Results for 'Grant Maxwell'

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  1. The rationality of scientific discovery part I: The traditional rationality problem.Nicholas Maxwell - 1974 - Philosophy of Science 41 (2):123-153.
    The basic task of the essay is to exhibit science as a rational enterprise. I argue that in order to do this we need to change quite fundamentally our whole conception of science. Today it is rather generally taken for granted that a precondition for science to be rational is that in science we do not make substantial assumptions about the world, or about the phenomena we are investigating, which are held permanently immune from empirical appraisal. According to this standard (...)
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  2. Does orthodox quantum theory undermine, or support, scientific realism?Nicholas Maxwell - 1994 - Philosophical Quarterly 44 (171):139-157.
    It is usually taken for granted that orthodox quantum theory poses a serious problem for scientific realism, in that the theory is empirically extraordinarily successful, and yet has instrumentalism built into it. This paper stand this view on its head. I argue that orthodox quantum theory suffers from a number of serious (if not always noticed) defects precisely because of its inbuilt instrumentalism. This defective character of orthdoox quantum theory thus undermines instrumentalism, and supports scientific realism. I go on to (...)
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  3. Understanding Scientific Progress: Aim-Oriented Empiricism.Nicholas Maxwell - 2017 - St. Paul, USA: Paragon House.
    "Understanding Scientific Progress constitutes a potentially enormous and revolutionary advancement in philosophy of science. It deserves to be read and studied by everyone with any interest in or connection with physics or the theory of science. Maxwell cites the work of Hume, Kant, J.S. Mill, Ludwig Bolzmann, Pierre Duhem, Einstein, Henri Poincaré, C.S. Peirce, Whitehead, Russell, Carnap, A.J. Ayer, Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn, Imre Lakatos, Paul Feyerabend, Nelson Goodman, Bas van Fraassen, and numerous others. He lauds Popper for advancing (...)
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  4. (1 other version)Has Science Established that the Cosmos is Physically Comprehensible?Nicholas Maxwell - 2013 - In Recent Advances in Cosmology. Nova Science Publishers. pp. 1-56.
    Most scientists would hold that science has not established that the cosmos is physically comprehensible – i.e. such that there is some as-yet undiscovered true physical theory of everything that is unified. This is an empirically untestable, or metaphysical thesis. It thus lies beyond the scope of science. Only when physics has formulated a testable unified theory of everything which has been amply corroborated empirically will science be in a position to declare that it has established that the cosmos is (...)
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  5. Wisdom Mathematics.Nicholas Maxwell - 2010 - Friends of Wisdom Newsletter (6):1-6.
    For over thirty years I have argued that all branches of science and scholarship would have both their intellectual and humanitarian value enhanced if pursued in accordance with the edicts of wisdom-inquiry rather than knowledge-inquiry. I argue that this is true of mathematics. Viewed from the perspective of knowledge-inquiry, mathematics confronts us with two fundamental problems. (1) How can mathematics be held to be a branch of knowledge, in view of the difficulties that view engenders? What could mathematics be knowledge (...)
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  6. Has science established that the universe is physically comprehensible?Nicholas Maxwell - 2013 - In Anderson Travena & Brady Soren (eds.), Recent Advances in Cosmology. Nova Science. pp. 1-56.
    Most scientists would hold that science has not established that the cosmos is physically comprehensible – i.e. such that there is some as-yet undiscovered true physical theory of everything that is unified. This is an empirically untestable, or metaphysical thesis. It thus lies beyond the scope of science. Only when physics has formulated a testable unified theory of everything which has been amply corroborated empirically will science be in a position to declare that it has established that the cosmos is (...)
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  7. Must Science Make Cosmological Assumptions if it is to be Rational?Nicholas Maxwell - 1997 - In T. Kelly (ed.), The Philosophy of Science: Proceedings of the Irish Philosophical Society Spring Conference. Irish Philosophical Society.
    Cosmological speculation about the ultimate nature of the universe, being necessary for science to be possible at all, must be regarded as a part of scientific knowledge itself, however epistemologically unsound it may be in other respects. The best such speculation available is that the universe is comprehensible in some way or other and, more specifically, in the light of the immense apparent success of modern natural science, that it is physically comprehensible. But both these speculations may be false; in (...)
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  8. Articulating the Aims of Science.Nicholas Maxwell - 1977 - Nature 265 (January 6):2.
