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| Author | : Anjan Chakravartty |
| Publisher | : Cambridge University Press |
| Total Pages | : 235 |
| Release | : 2007-10-18 |
| Genre | : Science |
| ISBN | : 1139468391 |
Download A Metaphysics for Scientific Realism Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Scientific realism is the view that our best scientific theories give approximately true descriptions of both observable and unobservable aspects of a mind-independent world. Debates between realists and their critics are at the very heart of the philosophy of science. Anjan Chakravartty traces the contemporary evolution of realism by examining the most promising strategies adopted by its proponents in response to the forceful challenges of antirealist sceptics, resulting in a positive proposal for scientific realism today. He examines the core principles of the realist position, and sheds light on topics including the varieties of metaphysical commitment required, and the nature of the conflict between realism and its empiricist rivals. By illuminating the connections between realist interpretations of scientific knowledge and the metaphysical foundations supporting them, his book offers a compelling vision of how realism can provide an internally consistent and coherent account of scientific knowledge.
| Author | : Anjan Chakravartty |
| Publisher | : Oxford University Press |
| Total Pages | : 288 |
| Release | : 2017-06-30 |
| Genre | : Philosophy |
| ISBN | : 0190651474 |
Download Scientific Ontology Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Both science and philosophy are interested in questions of ontology - questions about what exists and what these things are like. Science and philosophy, however, seem like very different ways of investigating the world, so how should one proceed? Some defer to the sciences, conceived as something apart from philosophy, and others to metaphysics, conceived as something apart from science, for certain kinds of answers. This book contends that these sorts of deference are misconceived. A compelling account of ontology must appreciate the ways in which the sciences incorporate metaphysical assumptions and arguments. At the same time, it must pay careful attention to how observation, experience, and the empirical dimensions of science are related to what may be viewed as defensible philosophical theorizing about ontology. The promise of an effectively naturalized metaphysics is to encourage beliefs that are formed in ways that do justice to scientific theorizing, modeling, and experimentation. But even armed with such a view, there is no one, uniquely rational way to draw lines between domains of ontology that are suitable for belief, and ones in which it would be better to suspend belief instead. In crucial respects, ontology is in the eye of the beholder: it is informed by underlying commitments with implications for the limits of inquiry, which inevitably vary across rational inquirers. As result, the proper scope of ontology is subject to a striking form of voluntary choice, yielding a new and transformative conception of scientific ontology.
| Author | : Juha Saatsi |
| Publisher | : Routledge |
| Total Pages | : 907 |
| Release | : 2017-11-22 |
| Genre | : Philosophy |
| ISBN | : 1351362909 |
Download The Routledge Handbook of Scientific Realism Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Scientific realism is a central, long-standing, and hotly debated topic in philosophy of science. Debates about scientific realism concern the very nature and extent of scientific knowledge and progress. Scientific realists defend a positive epistemic attitude towards our best theories and models regarding how they represent the world that is unobservable to our naked senses. Various realist theses are under sceptical fire from scientific antirealists, e.g. empiricists and instrumentalists. The different dimensions of the ensuing debate centrally connect to numerous other topics in philosophy of science and beyond. The Routledge Handbook of Scientific Realism is an outstanding reference source – the first collection of its kind – to the key issues, positions, and arguments in this important topic. Its thirty-four chapters, written by a team of international experts, are divided into five parts: Historical development of the realist stance Classic debate: core issues and positions Perspectives on contemporary debates The realism debate in disciplinary context Broader reflections In these sections, the core issues and debates presented, analysed, and set into broader historical and disciplinary contexts. The central issues covered include motivations and arguments for realism; challenges to realism from underdetermination and history of science; different variants of realism; the connection of realism to relativism and perspectivism; and the relationship between realism, metaphysics, and epistemology. The Routledge Handbook of Scientific Realism is essential reading for students and researchers in philosophy of science. It will also be very useful for anyone interested in the nature and extent of scientific knowledge.
| Author | : K. Brad Wray |
| Publisher | : Cambridge University Press |
| Total Pages | : 237 |
| Release | : 2018-11 |
| Genre | : History |
| ISBN | : 1108415210 |
Download Resisting Scientific Realism Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Provides a spirited defence of anti-realism in philosophy of science. Shows the historical evidence and logical challenges facing scientific realism.
| Author | : Ilkka Niiniluoto |
| Publisher | : OUP Oxford |
| Total Pages | : 356 |
| Release | : 1999-12-09 |
| Genre | : Philosophy |
| ISBN | : 0191519405 |
Download Critical Scientific Realism Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Ilkka Niiniluoto comes to the rescue of scientific realism, showing that reports of its death have been greatly exaggerated. Philosophical realism holds that the aim of a particular discourse is to make true statements about its subject-matter. Niiniluoto surveys the different varieties of realism in ontology, semantics, epistemology, theory construction, and methodology. He then sets out his own original version, and defends it against competing theories in the philosophy of science. Niiniluoto's critical scientific realism is founded upon the notion of truth as correspondence between language and reality, and characterizes scientific progress in terms of increasing truthlikeness. This makes it possible not only to take seriously, but also to make precise, the troublesome idea that scientific theories typically are false but nevertheless close to the truth.
