semantic accounts and explicate the concept of a structure in a way that avoids hidden references to a specific vocabulary. From there, I argue that contrary to common opinion (i) unintended models do not (...) pose a significant problem for syntactic approaches to scientific theories, (ii) syntactic approaches can be at least as language-independent as semantic ones, and (iii) in syntactic approaches, scientific theories can be as well connected to the world as in semantic ones. Based on these results, I argue that syntactic and semantic approaches fare equally well when it comes to (iv) ease of application, (v) accommodating the use of models in the sciences, and (vi) capturing the theory-observation relation. (shrink)

In recent philosophy of mathematics avariety of writers have presented ``structuralist''views and arguments. There are, however, a number ofsubstantive differences in what their proponents take``structuralism'' to be. In this paper we make explicitthese differences, as well as some underlyingsimilarities and common roots. We thus identifysystematically and in detail, several main variants ofstructuralism, including some not often recognized assuch. As a result the relations between thesevariants, and between the respective problems theyface, become manifest. Throughout our focus is onsemantic and metaphysical issues, (...) including what is orcould be meant by ``structure'' in this connection. (shrink)

The numerical representations of measurement, geometry and kinematics are here subsumed under a general theory of representation. The standard theories of meaningfulness of representational propositions in these three areas are shown to be special cases of two theories of meaningfulness for arbitrary representational propositions: the theories based on unstructured and on structured representation respectively. The foundations of the standard theories of meaningfulness are critically analyzed and two basic assumptions are isolated which do not seem to have received adequate justification: the (...) assumption that a proposition invariant under the appropriate group is therefore meaningful, and the assumption that representations should be unique up to a transformation of the appropriate group. A general theory of representational meaningfulness is offered, based on a semantic and syntactic analysis of representational propositions. Two neglected features of representational propositions are formalized and made use of: (a) that such propositions are induced by more general propositions defined for other structures than the one being represented, and (b) that the true purpose of representation is the application of the theory of the representing system to the represented system. On the basis of these developments, justifications are offered for the two problematic assumptions made by the existing theories. (shrink)

In many applications of physics, boundary conditions have an essential role. The purpose of this paper is to examine from both a historical and philosophical perspective one such boundary condition, namely, the no-slip condition of fluid dynamics. The historical perspective is based on the works of George Stokes and serves as the foundation for the philosophical perspective. It is seen that historically the acceptance of the no-slip condition was problematic. Philosophically, the no-slip condition is interesting since the use of the (...) no-slip condition illustrates nicely the use of scientific models. But more importantly, both the use and justification of the no-slip condition illustrate clearly how theories can holistically approach the world through model construction. Further, since much of the debate over scientific realism occurs in the realm of models, a case is made that an understanding of the role of the no-slip condition has something to offer to this debate. (shrink)

Recently some philosophers have urged that connectionist artificial intelligence is (potentially) eliminative for the propositional attitudes of folk psychology. At the same time, however, these philosophers have also insisted that since philosophy of science has failed to provide criteria distinguishing ontologically retentive from eliminative theory changes, the resulting eliminativism is not principled. Application of some resources developed within the semantic view of scientific theories, particularly recent formal work on the theory reduction relation, reveals these philosophers to be wrong in this (...) second contention, yet by and large correct in the first. (shrink)

Modal logic has been applied in many different areas, as reasoning about time, knowledge and belief, necessity and possibility, to mention only some examples. In the present paper, an attempt is made to use modal logic to account for the semantics of theoretical sentences in scientific language. Theoretical sentences have been studied extensively since the work of Ramsey and Carnap. The present attempt at a modal analysis is motivated by there being several intended interpretations of the theoretical terms once these (...) terms are introduced through the axioms of a theory. (shrink)