DOCSLIB.ORG

Scientific Representation

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Scientific Representation Metascience (2011) 20:417–442 DOI 10.1007/s11016-010-9465-5 BOOK SYMPOSIUM Scientific representation: A long journey from pragmatics to pragmatics Bas C. van Fraassen: Scientific representation: Paradoxes of perspective. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2008, xiv+408pp, £35.00 HB James Ladyman • Ota´vio Bueno • Mauricio Sua´rez • Bas C. van Fraassen Published online: 17 November 2010 Ó Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010 James Ladyman Once again, van Fraassen has given us an incredibly rich, learned and profound book that will be studied and argued about for decades to come. The book is about scientific representation, but from the perspective of Bas van Fraassen’s empiricism this means ‘‘representation of the empirical phenomena’’ (1). He is keen to distance himself from the empiricist tradition that would interpret the latter notion in terms of mental representation, and instead focuses his attention on mathematical and material representations, and one main form of representation in which he is interested is the representational aspect of measurement. Following and extending the line of argument that we find in the work of Poincare´ and Weyl among others, van Fraassen argues for the ‘‘essential indexical’’ (3) in science. This is a radical view that is at odds with the idea of objective inquiry that enables us to transcend our situation and describe the world independently of human beings, which is how many philosophers, especially scientific realists, see science. van Fraassen’s J. Ladyman (&) Department of Philosophy, University of Bristol, 9 Woodland Rd, Bristol BS8 1TB, UK e-mail: [email protected] O. Bueno (&) Department of Philosophy, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL 33124, USA e-mail: [email protected] M. Sua´rez (&) Department of Logic and Philosophy of Science, Complutense University of Madrid, 28040 Madrid, Spain e-mail: msuarez@filos.ucm.es B. C. van Fraassen (&) Philosophy Department, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94132, USA e-mail: [email protected] 123 418 Metascience (2011) 20:417–442 empiricist and antimetaphysical philosophy permeates his treatment of scientific representation and he repeatedly highlights those aspects of how we draw, describe and measure the phenomena that have to do with our relationship to both the latter and the representations themselves. He argues for subjectivity’s place in our understanding of science and denies that science can ever achieve a fully objective representation of the world. In the light of these observations, it is questionable whether the project of describing how scientific representation works can really be largely orthogonal to the realism/antirealism dispute as van Fraassen claims (3). Van Fraassen did a great deal to reinvigorate the scientific realism debate after the post-positivist repudiation of previously popular forms of instrumentalism. In a much-anthologised chapter of The Scientific Image, he defended the idea that the aim of science is ‘‘to save the phenomena’’. The latter were understood to be the same as the appearances, but there is an important innovation in his thought expressed by the distinction he now draws between the phenomena and the appearances, where the former are observable entities and the latter are the contents of observation or measurement outcomes (8). So, for example, the measurement of temperature (Chapter 5) is to be understood in terms of the distinction between the phenomena associated with heat and the appearances that are saved by scientific theories mapping to representations of the appearances in the form of experimen- tally determined values of temperature. As van Fraassen explains, the construction of appropriate appearances—thermometry—is a rich science in its own right. Here, he cites approvingly the work of Cartwright, Giere and others who have argued that scientific representation must be understood not only at the level of high theory but also in the local domains in which high theory is de-idealised and experimental phenomena are modelled in detail. The distinction between phenomena and appearances is the distinction between what is immediately manifest in experience, and the special kinds of experience that are constructed by scientific experimentation and then codified in the form of ‘‘measurement outcomes’’. Clearly, the appearances will be highly theory laden, as in the case of temperature previously mentioned, and in all the appearances of fundamental physics. Van Fraassen stresses that when a theory is said to ‘‘save the phenomena’’, what this usually means is ‘‘saving the appearances’’. The latter can naturally be understood in terms of structural relationships between representations because the appearances are usually in mathematical form. Consider the case of the planetary orbits and their theoretical representation in Copernicus’ model of the solar system (Chapter 12). Here, the phenomena are the orbits of the planets and the appearances are the perspectival measurements of the positions of particular heavenly bodies in the night sky. Hence, retrograde motion belongs merely to the appearances and is not a genuine phenomenon. Note however that while the phenomena are supposed to be observable, they are only manifest to us in the form of one or other set of appearances (the positions of points of light in the night sky on Earth seen with the naked eye or through a telescope, as opposed to the positions of lights in the night sky seen from the Moon). So are the phenomena inferred and theoretical (though perhaps not usually as much as the appearances)? Van Fraassen would, I