Download or read book Correspondence Invariance and Heuristics written by S. French and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-03-09 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume is presented in honour of Heinz Post, who founded a distinc tive and distinguished school of philosophy of science at Chelsea College, University of London. The 'Chelsea tradition' in philosophy of science takes the content of science seriously, as exemplified by the papers presented here. The unifying theme of this work is that of 'Correspondence, Invariance and Heuristics', after the title of a classic and seminal paper by Heinz Post, published in 1971, which is reproduced in this volume with the kind permission of the editors and publishers of Studies in History and Philosophy of Science. Described by Paul Feyerabend in Against Method as "brilliant" and " . . . a partial antidote against the view which I try to defend" (1975, p. 61, fn. 17), this paper, peppered with illustrative examples from the history of science, brings to the fore some of Heinz Post's central concerns: the heuristic criteria used by scientists in constructing their theories, the intertheoretic relationships which these criteria reflect and, in particular, the nature of the correspondence that holds between a theory and its predecessors (and its suc cessors). The appearance of this volume more than twenty years later is an indica tion of the fruitfulness of Post's contribution: philosophers of science continue to explore the issues raised in his 1971 paper.
Download or read book Heuristic Reasoning written by Emiliano Ippoliti and published by Springer. This book was released on 2014-09-05 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How can we advance knowledge? Which methods do we need in order to make new discoveries? How can we rationally evaluate, reconstruct and offer discoveries as a means of improving the ‘method’ of discovery itself? And how can we use findings about scientific discovery to boost funding policies, thus fostering a deeper impact of scientific discovery itself? The respective chapters in this book provide readers with answers to these questions. They focus on a set of issues that are essential to the development of types of reasoning for advancing knowledge, such as models for both revolutionary findings and paradigm shifts; ways of rationally addressing scientific disagreement, e.g. when a revolutionary discovery sparks considerable disagreement inside the scientific community; frameworks for both discovery and inference methods; and heuristics for economics and the social sciences.
Download or read book Inconsistency in Science written by Joke Meheus and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-03-09 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For centuries, inconsistencies were seen as a hindrance to good reasoning, and their role in the sciences was ignored. In recent years, however, logicians as well as philosophers and historians have showed a growing interest in the matter. Central to this change were the advent of paraconsistent logics, the shift in attention from finished theories to construction processes, and the recognition that most scientific theories were at some point either internally inconsistent or incompatible with other accepted findings. The new interest gave rise to important questions. How is `logical anarchy' avoided? Is it ever rational to accept an inconsistent theory? In what sense, if any, can inconsistent theories be considered as true? The present collection of papers is the first to deal with this kind of questions. It contains case studies as well as philosophical analyses, and presents an excellent overview of the different approaches in the domain.
Download or read book The Classical Quantum Correspondence written by Benjamin H. Feintzeig and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2023-01-31 with total page 141 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Element provides an entry point for philosophical engagement with quantization and the classical limit. It introduces the mathematical tools of C*-algebras as they are used to compare classical and quantum physics. It then employs those tools to investigate philosophical issues surrounding theory change in physics. It discusses examples in which quantization bears on the topics of reduction, structural continuity, analogical reasoning, and theory construction. In doing so, it demonstrates that the precise mathematical tools of algebraic quantum theory can aid philosophers of science and philosophers of physics.
Download or read book Every Thing Must Go written by James Ladyman and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2007-07-05 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every Thing Must Go argues that the only kind of metaphysics that can contribute to objective knowledge is one based specifically on contemporary science as it really is, and not on philosophers' a priori intuitions, common sense, or simplifications of science. In addition to showing how recent metaphysics has drifted away from connection with all other serious scholarly inquiry as a result of not heeding this restriction, they demonstrate how to build a metaphysics compatible with current fundamental physics ('ontic structural realism'), which, when combined with their metaphysics of the special sciences ('rainforest realism'), can be used to unify physics with the other sciences without reducing these sciences to physics itself. Taking science metaphysically seriously, Ladyman and Ross argue, means that metaphysicians must abandon the picture of the world as composed of self-subsistent individual objects, and the paradigm of causation as the collision of such objects. Every Thing Must Go also assesses the role of information theory and complex systems theory in attempts to explain the relationship between the special sciences and physics, treading a middle road between the grand synthesis of thermodynamics and information, and eliminativism about information. The consequences of the author's metaphysical theory for central issues in the philosophy of science are explored, including the implications for the realism vs. empiricism debate, the role of causation in scientific explanations, the nature of causation and laws, the status of abstract and virtual objects, and the objective reality of natural kinds.