    Most scientists and philosophers of science take for granted the standard empiricist view that the basic intellectual aim of science is truth per se. But this seriously misrepresents the aims of scieince. Actually, science seeks explanatory truth and, more generally, important truth. Problematic metaphysical and value assumptions are inherent in the real aims of science. Precisely because these aims are profoundly problematic, they need to be articulated, imaginatively explored and critically assesseed, in order to improve them, as an integral part (...)
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  9. Does the Scientific Community Misconstrue the Nature of Science?Nicholas Maxwell - 2021 - Global Journal of Research and Review 8 (5):83.
    The scientific community takes for granted a view of science that may be called standard empiricism. This holds that the basic intellectual aim of science is truth, nothing being presupposed about the truth, the basic method being to assess theories with respect to evidence. A basic tenet of the view is that science must not accept any thesis about the world as a part of scientific knowledge independent of evidence, let alone in violation of evidence. But physics only accepts unified (...)
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  10. (1 other version)Relativity Theory may not have the last Word on the Nature of Time: Quantum Theory and Probabilism.Nicholas Maxwell - 2016 - In Giancarlo Ghirardi & Shyam Wuppuluri (eds.), Space, Time and the Limits of Human Understanding. Cham: Imprint: Springer. pp. 109-124.
    Two radically different views about time are possible. According to the first, the universe is three dimensional. It has a past and a future, but that does not mean it is spread out in time as it is spread out in the three dimensions of space. This view requires that there is an unambiguous, absolute, cosmic-wide "now" at each instant. According to the second view about time, the universe is four dimensional. It is spread out in both space and time (...)
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  11. Misunderstanding Understanding Scientific Progress.Nicholas Maxwell - manuscript
    In my book Understanding Scientific Progress, I argue that fundamental philosophical problems about scientific progress, above all the problem of induction, cannot be solved granted standard empiricism (SE), a doctrine which most scientists and philosophers of science take for granted. A key tenet of SE is that no permanent thesis about the world can be accepted as a part of scientific knowledge independent of evidence. For a number of reasons, we need to adopt a rather different conception of science which (...)
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  12. Three philosophical problems about consciousness.Nicholas Maxwell - 2002 - Ethical Record 107 (4):3-11.
    I am inclined to think that there are three basic philosophical problems that arise in connection with consciousness. (1) Existence. Why does sentience or consciousness exist at all? Why are we not zombies? (2) Intelligibility. Granted that consciousness exists, what is it? How is it to be explained and understood? On the face of it, there could be no greater mystery than that brains should somehow produce, or be, our states of awareness, our thoughts, feelings, perceptions and desires. What is (...)
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  13. Brief Account of How Nicholas Maxwell Came to Argue for the Urgent Need for a Revolution in Universities.Nicholas Maxwell - manuscript
    We need urgently to bring about a revolution in universities around the world, wherever possible, so that they take their fundamental task to be, not to acquire and apply knowledge, but rather to help humanity learn how to resolve conflicts and problems of living in increasingly cooperatively rational ways, so that we may make progress towards a good, genuinely civilized, wise world. The pursuit of knowledge would be a vital but subsidiary task. I have argued for the urgent need for (...)
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  14. Quantum propensiton theory: A testable resolution of the wave/particle dilemma.Nicholas Maxwell - 1988 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 39 (1):1-50.
    In this paper I put forward a new micro realistic, fundamentally probabilistic, propensiton version of quantum theory. According to this theory, the entities of the quantum domain - electrons, photons, atoms - are neither particles nor fields, but a new kind of fundamentally probabilistic entity, the propensiton - entities which interact with one another probabilistically. This version of quantum theory leaves the Schroedinger equation unchanged, but reinterprets it to specify how propensitons evolve when no probabilistic transitions occur. Probabilisitic transitions occur (...)
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  15. How Universities have Betrayed Reason and Humanity – And What’s to be Done About It.Nicholas Maxwell - 2021 - Frontiers 631.
    In 1984 the author published From Knowledge to Wisdom, a book that argued that a revolution in academia is urgently needed, so that problems of living, including global problems, are put at the heart of the enterprise, and the basic aim becomes to seek and promote wisdom, and not just acquire knowledge. Every discipline and aspect of academia needs to change, and the whole way in which academia is related to the rest of the social world. Universities devoted to the (...)
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  16. The World Crisis and the Key to Its Resolution.Nicholas Maxwell - forthcoming - In Leading under Pressure. Ottawa, ON, Canada:
    Humanity faces two basic problems of learning: learning about the universe, and learning how to become civilized. We have solved the first problem, but not the second, and that puts us in a situation of great danger. Almost all our global problems have arisen as a result. It has become a matter of extreme urgency to solve the second problem. The key to that is to learn from our solution to the first problem how to solve the second one. This (...)