think, say not because he insists that the phenomena are observable entities, events and processes. He denies that we can 123 Metascience (2011) 20:417–442 419 reduce the observation of a galloping horse to a series of mental representations with some characteristic content and structure, and then claim that the horse is inferred as the best explanation. Now of course nobody would deny that in our actual cognition the representation of a continuing entity that moves through space is not a matter of inference. It is in philosophical vein when we ask about the source of our knowledge of the horse and what limits there are to that knowledge that indirect or representative realism is tied to the choices we face among competing explanations of the world we see around us. Returning to the case of the night sky, the appearances were once interpreted in very different terms by people who had no inkling of the distinction between planets and stars. The interpretation of the appearances is up for grabs and is only stabilised as the result of sophisticated inference to orbits based on lots of data. What in principle is different between the case of the orbits and the measurements of them, and cells and how they look through a microscope or particle collisions and the tracks they cause in cloud chambers? Measurement outcomes in general ‘‘show not how the phenomena are but how they look’’. However, if how they are must be inferred from how they look, then ultimately that they are must also be so inferred. This may not go for charging horses, but it surely does for the Moon and public objects like gases such as methane, which we can smell, electromagnetic fields, which we can see in the form of sparks and lightning, and so on. Tracks in particle chambers and images in microscopes are public objects, but van Fraassen classifies them as akin to mirages or rainbows, namely as public images. Phenomenologically, he is correct but the objection I have in mind is that the public objects he takes to be part of the realm of the phenomena are as much inferred as theoretical objects. I think we have good reason to believe that the inferences in the case of everyday objects are ones that we are evolutionarily predisposed to make as we are stimulated by the senses in the course of our development. Furthermore, if someone spends the daily life in a physics laboratory, it is unclear what should we count as the everyday things around him or her. Of course, van Fraassen has in the past set great store in the distinction between the unobservable and the merely unobserved, in the sense that horses galloping too far away to see are nonetheless in the realm of the phenomena. His view in the present work is much the same for the phenomena include all the observable entities—events, objects, processes—that there are, have been, or will be, whether observed or measured or not (307, his emphasis). I have argued that the modal status of the observable is a problem for van Fraassen’s empiricism, but whether or not that is correct, it is worth considering also whether his account of scientific representation has aporia related to modality. Van Fraassen argues that represen- tation must be understood contextually and pragmatically in terms of the use or function it has for someone (23). It seems then that he rules out the naturalisation of representation in evolutionary theory and biology more generally. On this view, RNA and DNA do not represent anything unless used by a genetic engineer to do so, and the state of the visual cortex per se does not represent the environment. This is mysterious, for we are told nothing about how human subjects manage to introduce representation out of nowhere. It is also implausible to make representation and subjectivity all-or-nothing and to confine them to human beings. I see no reason to 123 420 Metascience (2011) 20:417–442 deny that animals’ senses represent their environments to them. Representation may concern ‘‘aboutness’’ but if the processing in the visual cortex is not about anything, then why suppose that my words are? In van Fraassen’s view, intentionality seems to be an all-or-nothing matter of which scientific understanding is impossible.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Ois Laruelle
    Frans;ois Laruelle --- and collaborators --- Dictio nary of Non-Philosophy -- translated by Taylor Adkins I Univocal -- Fran\:ois Laruelle ------ and collaborators -----­ To ny Brachet. Gilbert Kieffer, Laurent Leroy, Da niel Nicolet, Anne-Fran�oise Schmid, Serge Valdinoci Dictio nary of Non-Philosophy translated by Taylor Adkins I Univocal ---- DJCT!ONNAIREDE LA NON-PHILOSOPH!Eby Fran�ois Laruelle ©Editions Kime, 1998 Translated by Taylor Adkins as Dictionary ofNon-Philosophy First Edition Minneapolis©2013, Univocal Publishing Published by Univocal 123 North 3rd Street, #202 Minneapolis, MN 55401 No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including phorocopying, recording or any other information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Thanks to John David Ebert and Ben Woodard Designed & Printed by Jason Wagner Distributed by the University of Minnesota Press ISBN 9781937561130 Library of Congress Control Number 2013939530 TA BLE OF CONTENTS Translator's Introduction .......................................... .....................9 Preface to the English Language Edition...................... ................. 15 Preface .........................................................................................19 Theory of the Non-Philosophical Dictionary....................... .......23 Auto-position .......................... .....................................................39 Being-in-One (Being-according-to-the-One)...............................