Download or read book Philosophers Look at Quantum Mechanics written by Alberto Cordero and published by Springer. This book was released on 2019-08-13 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited volume explores the philosophical implications of quantum mechanics. It features papers from venues of the International Ontology Congress (IOC) up to 2016. IOC is a worldwide platform for dialogue and reflection on the interactions between science and philosophy. The collection features philosophers as well as physicists, including David Albert, Harvey Brown, Jeffrey Bub, Otávio Bueno, James Cushing, Steven French, Victor Gomez-Pin, Carl Hoefer, Simon Kochen, Peter Lewis, Tim Maudlin, Peter Mittlestatedt, Roland Omnès, Juha Saatsi, Albert Solé, David Wallace, and Anton Zeilinger. Since the early days of quantum mechanics, philosophers have studied the subject with growing technical skill and fruitfulness. Their efforts have unveiled intellectual bridges between physics and philosophy. These connections have helped fuel the contemporary debate about the scope and limits of realism and understanding in the interpretation of physical theories and scientific theories in general. The philosophical analysis of quantum mechanics is now one of the most sophisticated and productive areas in contemporary philosophy, as the papers in this collection illustrate.
Download or read book Applying Mathematics written by Otávio Bueno and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How is that when scientists need some piece of mathematics through which to frame their theory, it is there to hand? Bueno and French offer a new approach to the puzzle of the applicability of mathematics, through a detailed examination of a series of case studies from the history of twentieth-century physics.
Download or read book There Are No Such Things As Theories written by Steven French and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-02-20 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There Are No Such Things as Theories considers the fundamental question: what is a scientific theory? It presents a range of options - from theories are sets of propositions, to theories are families of models, abstract artefacts, or fictions - and highlights the various problems they all face. In so doing it draws multiple comparisons between theories and artworks: on the one hand, theories are like certain kinds of paintings with regard to their representational capacity; on the other, they are like musical works in that they can be multiply presented. An alternative answer to the question is then offered, drawing on the metaphysics of musical works: there are no such things as theories. Nevertheless, we can still talk about them, since that talk is made true by the various practices that scientists engage in. The implications of this form of eliminativism for the realism debate is then discussed and it is concluded that this may offer a more flexible framework in which we can understand both the history and the philosophy of science in general.
Download or read book Powers and Capacities in Philosophy written by Ruth Groff and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Published in 2012, Powers and Capacities in Philosophy is a valuable contribution to the field of Philosophy.
Download or read book Understanding the Knowledge Society written by Andrea Cerroni and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2020-05-29 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Complex knowledge and ideas are generated, shared and accessed globally. Andrea Cerroni turns to this knowledge society to offer a comprehensive social theory of its processes to bridge the gap between knowledge and democracy. Drawing on a long-term historical perspective, Cerroni assembles a cultural matrix, comprising ancient myths on nature, society and knowledge and modern myths of reductionism, individualism and relativism to improve our contemporary sociological imagination.
Download or read book The Structure of the World written by Steven French and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2014 with total page 413 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Steven French articulates and defends the bold claim that there are no objects in the world. He draws on metaphysics and philosophy of science to argue for structural realism—the position that we live in a world of structures—and defends a form of eliminativism about objects that sets laws and symmetry principles at the heart of ontology.