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  17. The Metaphysics of Science and Aim-Oriented Empiricism: A Revolution for Science and Philosophy.Nicholas Maxwell - 2018 - Cham, Switzerland: Springer Nature.
    This book gives an account of work that I have done over a period of decades that sets out to solve two fundamental problems of philosophy: the mind-body problem and the problem of induction. Remarkably, these revolutionary contributions to philosophy turn out to have dramatic implications for a wide range of issues outside philosophy itself, most notably for the capacity of humanity to resolve current grave global problems and make progress towards a better, wiser world. A key element of the (...)
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  18. Are Universities Undergoing an Intellectual Revolution?Nicholas Maxwell - 2009 - Oxford Magazine 1 (290):13-16.
    For over 30 years I have argued, in and out of print that, for both intellectual and humanitarian reasons, we urgently need a revolution in the aims and methods of academic inquiry. Instead of giving priority to the search for knowledge, academia needs to devote itself to seeking and promoting wisdom by rational means, wisdom being the capacity to realize what is of value in life, for oneself and others. Wisdom thus includes knowledge but much else besides. A basic task (...)
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  19.  91
    Is Bad Philosophy Responsible for the Climate Crisis?Nicholas Maxwell - 2024 - Hps and St Newsletter.
    I have recently published a book to which I gave the title: Is Bad Philosophy Responsible for the Climate Crisis? But this proved to be too inflammatory for Palgrave Macmillan, and they changed it to the anodyne The Philosophy of Inquiry and Global Problems: The Intellectual Revolution Needed to Create a Better World. In the book I argue that academic philosophy has a certain responsibility for the failure of humanity to put a stop to the climate and nature crises, in (...)
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  20. The Need for a Revolution in the Philosophy of Science.Nicholas Maxwell - 2002 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 33 (2):381-408.
    There is a need to bring about a revolution in the philosophy of science, interpreted to be both the academic discipline, and the official view of the aims and methods of science upheld by the scientific community. At present both are dominated by the view that in science theories are chosen on the basis of empirical considerations alone, nothing being permanently accepted as a part of scientific knowledge independently of evidence. Biasing choice of theory in the direction of simplicity, unity (...)
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  21. (1 other version)Is Science Neurotic?Nicholas Maxwell - 2002 - Metaphilosophy 33 (3):259-299.
    Neurosis can be interpreted as a methodological condition which any aim-pursuing entity can suffer from. If such an entity pursues a problematic aim B, represents to itself that it is pursuing a different aim C, and as a result fails to solve the problems associated with B which, if solved, would lead to the pursuit of aim A, then the entity may be said to be "rationalistically neurotic". Natural science is neurotic in this sense in so far as a basic (...)
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  22. (1 other version)A New Task for the Philosophy of Science.Nicholas Maxwell - 2019 - Metaphilosophy (3):316-338.
    We philosophers of science have before us an important new task that we need urgently to take up. It is to convince the scientific community to adopt and implement a new philosophy of science that does better justice to the deeply problematic basic intellectual aims of science than that which we have at present. Problematic aims evolve with evolving knowledge, that part of philosophy of science concerned with aims and methods thus becoming an integral part of science itself. The outcome (...)
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  23. How can life of value best flourish in the real world?Nicholas Maxwell - 2009 - In Leemon McHenry (ed.), Science and the Pursuit of Wisdom: Studies in the Philosophy of Nicholas Maxwell. Frankfurt, Germany: Ontos Verlag.
    The Urgent Need for an Intellectual Revolution For much of my working life (from 1972 onwards) I have argued, in and out of print, that we need to bring about a revolution in the aims and methods of science – and of academic inquiry more generally. Instead of giving priority to the search for knowledge, academia needs to devote itself to seeking and promoting wisdom by rational means, wisdom being the capacity to realize what is of value in life, for (...)
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  24. How Can Life of Value Best Flourish in the Real World?Nicholas Maxwell (ed.) - 2009
    1. The Urgent Need for an Intellectual Revolution 2. Two Fundamental Problems 3. Autobiographical Remarks 4. What Kind of Inquiry Can Best Help Life of Value to Flourish? 5. How is Life of Value Possible in the Physical Universe? 6. Connections between the Two Problems .
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  25. Our Fundamental Problem: A Revolution for Philosophy and the World.Nicholas Maxwell - 2021 - Humanities, Arts, and Society Magazine 3.