    [Show full text]
  • Empiricism, Stances, and the Problem of Voluntarism
    Swarthmore College Works Philosophy Faculty Works Philosophy 1-1-2011 Empiricism, Stances, And The Problem Of Voluntarism Peter Baumann Swarthmore College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://works.swarthmore.edu/fac-philosophy Part of the Philosophy Commons Let us know how access to these works benefits ouy Recommended Citation Peter Baumann. (2011). "Empiricism, Stances, And The Problem Of Voluntarism". Synthese. Volume 178, Issue 1. 27-36. DOI: 10.1007/s11229-009-9519-7 https://works.swarthmore.edu/fac-philosophy/13 This work is brought to you for free by Swarthmore College Libraries' Works. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Faculty Works by an authorized administrator of Works. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Empiricism, Stances and the Problem of Voluntarism Peter Baumann Synthese 178, 2011, 207-224 Empiricism can be very roughly characterized as the view that our knowledge about the world is based on sensory experience. Our knowledge about the world is "based" on sensory experience in the sense that we could not know what we know without relying on sense experience. This leaves open the possibility that sense experience is only necessary but not sufficient for the knowledge based upon it1-as long as the non-empirical elements are not themselves sufficient for the relevant piece of knowledge.2 The basing relation is not just a genetic one but also a justificatory one: Sense experience does not only lead to beliefs which happen to count as knowledge but also qualifies them as knowledge. In his important book The Empirical Stance Bas van Fraassen characterizes traditional empiricism at one point in a more negative way-as involving the rejection of "metaphysical" explanations which proceed by postulating the existence of something not 1 "But although all our cognition commences with experience, yet it does not on that account all arise from experience." (Kant, CpR, B1).
    [Show full text]
  • Reply by Jean Bricmont and Alan Sokal
    Reply to Turnbull Krips Dusek and Fuller For Metascience Jean Bricmont Institut de Physique Theorique Universite Catholique de Louvain chemin du Cyclotron B LouvainlaNeuve BELGIUM Internet BRICMONTFYMAUCLACBE Telephone Fax Alan Sokal Department of Physics New York University Washington Place New York NY USA Internet SOKALNYUEDU Telephone Fax February Biographical Note Jean Bricmont is professor of theoretical physics at the University of Louvain Belgium Alan Sokal is professor of physics at New York University Introduction 1 In the preface to the second edition of Intel lectual Impostures we wrote that the criticisms of our b o ok can b e divided roughly into four types A very few reviewers discuss what we wrote and try to refute it Other commentators raise ob jections often p erfectly valid ones to ideas that are not in fact ours and that we may have expressly rejected in the b o ok while attributing them to us implicitly or explicitly Yet a third group of critics pretend to discuss our b o ok while actually doing something completely dierent for example attacking our p ersonalities our alleged motivations for writing the b o ok or the failings of scientists in general And nally some reviewers agree with us but think that we do not go far enough I I p xv The comments by Turnbull and Dusek fall squarely into the second and third cat egories apart from o ccasional brief excursions into category while Krips and Fuller oer a mixture of the rst and second categories It would b e a hop eless task to address al l the issues
    [Show full text]
  • LD5655.V855 1993.C655.Pdf (11.60Mb)
    SCIENTIFIC DISCOURSE, SOCIOLOGICALT HEORY, AND THE STRUCTURE OF RHETORIC by James H. Collier Thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF SCIENCE in Science and Technology Studies APPROVED: Y— Joseph C. Pitt, Chair Aone ble EtaaT hone, Steve Fuller Elisworth Fuhrman April, 1993 Blacksburg, VA LD S635 VE5S , DaQa cose} aM’~ Scientific Discourse, Sociological Theory, and the Structure of Rhetoric James H. Collier Graduate Program in Science and Technology Studies Chair: Joseph C. Pitt (ABSTRACT) This thesis examines the rhetorical, analytical and critical efficacy of reflexivity and sociological theory as means for reconciling the normative and descriptive functions of the rhetoric of science. In attempting to define a separate research domain within Science Studies, rhetoric of science has borrowed Strong Program and constructivist principles and descriptions of scientific practice from the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge (SSK) as a basis for analyzing scientific discourse. While epistemological claims in the social sciences have been considered inherently self-referential and subject to reflexive analysis and critique, rhetoricians have generally taken these claims on face value and applied them to a treatment of scientific practice. Accordingly, rhetoricians have maintained a natural ontological attitude to sociological theories and descriptions supporting an understanding of scientific discourse as implicitly rhetorical. Recently, however, the concept of "rhetoric" in rhetoric of science has come under scrutiny. This thesis will connect arguments involving the relation of the "irreducibly social" nature of science, to a concept of scientific discourse as rhetorical "without remainder,” to the philosophical commitments of reflexive analysis.