Download or read book Reduction in Science written by W. Balzer and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 445 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The papers in this volume were presented at the colloquium "Reduktion in der Wissenschaft: Struktur, Beispiele, philos ophische PrObleme", held in Bielefeld, West Germany, July 18- 21, 1983. Altogether eighteen talks were delivered at the symposium, and all appear here with the exception of Professor Ehlers' address. In addition, we are pleased to be able to include three papers by invited participants (Kamiah, Ludwig, Scheibe) who were unable to attend the meeting. The meeting itself brought together a sizeable group of logicians, philosophers and working scientists to discuss and debate the theme of reduction, one that occupies a central place in contemporary philosophy of science. The participants and contributors succeeded in opening up new directions in reduction studies and presenting fresh case studies of re duction from many different areas of scientific practice. Their efforts will greatly enhance our understanding of reduction and, consequently, our grasp of the complex process of scien tific change and the unity and growth of scientific knowledge
Download or read book Idealization I General Problems written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2023-03-13 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Explanatory Translation written by V. Rantala and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-11-11 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, the author makes a systematic attempt to understand cognitive characteristics of translation by bringing its logical, pragmatic and hermeneutic features together and examining a number of scientific, logical, and philosophical applications. The book is for philosophers of science, linguists, logicians, historians of science, and scientists interested in philosophical questions of scientific change.
Download or read book The SAGE Encyclopedia of Research Design written by Bruce B. Frey and published by SAGE Publications. This book was released on 2022-01-27 with total page 3889 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The SAGE Encyclopedia of Research Design maps out how one makes decisions about research design, interprets data, and draws valid inferences, undertakes research projects in an ethical manner, and evaluates experimental design strategies and results. From A-to-Z, this four-volume work covers the spectrum of research design strategies and topics including, among other things: fundamental research design principles, ethics in the research process, quantitative versus qualitative and mixed-method designs, completely randomized designs, multiple comparison tests, diagnosing agreement between data and models, fundamental assumptions in analysis of variance, factorial treatment designs, complete and incomplete block designs, Latin square and related designs, hierarchical designs, response surface designs, split-plot designs, repeated measures designs, crossover designs, analysis of covariance, statistical software packages, and much more. Research design, with its statistical underpinnings, can be especially daunting for students and novice researchers. At its heart, research design might be described simply as a formalized approach toward problem solving, thinking, and acquiring knowledge, the success of which depends upon clearly defined objectives and appropriate choice of statistical design and analysis to meet those objectives. The SAGE Encyclopedia of Research Design will assist students and researchers with their work while providing vital information on research strategies.
Download or read book Tools and Modes of Representation in the Laboratory Sciences written by U. Klein and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: constitutive of reference in laboratory sciences as cultural sign systems and their manipulation and superposition, collectively shared classifications and associated conceptual frameworks,· and various fonns of collective action and social institutions. This raises the question of how much modes of representation, and specific types of sign systems mobilized to construct them, contribute to reference. Semioticians have argued that sign systems are not merely passive media for expressing preconceived ideas but actively contribute to meaning. Sign systems are culturally loaded with meaning stemming from previous practical applications and social traditions of applications. In new local contexts of application they not only transfer stabilized meaning but also can be used as active resources to add new significance and modify previous meaning. This view is supported by several analyses presented in this volume. Sign systems can be implemented like tools that are manipulated and superposed with other types of signs to forge new representations. The mode of representation, made possible by applying and manipulating specific types of representational tools, such as diagrammatic rather than mathematical representations, or Berzelian fonnulas rather than verbal language, contributes to meaning and forges fine-grained differentiations between scientists' concepts. Taken together, the essays contained in this volume give us a multifaceted picture of the broad variety of modes of representation in nineteenth-century and twentieth-century laboratory sciences, of the way scientists juxtaposed and integrated various representations, and of their pragmatic use as tools in scientific and industrial practice.
Download or read book The Fortunes of Inquiry written by Nicholas Jardine and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1986 with total page 162 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Until about the middle of this century philosophers and scientists commonly held that science showed an accumulation of a body of objective knowledge. This view has been very widely challenged over recent years; but in this study Dr Jardine offers a defence.The discussion involves consideration of many controversial issues concerning truth in science, interpretation of past theories, and grounds of scientific method. The author writes with a careful appreciation of the complexities involved and argues for a distinctive point of view with skill andclarity.