    How can our human world – the world we experience and live in – exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the physical universe? That is Our Fundamental Problem. It encompasses all others of science, thought and life. It is the proper task of philosophy to try to improve our conjectures as to how aspects of Our Fundamental Problem are to be solved, and to encourage everyone to think, imaginatively and critically, now and again, about the problem. We (...)
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  26. How Wisdom Can Help Solve Global Problems.Nicholas Maxwell - 2019 - In R. Sternberg, H. Nusbaum & J. Glueck (eds.), Applying Wisdom to Contemporary World Problems. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 337-380.
    Two great problems of learning confront humanity: learning about the nature of the universe and about ourselves and other living things as a part of the universe, and learning how to become civilized. The first problem was solved, in essence, in the 17th century, with the creation of modern science. But the second problem has not yet been solved. Solving the first problem without also solving the second puts us in a situation of great danger. All our current global problems (...)
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  27. Science, reason, knowledge, and wisdom: A critique of specialism.Nicholas Maxwell - 1980 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 23 (1):19 – 81.
    In this paper I argue for a kind of intellectual inquiry which has, as its basic aim, to help all of us to resolve rationally the most important problems that we encounter in our lives, problems that arise as we seek to discover and achieve that which is of value in life. Rational problem-solving involves articulating our problems, proposing and criticizing possible solutions. It also involves breaking problems up into subordinate problems, creating a tradition of specialized problem-solving - specialized scientific, (...)
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  28. From Knowledge to Wisdom: The Need for an Academic Revolution.Nicholas Maxwell - 2007 - London Review of Education 5:97-115.
    At present the basic intellectual aim of academic inquiry is to improve knowledge. Much of the structure, the whole character, of academic inquiry, in universities all over the world, is shaped by the adoption of this as the basic intellectual aim. But, judged from the standpoint of making a contribution to human welfare, academic inquiry of this type is damagingly irrational. Three of four of the most elementary rules of rational problem-solving are violated. A revolution in the aims and methods (...)
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  29. Induction and scientific realism: Einstein versus Van Fraassen part three: Einstein, aim-oriented empiricism and the discovery of special and general relativity.Nicholas Maxwell - 1993 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 44 (2):275-305.
    In this paper I show that Einstein made essential use of aim-oriented empiricism in scientific practice in developing special and general relativity. I conclude by considering to what extent Einstein came explicitly to advocate aim-oriented empiricism in his later years.
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  30. Is the quantum world composed of propensitons?Nicholas Maxwell - 2010 - In Mauricio Suárez (ed.), Probabilities, Causes and Propensities in Physics. New York: Springer. pp. 221-243.
    In this paper I outline my propensiton version of quantum theory (PQT). PQT is a fully micro-realistic version of quantum theory that provides us with a very natural possible solution to the fundamental wave/particle problem, and is free of the severe defects of orthodox quantum theory (OQT) as a result. PQT makes sense of the quantum world. PQT recovers all the empirical success of OQT and is, furthermore, empirically testable (although not as yet tested). I argue that Einstein almost put (...)
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  31. On relativity theory and openness of the future.Nicholas Maxwell - 1993 - Philosophy of Science 60 (2):341-348.
    In a recent paper, Howard Stein makes a number of criticisms of an earlier paper of mine ('Are Probabilism and Special Relativity Incompatible?', Phil. Sci., 1985), which explored the question of whether the idea that the future is genuinely 'open' in a probabilistic universe is compatible with special relativity. I disagree with almost all of Stein's criticisms.
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  32. The enlightenment, Popper and Einstein.Nicholas Maxwell - 2007 - In Yong Shi, David L. Olson & Antonie Stam (eds.), Knowledge and Wisdom: Advances in Multiple Criteria Decision Making and Human Systems Management,. IOS Press.
    In this paper I discuss four versions of the basic idea of the French Enlightenment of the 18th century, namely: To learn from scientific progress how to achieve social progress towards an enlightened world. These four versions are: 1. The Traditional Enlightenment Programme. 2. The Popperian Version of the Enlightenment Programme. 3. The Improved Popperian Enlightenment Programme. 4. The New Enlightenment Programme. The Traditional Enlightenment Programme is the version of the idea upheld by the philosophes of the French Enlightenment. It (...)
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  33. How Universities Can Help Create a Wiser World: The Urgent Need for an Academic Revolution.Nicholas Maxwell - 2014 - Exeter: Imprint Academic.
