Questions tagged [philosophy-of-science]
for applied philosophical questions about the study of science, the pursuit of scientific knowledge, and the scientific method
198
questions with no upvoted or accepted answers
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Way to find a middle ground between functionalism and "panpsychism"?
Scientifically, given that we are just pieces of universe (earth), then parts of the universe can experience phenomenal consciousness.
"Panpsychism" says that therefore phenomenality must be ...
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172
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Have the indispensability arguments been examined for probability theory?
Indispensability arguments are widely known in the philosophy of mathematics, the idea being (roughly) that we should commit to the existence of those mathematical entities that are indispensable for ...
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46
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Are there any philosophers after Kant but before Peirce that developed the Kantian concept of schema further?
I was reading Peirce's writings on schemata and I was wondering if there was any other known philosopher before him who tried to use or extend schemata in his work.
Are there any philosophers after ...
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Some questions on causality and modern science
Note: I'm translating the vocabulary from Spanish so there may be some erroneous terms. If so, please edit them.
In Causality: the place of the causal principle in modern science by Mario Bunge, the ...
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Explanation vs. prediction in statistics and in the philosophy of science?
In the realm of statistics and machine learning, a lot of discussion has arisen recently around the difference between explaining and predicting: That the two are not the same, and that the difference ...
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Name of Principle Giving Precedence to a More General Hypothesis
As far as I know, there is a principle that gives precedence to a theory that is more general than a more specific one, i.e the more general one is more acceptable.
What is the name of that principle?
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131
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Looking for a book to compliment Zammito and Mohanty in understanding the ethos of post positivistic realism
There are two books which I consider to be indispensable to an understanding of
contemporary western culture’s post-truth/alternative facts (scientific and cultural post modernism/structuralism/...
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262
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In which sense does Kuhn acknowledge the importance of metaphors in science?
Kuhn, in Metaphors and Through [1993], claims:
“Metaphors play an essential role in establishing links between
scientific language and the world. Those links are not, however, given
once and ...
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131
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Is 't Hooft cellular automaton compatible with Floridi's Informational (Structural) Realism?
Informational (Structural) Realism (by Luciano Floridi) relates to digital physics ideas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_physics)
As Floridi himself says in one of his articles (http://philsci-...
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Is There a World That Exactly Mimics Our Own?
If parallel universes do indeed exist and if we are just viewing one tiny part of reality, is it possible that in an alternate universe there would appear an exact replica of our world?
Note: I ...
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Does the unobserved past exist in a super position
Does the unobserved past exist in a super position in the sense of quantum mechanics? Has anyone seen this question asked before? If the question is meaningful, what answer seems most likely. If the ...
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51
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Can an event that has a beginning be metaphysically necessary?
Suppose an extremely complex event occurs that is meaningful but extremely improbable under current physical laws.
Suppose then, that a theist says, “God explains this better for otherwise it is very ...
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53
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The naive, formal, and critical phases of a scientific theory
A long time ago, I read something about three stages in the development of a scientific or mathematical theory, namely the naive, the formal, and the critical phase. This appeared very natural to me, ...
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2
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132
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Lakatos's influence on contemporary philosophy of science
Lakatos introduced the notion of scientific research programmes, consisting of a hard core (basic assumptions of a theory) and a protective belt (auxiliary hypotheses that can be modified to protect ...
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Are there any sources linking Schopenhauerian metaphysics (will as thing-in-itself) with our contemporary understanding of physics?
I'm especially interested if there are any attempts at reconciling Schopenhauer's metaphysical will with the seeming indeterministic nature of quantum physics. Thank you.
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Are information, matter and energy improper concepts?
In Proper and Improper concepts (1927) Carnap argued for the distinction between proper concepts (the ones that are explicitly defined)
”It is essential to a proper concept that for any object it is ...
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Is analytic philsophy the most associated with "armchair" knowledge and is that subject to change?
*By armchair I mean knowledge one can gain by not going out into the world very far. And by my title I get the impression (perhaps mistakenly) that if armchair knowledge was lessened, so too would ...
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Are questions truth-apt; what is the use of assigning questions a truth-value?
Is John black (or white)?
Yes he is black.
No he is not (black).
I don’t see how can the question be truth-apt and what use is there in assigning (or even being able to assign) a truth-value to the ...
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117
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Brute facts and the burden of proof
I'm trying my best to understand Della Rocca's article "PSR", which I believe convincingly shows that that one cannot reasonably hold that some facts are brute while others are not without a ...
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132
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What is Aristotle's view of plant generation?
In Book 1 of On the Generation of Animals, Aristotle gives his view of plant generation.
In Book 1.1, Aristotle writes:
But all those creatures which do not move, as the testacea and animals that ...
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118
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What Richard Rorty understands by science?
I just read Philosophy and social hope, a collection of essays by Richard Rorty. Except for the excess of academicism, I can say I’m definitely inspired by it and happy with the discussions it threw ...
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71
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Non-traditional (individuals = graph edges) views on societies
In his book Large graphs and graph limits, mathematician and Abel prize winner László Lovász says on page 4:
We can say that the whole universe is a single (really huge, possibly
infinite) network, ...
2
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60
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Question from a high school student about role of natural sciences?
I am doing my essay on natural sciences methodology therefore, I wanted to give the example how according to the scientific method, new valid evidence could add to or correct previous knowledge. ...
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153
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Material theory of induction: why not abandon induction altogether?
John Norton defends a material theory of induction, based on the idea that universal inference schemes cannot account for the strength of inductive inferences. Whether a specific induction is good or ...
- 253
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96
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What's the role of logic in logical positivism?