| Author | : Howard Sankey |
| Publisher | : Routledge |
| Total Pages | : 174 |
| Release | : 2016-04-01 |
| Genre | : Philosophy |
| ISBN | : 1317058801 |
Download Scientific Realism and the Rationality of Science Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Scientific realism is the position that the aim of science is to advance on truth and increase knowledge about observable and unobservable aspects of the mind-independent world which we inhabit. This book articulates and defends that position. In presenting a clear formulation and addressing the major arguments for scientific realism Sankey appeals to philosophers beyond the community of, typically Anglo-American, analytic philosophers of science to appreciate and understand the doctrine. The book emphasizes the epistemological aspects of scientific realism and contains an original solution to the problem of induction that rests on an appeal to the principle of uniformity of nature.
| Author | : N. Rescher |
| Publisher | : Springer Science & Business Media |
| Total Pages | : 190 |
| Release | : 2012-12-06 |
| Genre | : Science |
| ISBN | : 9400939051 |
Download Scientific Realism Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
The increasingly lively controversy over scientific realism has become one of the principal themes of recent philosophy. 1 In watching this controversy unfold in the rather technical way currently in vogue, it has seemed to me that it would be useful to view these contemporary disputes against the background of such older epistemological issues as fallibilism, scepticism, relativism, and the traditional realism/idealism debate. This, then, is the object of the present book, which will recon sider the newer concerns about scientific realism in the context of these older philosophical themes. Historically, realism concerns itself with the real existence of things that do not "meet the eye" - with suprasensible entities that lie beyond the reach of human perception. In medieval times, discussions about realism focused upon universals. Recognizing that there are physical objects such as cats and triangular objects and red tomatoes, the medievels debated whether such "abstract objects" as cathood and triangularity and redness also exist by way of having a reality indepen dent of the concretely real things that exhibit them. Three fundamen tally different positions were defended: (1) Nominalism. Abstracta have no independent existence as such: they only "exist" in and through the objects that exhibit them. Only particulars (individual substances) exist. Abstract "objects" are existents in name only, mere thought fictions by whose means we address concrete particular things. (2) Realism. Abstracta have an independent existence as such.
| Author | : Derek Turner |
| Publisher | : Cambridge University Press |
| Total Pages | : 195 |
| Release | : 2007-07-05 |
| Genre | : Science |
| ISBN | : 1139465058 |
Download Making Prehistory Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Scientists often make surprising claims about things that no one can observe. In physics, chemistry, and molecular biology, scientists can at least experiment on those unobservable entities, but what about researchers in fields such as paleobiology and geology who study prehistory, where no such experimentation is possible? Do scientists discover facts about the distant past or do they, in some sense, make prehistory? In this book Derek Turner argues that this problem has surprising and important consequences for the scientific realism debate. His discussion covers some of the main positions in philosophy of science - realism, social constructivism, empiricism, and the natural ontological attitude - and shows how they relate to issues in paleobiology and geology. His original and thought-provoking book will be of wide interest to philosophers and scientists alike.
| Author | : Anjan Anjan Chakravartty |
| Publisher | : CreateSpace |
| Total Pages | : 270 |
| Release | : 2015-03-18 |
| Genre | : |
| ISBN | : 9781508932864 |
Download A Metaphysics for Scientific Realism Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
One might think that in order to discuss the question of whether realism is plausible or reasonable, one should already know what it is. As philosophers know only too well, however, one cannot think about everything at once, and the debate surrounding realism is no exception. One must often assume coherent accounts of various components of a position in order to give careful attention to others, and people on all sides of this debate usually take a great deal for granted so as to focus on epistemic questions.
| Author | : Francesco Federico Calemi |
| Publisher | : Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG |
| Total Pages | : 270 |
| Release | : 2016-01-15 |
| Genre | : Philosophy |
| ISBN | : 3110455919 |
Download Metaphysics and Scientific Realism Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
David Malet Armstrong (8 July 1926–13 May 2014) has been one of the most influential contemporary metaphysicians working in the analytic tradition and surely the greatest 20th century Australian philosopher. His main merit is to have reestablished metaphysics as a respectable branch of philosophy placing it at the centre of the philosophical debate, and giving it the status of an authoritative and competent interlocutor of both rational and empirical sciences. By means of a rigorously argumentative approach and a sharp prose, Armstrong has built a whole metaphysical system, that is, a comprehensive and unified picture of the fundamental structure of the world. The various chapters of the book address the key issues concerning Armstrong' view about the problem of universals, the nature of states of affairs, the ontological ground of possibility, nomic necessity, and dispositions, the truthmaker theory, and the theory of mind. This volume aims to celebrate Armstrong’s memory bringing new understanding, and hopefully stimulating more work, on his philosophy, with the conviction that it constitutes an invaluable heritage for contemporary research in metaphysics.