    [Show full text]
  • Three Positivist Disputes in the 1960S
    JOURNAL FOR THE HISTORY OF ANALYTICAL PHILOSOPHY THREE POSITIVIST DISPUTES IN THE 1960S VOLUME 6, NUMBER 8 CARL-GörAN HEIDEGREN EDITOR IN CHIEF MARCUS ROSSBERG, UnIVERSITY OF CONNECTICUT The West German positivist dispute in the 1960s is well known EDITORIAL BOARD and thoroughly studied. At about the same time positivist dis- ANNALISA COLIVA, UC IRVINE putes also took place in two Scandinavian countries: one in Nor- HENRY JACKMAN, YORK UnIVERSITY way and one in Sweden. What did the front lines in the debate KEVIN C. KLEMENt, UnIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS look like in the three countries? What was the outcome of the dif- CONSUELO PRETI, THE COLLEGE OF NEW JERSEY ferent disputes? The main focus in the article is on the Swedish ANTHONY SKELTON, WESTERN UnIVERSITY case, but some comparative perspectives relating to the three MARK TEXTOR, KING’S COLLEGE LonDON disputes will also be presented. The Swedish positivist dispute AUDREY YAP, UnIVERSITY OF VICTORIA originated with Gerard Radnitzky’s doctoral dissertation in the- RICHARD ZACH, UnIVERSITY OF CALGARY ory of science, defended at the University of Gothenburg in May 1968, Contemporary Schools of Metascience (2 volumes). The dis- EDITOR FOR SPECIAL ISSUES sertation caused a stir of controversy. It meant a challenge to the SANDRA LaPOINte, MCMASTER UnIVERSITY Swedish philsophical establishment because it leaned heavily on continental philosophers such as Karl-Otto Apel and Jürgen REVIEW EDITORS Habermas, who at the time were more or less unknown in Swe- SEAN MORRIS, METROPOLITAN STATE UnIVERSITY OF DenVER den. The controversy was continuated in the following years, SANFORD SHIEH, WESLEYAN UnIVERSITY most notably in the leftist journal Häften för kritiska studier (Note- DESIGN AND LAYOUT books for Critical Studies).
    [Show full text]
  • A History of Soviet Cybernetics. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2002
    REVIEWS THE RISE OF CYBERNEWSPEAK Slava Gerovitch, From Newspeak to Cyberspeak: A History of Soviet Cybernetics. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2002. Pp. xiv + 369. £25.95, US$37.95 HB. By Andrew Pickering The growing interest in the history of cybernetics has so far largely focused on its early days in the US, the 1940s and 1950s: Norbert Wiener, Claude Shannon, Warren McCulloch, the Macy conferences. That cybernetics enjoyed more success institutionally on the other side of the Iron Curtain is well known, but Slava Gerovitch’s book is the first to tell us at any length about how that occurred, covering the decades from the 1950s to the 1970s. It is a valuable addition to the literature. Gerovitch distinguishes three phases in the history of Soviet cyber- netics. In the early 1950s, towards the end of the Stalinist era, cybernetics was trashed as “An American Pseudo-Science” and “cyberneticians were branded ‘semanticist-cannibals’ ” (p. 94 – what a splendid insult!). This despite the fact that a plausible ancestry for cybernetics could readily be constructed from the work of Soviet scientists and mathematicians, and that almost nothing about cybernetics was then known in the Soviet Union. Gerovitch argues that this was not the result of any centrally organised campaign, but rather the upshot of an almost randomly generated ritual of ideological denunciation of a type that was ubiquitous in the period. All sorts of sciences were liable to be condemned for their inconsistency with the official philosophy of dialectical materialism, condemnations always articulated in the formulaic terms that Gerovitch calls Newspeak – ‘mech- anist’, ‘idealist’, ‘formalist’, etc.
