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This monograph presents new ideas in nomic truth approximation. It
features original and revised papers from a (formal) philosopher of
science who has studied the concept for more than 35 years. Over
the course of time, the author's initial ideas evolved. He
discovered a way to generalize his first theory of nomic truth
approximation, viz. by dropping an unnecessarily strong assumption.
In particular, he first believed to have to assume that theories
were maximally specific in the sense that they did not only exclude
certain conceptual possibilities, but also that all non-excluded
possibilities were in fact claimed to be nomically possible. Now,
he argues that the exclusion claim alone, or for that matter the
inclusion claim alone, is sufficient to motivate the formal
definition of being closer to the nomic truth. The papers collected
here detail this generalized view of nomic truthlikeness or
verisimilitude. Besides this, the book presents, in adapted form,
the relation with several other topics, such as, domain revision,
aesthetic progress, abduction, inference to the best explanation,
pragmatic aspects, probabilistic methods, belief revision and
epistemological positions, notably constructive realism. Overall,
the volume presents profound insight into nomic truth
approximation. This idea seeks to determine how one theory can be
closer to, or more similar to, the truth about what is nomically,
e.g. physically, chemically, biologically, possible than another
theory. As a result, it represents the ultimate goal of theory
oriented empirical science. Theo Kuipers is the author of Studies
in Inductive Probability and Rational Expectation (1978), From
Instrumentalism to Constructive Realism (2000) and Structures in
Science (2001). He is the volume-editor of the Handbook on General
Philosophy of Science (2007). In 2005 there appeared two volumes of
Essays in Debate with Theo Kuipers, entitled Confirmation,
Empirical Progress, and Truth Approximation and Cognitive
Structures in Scientific Inquiry.
3 in philosophy, and therefore in metaphilosophy, cannot be based
on rules that avoid spending time on pseudo-problems. Of course,
this implies that, if one succeeds in demonstrating convincingly
the pseudo-character of a problem by giving its 'solution', the
time spent on it need not be seen as wasted. We conclude this
section with a brief statement of the criteria for concept
explication as they have been formulated in several places by
Carnap, Hempel and Stegmiiller. Hempel's account ( 13J, Chapter 1)
is still very adequate for a detailed introduction. The process of
explication starts with the identification of one or more vague
and, perhaps, ambiguous concepts, the so-called explicanda. Next,
one tries to disentangle the ambiguities. This, however, need not
be possible at once. Ultimately the explicanda are to be replaced
(not necessarily one by one) by certain counterparts, the so-called
explicata, which have to conform to four requirements. They have to
be as precise as possible and as simple as possible. In addition,
they have to be useful in the sense that they give rise to the
formulation of theories and the solution of problems. The three
requirements of preciseness, simplicity and usefulness. have of
course to be pursued in all concept formation.
Surprisingly, modified versions of the confirmation theory (Carnap
and Hempel) and truth approximation theory (Popper) turn out to be
smoothly sythesizable. The glue between the two appears to be the
instrumentalist methodology, rather than that of the
falsificationalist. The instrumentalist methodology, used in the
separate, comparative evaluation of theories in terms of their
successes and problems (hence, even if already falsified), provides
in theory and practice the straight road to short-term empirical
progress in science ( a la Laudan). It is also argued that such
progress is also functional for all kinds of truth approximation:
observational, referential, and theoretical. This sheds new light
on the long-term dynamics of science and hence on the relation
between the main epistemological positions, viz., instrumentalism
(Toulmin, Laudan), constructive empiricism (Van Fraassen),
referential realism (Hacking, Cartwright), and theory realism of a
non-essentialist nature (constructive realism a la Popper).
Readership: Open minded philosophers and scientists. The book
explains and justifies the scientist's intuition that the debate
among philosophers about instrumentalism and realism has almost no
practical consequences.
Although there is an abundance of highly specialized monographs,
learned collections and general introductions to the philosophy of
science, only a few 25 years. synthetic monographs and advanced
textbooks have appeared in the last The philosophy of science seems
to have lost its self-confidence. The main reason for such a loss
is that the traditional analytical, logical-empiricist approaches
to the philosophy of science had to make a number of concessions,
especially in response to the work of Popper, Kuhn and Lakatos.
With Structures in Science I intend to present both a synthetic
mono graph and an advanced textbook that accommodates and
integrates the insight of these philosophers, in what I like to
call a neo-classical approach. The resulting monograph elaborates
several important topics from one or more perspectives, by
distinguishing various kinds of research programs, and various ways
of explaining and reducing laws and concepts, and by summarizing an
integrated explication (presented in From Instrumentalism to
Constructive Realism, ICR) of the notions of confirmation,
empirical progress and truth approximation.