    In order to make progress towards a better world we need to learn how to do it. And for that we need institutions of learning rationally designed and devoted to helping us solve our global problems, make progress towards a better world. It is just this that we lack at present. Our universities pursue knowledge. They are neither designed nor devoted to helping humanity learn how to tackle global problems — problems of living — in more intelligent, humane and effective (...)
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  34. Towards a Micro Realistic Version of Quantum Mechanics, Part I.Nicholas Maxwell - 1976 - Foundations of Physics 6 (3):275-292.
    This paper investigates the possibiity of developing a fully micro realistic version of elementary quantum mechanics. I argue that it is highly desirable to develop such a version of quantum mechanics, and that the failure of all current versions and interpretations of quantum mechanics to constitute micro realistic theories is at the root of many of the interpretative problems associated with quantum mechanics, in particular the problem of measurement. I put forward a propensity micro realistic version of quantum mechanics, and (...)
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  35. Global Philosophy: What Philosophy Ought to Be.Nicholas Maxwell - 2014 - Exeter, UK: Imprint Academic.
    These essays are about education, learning, rational inquiry, philosophy, science studies, problem solving, academic inquiry, global problems, wisdom and, above all, the urgent need for an academic revolution. Despite this range and diversity of topics, there is a common underlying theme. Education ought to be devoted, much more than it is, to the exploration real-life, open problems; it ought not to be restricted to learning up solutions to already solved problems - especially if nothing is said about the problems that (...)
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  36. Physics and Common Sense: A Critique of Physicalism.Nicholas Maxwell - 1966 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 16 (February):295-311.
    In this paper I set out to solve the problem of how the world as we experience it, full of colours and other sensory qualities, and our inner experiences, can be reconciled with physics. I discuss and reject the views of J. J. C. Smart and Rom Harré. I argue that physics is concerned only to describe a selected aspect of all that there is – the causal aspect which determines how events evolve. Colours and other sensory qualities, lacking causal (...)
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  37. Can Scientific Method Help Us Create a Wiser World?Nicholas Maxwell - 2016 - In Nikunj Dalal, Ali Intezari & Marty Heitz (eds.), Practical wisdom in the age of technology: insights, issues, and questions for a new millennium. New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group. pp. 147-161.
    Two great problems of learning confront humanity: (1) learning about the universe, and about ourselves as a part of the universe, and (2) learning how to make progress towards as good a world as possible. We solved the first problem when we created modern science in the 17th century, but we have not yet solved the second problem. This puts us in a situation of unprecedented danger. Modern science and technology enormously increase our power to act, but not our power (...)
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  38. Zagrożenie nauką bez cywilizacji: od wiedzy do mądrości (Polish translation of "The Menace of Science without Civilization: From Knowledge to Wisdom" (2012)).Nicholas Maxwell - 2011 - Zagadnienia Naukoznawstwa 47 (189):269-294.
    We are in a state of impending crisis. And the fault lies in part with academia. For two centuries or so, academia has been devoted to the pursuit of knowledge and technological know-how. This has enormously increased our power to act which has, in turn, brought us both all the great benefits of the modern world and the crises we now face. Modern science and technology have made possible modern industry and agriculture, the explosive growth of the world’s population, global (...)
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  39. What Kind of Inquiry Can Best Help Us Create a Good World?Nicholas Maxwell - 1992 - Science, Technology and Human Values 17:205-227.
    In order to create a good world, we need to learn how to do it - how to resolve our appalling problems and conflicts in more cooperative ways than at present. And in order to do this, we need traditions and institutions of learning rationally devoted to this end. When viewed from this standpoint, what we have at present - academic inquiry devoted to the pursuit of knowledge and technological know-how - is an intellectual and human disaster. We urgently need (...)
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  40. Our Global Problems And What We Need To Do About Them.Nicholas Maxwell - 2012 - In Charles Tandy & Jack Lee (eds.), Death and Anti-Death Anthology, vol. 10: Ten Years After John Rawls (1921-2002). Ria University Press.
    How can what is of value associated with our human world exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the physical universe? Or, as we may put it, how can the God-of-Cosmic-Value exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the God-of-Cosmic-Power? This, I argue, is our fundamental problem – fundamental in both intellectual and practical terms. Here, I tackle the practical aspect of the problem. I consider briefly five global problems – climate change, war, population growth, world (...)
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  41. Scientific metaphysics.Nicholas Maxwell - 2004 - Philsci Archive.