    [Show full text]
  • A Scientometric Analysis
    University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal) Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln Summer 5-3-2021 RESEARCH OUTPUT ON LEPROSY DURING THE YEAR OF 2010-2020: A SCIENTOMETRIC ANALYSIS Victoria P [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac Part of the Library and Information Science Commons P, Victoria, "RESEARCH OUTPUT ON LEPROSY DURING THE YEAR OF 2010-2020: A SCIENTOMETRIC ANALYSIS" (2021). Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal). 5604. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac/5604 RESEARCH OUTPUT ON LEPROSY DURING THE YEAR OF 2010-2020: A SCIENTOMETRIC ANALYSIS VICTORIA. P1 Ph.D. Research Scholar, DLIS, Periyar University, Salem-11. E-mail: [email protected] Dr.P.GOMATHI2 Assistant Professor, DLIS Periyar University, Salem-11 E-mail: [email protected] ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to measure the number of contributions and highlight the contributions made by the researchers in the field of leprosy and published on the Web of Science database during 2010-2020 using scientometric analysis. Data were interpreted by using software such as Bibexcel, Vosviewer, and tabulated using MS Excel. The results indicated that 4544 papers were published during 2010 - 2020 and the highest number of publications 456 (10.03%) was produced in 2020. The trends in multi-authored papers have tremendously increased (89.28%) compared to (10.72%) single-authored papers. The relative growth rate (3.13) and degree of collaboration (0.89) is noted significantly and the highest no of papers (12.50%) was contributed by the collaboration of four authors and source wise most of the records were published an article 3063.
    [Show full text]
  • Unit 1 Introduction to Contemporary Philosophy of Science
    UNIT 1 INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE Contents 1.0 Objectives 1.1 Introduction 1.2 Meaning of Science 1.3 Science and Explanation 1.4 Laws and Theories 1.5 Methods 1.6 Newton’s Concept of Scientific Method 1.7 Let Us Sum Up 1.8 Key Words 1.9 Further Readings and References 1.10 Answers to Check Your Progress 1.0 OBJECTIVES This unit introduces you to the significance of philosophy of science and its relation to science. The manner in which science differs from philosophy of science is another issue with which you must become familiar. As science progresses philosophy of science also progresses. Therefore an understanding of contemporary philosophy of science helps you to assess and evaluate contemporary science. While doing so emphasis is laid on physics since physics and cosmology are interrelated. When you are through this unit, you will be in a position to discover the hidden elements of science and critically evaluate various claims made by science 1.1 INTRODUCTION 1 It is difficult to locate exactly the origin of philosophy of science and to decide whether in antiquity or in modern era there was anything like philosophy of science either in the writings of philosophers or in the writings of scientists. This observation is essential because none of those philosophers who grappled with epistemological and metaphysical issues could afford to neglect the external world. Though some problems were common to philosophers and scientists, not all are philosophers of science. In the history of western philosophy Hume was the first philosopher to criticize certain aspects of science.
    [Show full text]
  • EHR AC Slides Improving Openness and Reproducibility of Scientific
    Improving Openness and Reproducibility of Scientific Research Brian Nosek University of Virginia -- Center for Open Science http://briannosek.com/ -- http://cos.io/ New Problems? Low power Overabundance of positive results Ignoring null results Questionable research practices Lack of replication Limitations of NHST Sterling, 1959; Cohen, 1962; Lykken, 1968; Tukey, 1969; Greenwald, 1975; Meehl, 1978; Rosenthal, 1979 New Solutions? Transparency Confirmatory v. Exploratory Replication Sterling, 1959; Cohen, 1962; Lykken, 1968; Tukey, 1969; Greenwald, 1975; Meehl, 1978; Rosenthal, 1979 Incentives for individual success are focused on getting it published, not getting it right Challenges 1. Perceived norms (Anderson, Martinson, & DeVries, 2007) Norms Counternorms Communality Secrecy Open sharing Closed Norms Counternorms Communality Secrecy Open sharing Closed Universalism Particularlism Evaluate research on own merit Evaluate research by reputation Norms Counternorms Communality Secrecy Open sharing Closed Universalism Particularlism Evaluate research on own merit Evaluate research by reputation Disinterestedness Self-interestedness Motivated by knowledge and discovery Treat science as a competition Norms Counternorms Communality Secrecy Open sharing Closed Universalism Particularlism Evaluate research on own merit Evaluate research by reputation Disinterestedness Self-interestedness Motivated by knowledge and discovery Treat science as a competition Organized skepticism Organized dogmatism Consider all new evidence, even Invest career promoting
    [Show full text]
  • Litigation Science After the Knowledge Crisis
    42705-crn_106-3 Sheet No. 4 Side A 03/25/2021 10:13:22 \\jciprod01\productn\C\CRN\106-3\CRN302.txt unknown Seq: 1 25-MAR-21 9:54 LITIGATION SCIENCE AFTER THE KNOWLEDGE CRISIS Edith Beerdsen† The knowledge crisis that has been causing turmoil in the social sciences for the past few years represents a fundamen- tal shift in scientists’ understanding of what it takes to create reliable science. This crisis, now known as the Replication Crisis, has thrown the spotlight on research practices that undermine the reliability of research results in ways that are typically invisible and cannot be remedied or made visible after the fact. There is ample reason to believe that the defects of method uncovered in the course of the Replication Crisis are at least as pervasive in litigation science as they are in aca- demic science. Yet the legal profession has failed to recognize and address them. This Article is the first to address the broad implications of the Replication Crisis for the production of scientific knowl- edge in a civil-litigation context. Drawing on insights from the Crisis, it argues that current procedural practice is simply in- capable of providing a court with the information it needs to make an accurate assessment of the reliability of scientific evidence. The Article identifies a number of core principles, drawn from the response of academic science to the Replica- tion Crisis, that can guide reforms to the treatment of scientific evidence in civil litigation. It argues that shoring up the courts’ capacity to evaluate scientific evidence requires a rethinking of 42705-crn_106-3 Sheet No.
