What use, then, is philosophy of science if not for scientists themselves? I see the target beneficiary as humankind, broadly speaking. We philosophers build narratives about science. We scrutinize scientific methodologies and modelling practices. We engage with the theoretical foundations of science and its conceptual nuances. And we owe this intellectual investigation to humankind. It is part of our cultural heritage and scientific history. The philosopher of science who explores Bayesian [statistical] methods in cosmology, or who scrutinizes assumptions behind simplified models in high-energy physics, is no different from the archaeologist, the historian or the anthropologist in producing knowledge that is useful for us as humankind.
I think that again we should resist the temptation of assessing progress in philosophy in the same terms as progress in science. To start with, there are different views about how to assess progress in science. Is it defined by science getting closer and closer to the final true theory? Or in terms of increased problem-solving? Or of technological advance? These are themselves philosophical unsolved questions.
What is the overarching aim of science? Does science aim to provide us with an approximately true story about nature, as realism would have it? Or does science instead aim to save the observable phenomena without necessarily having to tell us a true story, as some antirealists would contend instead?
I don't like this term "save"'; I think "explain" would be much better.
The distinction is crucial in the history of astronomy. Ptolemaic astronomy was for centuries able to “save the observable phenomena” about planetary motions by assuming epicycles and deferents [elaborations of circular motions], with no pretense to give a true story about it. When Copernican astronomy was introduced, the battle that followed — between Galileo and the Roman Church, for example — was ultimately also a battle about whether Copernican astronomy was meant to give a “true story” of how the planets move as opposed to just saving the phenomena.
We can ask exactly the same questions about the objects of current scientific theories. Are coloured quarks real? Or do they just save the empirical evidence we have about the strong interaction in quantum chromodynamics? Is the Higgs boson real? Dark matter?
https://www.quantamagazine.org/questioning-truth-reality-and-the-role-of-science-20180524/
Antirealist here. Save seems OK to me.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure what is meant by "saved" here. Stored ? Preserved ? Defended ?
ReplyDeleteRhys Taylor I would say preserved with as little interpretation as possible.
ReplyDeleteBob Calder it's completely wrong: we have very rich interpretations. In fact in science theory is much more interesting if has very rich interpretation and works
ReplyDeleteI would say, the real tragedy of present science is that it take too much from philosophy and literature...
Makes sense to me. As agents embedded within our environment of interaction, it makes sense that all knowledge is subjective (or perspectival) but that doesn't imply that it's arbitrary. It's meaningless to refer to (capital-T) Truth independent of context. Our aim should be for increasing coherence over increasing context. Lather, rinse, repeat, selecting always for "what works."
ReplyDeleteBob Calder Hmm, I suppose that makes sense form an anti-realist perspective. I'm much more of a realist, so me the measurements don't need "saving" because there's nothing threatening them. :)
ReplyDeleteRhys Taylor See above. Some people have "very rich" interpretations. heh heh.
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