    In this paper I argue that physics makes metaphysical presuppositions concerning the physical comprehensibility, the dynamic unity, of the universe. I argue that rigour requires that these metaphysical presuppositions be made explicit as an integral part of theoretical knowledge in physics. An account of what it means to assert of a theory that it is unified is developed, which provides the means for partially ordering dynamical physical theories with respect to their degrees of unity. This in turn makes it possible (...)
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  42. Science and the environment: A new enlightenment.Nicholas Maxwell - 1997 - Science and Public Affairs (Spring 1997):50-56.
    Nicholas Maxwell believes that while we have developed an excellent way of learning about the nature of the universe, we have so far failed in our attempts to apply this method to create a civilized world.
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  43. Karl Popper, Science and Enlightenment: An Idea to Help Save the World.Nicholas Maxwell - 2018 - Ethical Record 123 (1):27-30.
    Natural science, properly understood, provides us with the methodological key to the salvation of humanity. First, we need to acknowledge that the actual aims of science are profoundly problematic, in that they make problematic assumptions about metaphysics, values and the social use of science. Then we need to represent these aims in the form of a hierarchy of aims, which become increasingly unproblematic as one goes up the hierarchy; as result we create a framework of relatively unproblematic aims and methods, (...)
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  44. The World Crisis - And What To Do About It: A Revolution for Thought and Action.Nicholas Maxwell - 2021 - New Jersey: World Scientific.
    Two great problems of learning confront humanity: learning about the universe, and about ourselves and other living things as a part of the universe; and learning how to create a good, civilized, enlightened, wise world. We have solved the first great problem of learning – we did that when we created modern science and technology in the 17th century. But we have not yet solved the second one. That combination of solving the first problem, failing to solve the second one, (...)
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  45. How Wisdom-Inquiry Could Help Us Cope with the Coronavirus Pandemic.Nicholas Maxwell - manuscript
    A kind of academic inquiry rationally devoted to helping to promote human welfare would give intellectual priority to the tasks of (1) articulating, and improving the articulating of, problems of living, and (2) proposing and critically assessing possible solutions - possible actions, policies, political programmes, ways of living. The pursuit of knowledge and technological know-how would be important but secondary. If such a genuinely rigorous kind of academic inquiry had been in place in our universities at the beginning of the (...)
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  46. Wisdom in the University.Nicholas Maxwell & Ronald Barnett - 2008 - Routledge.
    We face grave global problems. We urgently need to learn how to tackle them in wiser, more effective, intelligent and humane ways than we have done so far. This requires that universities become devoted to helping humanity acquire the necessary wisdom to perform the task. But at present universities do not even conceive of their role in these terms. The essays of this book consider what needs to change in the university if it is to help humanity acquire the wisdom (...)
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  47. Particle Creation as the Quantum Condition for Probabilistic Events to Occur.Nicholas Maxwell - 1994 - Physics Letters A 187 (2 May 1994):351-355.
    A new version of quantum theory is proposed, according to which probabilistic events occur whenever new statioinary or bound states are created as a result of inelastic collisions. The new theory recovers the experimental success of orthodox quantum theory, but differs form the orthodox theory for as yet unperformed experiments.
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  48. A new way of understanding the wave function: Shan Gao: The meaning of the wave function. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017, x+189pp, $140 HB.Nicholas Maxwell - 2017 - Metascience 27 (1):87-90.
    This is a review of a book by Shan Gao called "The meaning of the wave function", Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017.
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  49. Darwinian Theory Reinterpreted.Nicholas Maxwell - 2010 - In Cutting God in Half - And Putting the Pieces Together Again: A New Approach to Philosophy. Pentire Press. pp. 264-300.
    It is argued that purposive action of living things plays a crucial role in Darwinian evolution. As evolution proceeds, the mechanisms of evolution evolve as well, giving an increasingly important role to purposive action - to be understood in a sense which is compatible with physics (the atom of purposiveness being the thermostat). Nine versions of Darwinian theory are distinguished. The first denies that purposive action has any role in evolution at all; each successive version gives an inceasingly important role (...)
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  50. The Urgent Need for Social Wisdom.Nicholas Maxwell - 2019 - In Robert J. Sternberg & Judith Glück (eds.), The Cambridge Handbook of Wisdom. Cambridge University Press. pp. 754-780.
    Two great problems of learning confront humanity: learning about the universe; and learning how to become civilized. The first problem was solved in the 17th century, with the creation of modern science. But the second problem has not yet been solved. That puts us in a situation of great danger. All our current global problems have arisen as a result. We need to learn from our solution to the first problem how to solve the second. This was the basic idea (...)
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