    [Show full text]
  • The Art of Metascience; Or, What Should a Psychological Theory Be?
    First published in Towards Unification in Psychology, J. R. Royce (ed.), 1970. Extract, pp. 54–103. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. The Art of Metascience; or, What Should a Psychological Theory Be? Introduction In order not to lay false claims upon your attention, let me confess at once that the subtitle of this paper is intended more as a stimulus to curiosity than as a serious synopsis of the subject here to be addressed. I shall indeed be concerned at considerable length with the methodological character of psychological theories, but my prescriptions will focus upon process rather than product. Specifically, I shall offer some detailed judgments on how theorizing must be done—or, more precisely, what sorts of metatheorizing must accompany it—if the enterprise is to make a genuine contribution to science; and while on first impression these may seem like no more than the standard broad-spectrum abstractions of one who has nothing specific to say, I assure you that they envision realizable operations which, if practiced, would have a profound effect on our conceptual efficiency as psychologists. There are at least two formal dimensions along which discussions of psycho- logical theory can vary. One is level of abstraction, or substantivity of concern, with attention to specific extant theories (e.g. pointing out an inconsistency or clarifying an ambiguity in John Smiths’ theory of binocular psychokinesis) at one extreme, and philosophy-of-science type concerns for the nature and functioning of idealized theories in general, detached from any real-life instances, at the other. Distinct from this, though not wholly orthogonal to it, is a second dimension of metatheory which might be called acuity or penetration, and which concerns the degree to which the discussion makes a serious, intellectually responsible attempt to further our understanding of the matter with which it deals.
    [Show full text]
  • RE-CONCEPTUALISING EMPIRICISM Bas C. Van Fraassen, the Empirical Stance. New Haven
    REVIEWS RE-CONCEPTUALISING EMPIRICISM Bas C. van Fraassen, The Empirical Stance. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002. Pp. xix + 282. US$30.00 HB. By Otávio Bueno Empiricism has a complex and intricate history. It is a multifarious tradi- tion that, for centuries, has been reformulated, reshaped, and re-invented. It may seem that there is little in common between the way in which Sextus Empiricus, Ockham, Locke, Reichenbach and Sartre were all empiricists. But often to be part of a tradition is to devise strategies to respond and re-conceptualise that tradition, while still preserving crucial features of the latter. Ultimately, it’s this process of re-examination and change that allows one to identify a tradition through time, despite the fuzziness that will always remain. For many years, Bas van Fraassen has been developing a novel and ingenious framework to defend empiricism. In his hands, empiricism has certainly changed. In The Scientific Image (Oxford, 1980), constructive empiricism was first formulated as a claim about the aim of science (empi- rical adequacy rather than truth), along with a new theory of the pragmatics of explanation, the formulation of the modal interpretation of probability, and a thorough critical assessment of scientific realism (pointing out limits to the inference to the best explanation and using the underdetermination argument in ingenious ways). But constructive empiricism would be a much less interesting view if it didn’t also provide a framework to understand particular aspects of science. To address this need, and to develop the view further, are the main goals of van Fraassen’s Laws and Symmetry (Oxford, 1989) and Quantum Mechanics: An Empiricist View (Oxford, 1991).
    [Show full text]