Essays on realism and rationalism / Alan Musgrave.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Musgrave, Alan.

Contributor:

Class of 1891 Department of Arts Fund.

Series:

Schriftenreihe zur Philosophie Karl R. Poppers und des kritischen Rationalismus ; Bd. 12.

Series in the philosophy of Karl R. Popper and critical rationalism = Schriftenreihe zur Philosophie Karl R. Poppers und des kritischen Rationalismus ; v. 12

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Realism.

Rationalism.

Realism in literature.

Physical Description:

367 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm.

Place of Publication:

Amsterdam ; Atlanta, GA : Rodopi, 1999.

Contents:

Part I Realism

Chapter 1 Explanation, Description and Scientific Realism 1

1. Does science explain as well as describe? 1

2. Do scientific explanations remove puzzlement? 6

3. Are there ultimate explanations? 10

4. Conclusion: Varieties of scientific realism 15

Chapter 2 The Myth of Astronomical Instrumentalism 17

1. Plato's Problem and the 'Dogma of Circularity' 19

2. Eudoxus 26

3. Aristotle 32

4. Ptolemy 35

5. Astronomical instrumentalism or astronomical scepticism? 49

Chapter 3 The Ultimate Argument for Scientific Realism 52

Chapter 4 Wittgensteinian Instrumentalism 71

1. Understanding Wittgenstein 72

2. Defending Wittgenstein 82

3. Evaluating Wittgenstein 98

Chapter 5 Realism Versus Constructive Empiricism 106

1. Truth, empirical adequacy, empirical equivalence 106

2. Theory and observation 113

3. Realism and explanation 117

Chapter 6 Realism and Idealisation 131

1. Folk-realism and scientific realism 131

2. Are all generalisations false? 133

3. Simple laws and complex phenomena 138

4. 'Covering laws' versus auxiliary assumptions 144

5. Ideal laws 148

Chapter 7 Unreal Assumptions in Economic Theory: The F-twist untwisted 154

1. Negligibility assumptions 155

2. Domain assumptions 157

3. Heuristic assumptions 158

Chapter 8 NOA's Ark - Fine For Realism 162

Chapter 9 Conceptual Idealism and Stove's Gem 177

Chapter 10 The T-Scheme Plus Epistemic Truth Equals Idealism 185

1. The T-scheme 185

2. Epistemic truth-theories 186

3. Epistemic truth + the T-scheme 188

4. Contingent epistemic truth 190

Part II Rationalism

Chapter 11 Falsification and its Critics 193

1. Falsification is not disproof 194

2. Polanyi and Kuhn on falsification 198

3. Popper's rule against ad hocness 203

4. Lakatos's 'positive heuristics' and falsification 206

5. Lakatos's 'negative heuristic' and falsification 212

6. Falsification and 'elimination' 219

Chapter 12 Logical versus Historical Theories of Confirmation 229

2. 'Background Knowledge' and the Paradox of Confirmation 231

3. The strictly temporal view of background knowledge 236

4. The heuristic view of background knowledge 240

5. Background knowledge or a background theory? 243

6. Requirements for the growth of knowledge 247

Chapter 13 Facts and Values in Science Studies 252

1. The problem of scientific progress 252

2. Getting values from facts - historical methodologies 258

3. Getting values from facts - testing methodologies 267

4. Getting facts from values - historical explanations 272

Chapter 14 Deductivism versus Psychologism 279

1. Who needs inductive logic? 279

2. 'Justifying' deduction - and induction 288

Chapter 15 Deductive Heuristics 297

1. Logic of discovery: inductive or deductive 297

2. Early attempts, why they failed, and positivist Orthodoxy 300

3. Examples, and the superiority of deductivist reconstructions 302

4. Some objections considered 306

Chapter 16 Critical Rationalism 314

2. The problem of induction 315

3. Non-solutions 316

4. Popper's solution A: induction is a myth 318

5. Popper's solution B: abandon justificationism 319

6. Critical Rationalism (CR) 322

7. Does CR smuggle in induction - A? 326

8. Does CR smuggle in induction - B? 329

9. Conjectural knowledge 331

10. Miller's mess 332

11. Bartley's comprehensively critical rationalism (CCR) 336

12. Critical rationalism and logical omniscience 338

13. Experience, perceptual belief and Principle E 341

14. An evolutionary argument for Principle E 343

15. Personal knowledge and the division of epistemic labour 347.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [351]-362) and index.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Class of 1891 Department of Arts Fund.

ISBN:

9042004185

OCLC:

42998329