I'm reading up on a bit of the ideas of logical positivism. It seems that the main components were the distinction of synthetic and analytic statements, and the verification principle. Without giving ...
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2
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340
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Relationism, Substantivalism, and Simultaneity?
I've been breaking my head open lately over special relativity and its conception of spacetime's dynamical as well as kinematical features. One thing that has stuck in my head is that of whether the ...
2
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3
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238
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Is "Societal Science" impossible?
Is "Societal Science" impossible?
Social science one can understand as dealing with more concrete groups, but to suggest that someone can study and predict societies sounds absurd. Also, it seems ...
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311
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Philosophy of Physics/Mathematics PhD with Mathematics/Physics undergrad (no philosophy undergrad)
I've found that I'm really interested in some research in the philosophy of mathematics and physics that's currently happening at various institutions. However, I don't have much experience in ...
- 121
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63
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Philosophical way to look at classical interpretation of probability
I was thinking about the classical interpretation of probability. They make the assumption that determinism obtains in the natural world. Hence, probability is epistemic. Can I see that as a form of ...
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136
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Kierkegaard and Natural Sciences
Is there any overlap in Kierkegaard's work and Philosophy of Science? If my memory is not misleading, Søren's journals had plenty of mathematical and scientific examples, but used for the most part to ...
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99
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is perceptual / observational incommensurability equivalent to ontological incommensurability?
perceptual/observational—observational evidence cannot provide a common basis for theory comparison, since perceptual experience is theory-dependent
Kuhn expresses or builds on the idea that ...
- 883
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205
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Philosophy of Quantum Mechanics - Argument explanation
I would be grateful if someone could explain me this argument from Philosophy of Physics in plain English. I'm not sure how Albert arrives at his conclusion and I lack the mathematical skills to ...
- 141
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62
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Arguments in scientific discussion and questioning administration on decision making
While we may have a no-holds barred attitude to prove a point in a scientific deliberation, we have to be little more responsible while questioning the decision making of an administration (assuming ...
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119
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Why didn't Newton pursue philosophy?
Why didn't he pursue philosophy in the same way Leibniz did, many "natural philosophers" during that time often delved into many fields since it wasn't really required to specialize yet, but it seems ...
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140
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Philosophy and Reading: Towards Math, and Physics
I was reading a book about learning philosophy for beginners called
Introduction to Philosophy Classical and Contemporary Readings Edited by John Perry, Michael Bratman, John Martin Fischer
It says ...
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342
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Can you list other Collingwood's Absolute Presuppositions?
Robin G. Collingwood's posited the existence of absolute presuppositions (AS). As a reminder, presuppositions are for Collingwood assumptions and guiding precepts that are closed to further analysis ...
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45
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history of philosophy side-by-side with science and art
Do you know any books which study the history of western philosophy
side-by-side with:
history of mathematics,
or history of physics,
or history of art?
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63
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What is Malebranche's explanation for the source of human error?
An omnibenevolent God would not deceive us or cause us to be in error, thus the gifts from cannot be the source of error. Rather sin confuses our faculties and prevents us from using them as they ...
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62
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What was Putnam's position re truth and/or word/world relationship at the time of his death.
The formidable philosopher of science and mathematics, Hillary Putnam, died last year, at 89, shortly [relatively] after his retirement. His was an intellectually peripatetic career. Though he ...
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Does Every Logic Have the Potential for Violent Measurement?
Measurement, in the broad sense, involves useful abstractions and logical applicability that allow us to survey environmental data with extreme precision and prediction. The tools or instruments used ...
- 1,855
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149
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How can rational choice theory be explanatory?
In his work, John Harsanyi appears to have taken issue with classical social theorists' account of social phenomena. For example, he criticized Max Weber's typological approach on the grounds, "If we ...
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105
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field concept - historical and contemporay perspectives?
Can someone give me some reference (or insight) on the development of the field concept in physics.
In particularly, the period between 17th century Newton/Leibniz notion of force/action-at-distance ...
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Materialist Epistemology?
In a normal theory of knowledge, a person's phenomenal consciousness is taken as basic. Thus, the sciences are an attempt at explaining the "world" that affects phenomenal consciousness. Excising ...
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79
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Is the Anglo-Analytical tradition founded on rejecting the principle of sufficient reason?
In this blog-post on a criticism of Nagels book Mind & Cosmos the author makes the assertion:
This is no surprise because analytical philosophy was founded in the act of rejecting PSR. Our ...
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1
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93
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Peter Lipton's response to Stanford's problem of unconceived alternatives/ 'underconsideration'
In his book, "Inference to the Best Explanation", Peter Lipton lays out a response to Stanford's problem of unconceived alternatives (also referred to as the problem of underconsideration) by saying ...
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241
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Causality: is it possible for one attribute to be found in one node but not the others before it?
This is a rather basic question about causality, but I'm a bit confused over it (especially in terms of the "first cause" argument).
Causality (from Wikipedia):
Agency or efficacy that connects ...
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49
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What is the relation between idealism and science?
My understanding of idealism is that it rests on the primacy of the mind and conscience over matter. The Encyclopædia Britannica provides the following "basic" forms of idealism:
The two ...
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What does Hume think about Occam's razor?
Let's define Occam's razor as this:
That it is not rational to believe something unnecessary or extra about reality without a specific reason to believe it. In other words, the facts that are ...
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Is necessary existence a property?
If existence is not a property then doesn't it follow that necessary existence is also not a property? If it is then why?
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Is Benacerraf's argument circular?
I'm reading Benacerraf's What numbers could not be, where he provides the following argument against platonistic account of numbers.
The only criteria we can ask for in searching the correct account ...
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