The philosophy of science has lost its self-confidence, witness the
lack of advanced textbooks in contrast to the abundance of
elementary textbooks. Structures in Science is an advanced textbook
that explicates, updates, accommodates, and integrates the best
insights of logical-empiricism and its main critics. This
neo-classical approach' aims at providing heuristic patterns for
research. The book introduces four ideal types of research programs
(descriptive, explanatory, design, and explicative) and reanimates
the distinction between observational laws and proper theories. It
explicates various patterns of explanation by subsumption and
specification as well as structures in reductive and other types of
interlevel research. Its analysis of theory evaluation leads to new
characterizations of confirmation, empirical progress, and
pseudoscience. Partial analogies between progress in nomological
research (i.e. observational, referential, and theoretical truth
approximation, presented in detail in From Instrumentalism to
Constructive Realism, 2000) and progress in explicative and design
research emerge. Finally, special chapters are devoted to design
research programs, computational philosophy of science, the
structuralist approach to theories, and research ethics.
Surprisingly, modified versions of the confirmation theory (Carnap
and Hempel) and truth approximation theory (Popper) turn out to be
smoothly sythesizable. The glue between the two appears to be the
instrumentalist methodology, rather than that of the
falsificationalist. The instrumentalist methodology, used in the
separate, comparative evaluation of theories in terms of their
successes and problems (hence, even if already falsified), provides
in theory and practice the straight road to short-term empirical
progress in science ( A la Laudan). It is also argued that such
progress is also functional for all kinds of truth approximation:
observational, referential, and theoretical. This sheds new light
on the long-term dynamics of science and hence on the relation
between the main epistemological positions, viz., instrumentalism
(Toulmin, Laudan), constructive empiricism (Van Fraassen),
referential realism (Hacking, Cartwright), and theory realism of a
non-essentialist nature (constructive realism A la Popper).
Readership: Open minded philosophers and scientists. The book
explains and justifies the scientist's intuition that the debate
among philosophers about instrumentalism and realism has almost no
practical consequences.
Scientists use concepts and principles that are partly specific for
their subject matter, but they also share part of them with
colleagues working in different fields. Compare the biological
notion of a 'natural kind' with the general notion of
'confirmation' of a hypothesis by certain evidence. Or compare the
physical principle of the 'conservation of energy' and the general
principle of 'the unity of science'. Scientists agree that all such
notions and principles aren't as crystal clear as one might wish.
An important task of the philosophy of the special sciences, such
as philosophy of physics, of biology and of economics, to mention
only a few of the many flourishing examples, is the clarification
of such subject specific concepts and principles. Similarly, an
important task of 'general' philosophy of science is the
clarification of concepts like 'confirmation' and principles like
'the unity of science'. It is evident that clarfication of concepts
and principles only makes sense if one tries to do justice, as much
as possible, to the actual use of these notions by scientists,
without however following this use slavishly. That is, occasionally
a philosopher may have good reasons for suggesting to scientists
that they should deviate from a standard use. Frequently, this
amounts to a plea for differentiation in order to stop debates at
cross-purposes due to the conflation of different meanings.
While the special volumes of the series of Handbooks of the
Philosophy of Science address topics relative to a specific
discipline, this general volume deals with focal issues of a
general nature.
After an editorial introduction about the dominant method of
clarifying concepts and principles in philosophy of science, called
explication, the first five chapters deal with the following
subjects. Laws, theories, and research programs as units of
empirical knowledge (Theo Kuipers), various past and contemporary
perspectives on explanation (Stathis Psillos), the evaluation of
theories in terms of their virtues (Ilkka Niiniluto), and the role
of experiments in the natural sciences, notably physics and biology
(Allan Franklin), and their role in the social sciences, notably
economics (Wenceslao Gonzalez).
In the subsequent three chapters there is even more attention to
various positions and methods that philosophers of science and
scientists may favor: ontological, epistemological, and
methodological positions (James Ladyman), reduction, integration,
and the unity of science as aims in the sciences and the humanities
(William Bechtel and Andrew Hamilton), and logical, historical and
computational approaches to the philosophy of science (Atocha
Aliseda and Donald Gillies).
The volume concludes with the much debated question of demarcating
science from nonscience (Martin Mahner) and the rich
European-American history of the philosophy of science in the 20th
century (Friedrich Stadler).
- Comprehensive coverage of the philosophy of science written by
leading philosophers in this field
- Clear style of writing for an interdisciplinary audience
- No specific pre-knowledge required
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