Measurement theory in (Hand in The world through quantification. Oxford University Press, 2004; Suppes and Zinnes in Basic measurement theory. Psychology Series, 1962) is concerned with the assignment of number to objects of phenomena. Representational aspect of measurement is the extent to which the assigned numbers and arithmetics truthfully represent the underlying objects and their relations, and is characteristic to natural sciences; pragmatic aspect is the extent to which the assigned numbers serve purposes other than representing the underlying phenomena, and (...) is characteristic to social sciences (Hand in The world through quantification. Oxford University Press, 2004). Here I criticise this distinction of representational and pragmatic measurements on the basis of the earlier history of the periodic system of chemical elements, viewed in terms of a practice based philosophy of science by Rein Vihalemm. I argue that the periodic system, although a natural scientific system interpretable as a measurement system, has considerable, in Hand’s terms pragmatic, aspects in it. Those aspects include: tampering with the material measurement results for the theoretical ideal of systematicity; adopting metaphysical assumptions that cannot be experimentally proven, like individuality of elements and atomicity; theoretical construction of the abstract entity—element—as the reference of the measurement system amenable to mathematically elegant ordering. Contrary to Suppes and Zinnes (Basic measurement theory. Psychology Series, 1962) I also argue for the dependence of the assigned numerical system on the material-procedural base of the measurement. (shrink)

Measurement is said to be the basis of exact sciences as the process of assigning numbers to matter (things or their attributes), thus making it possible to apply the mathematically formulated laws of nature to the empirical world. Mathematics and empiria are best accorded to each other in laboratory experiments which function as what Nancy Cartwright calls nomological machine: an arrangement generating (mathematical) regularities. On the basis of accounts of measurement errors and uncertainties, I will argue for two claims: 1) (...) Both fundamental laws of physics, corresponding to ideal nomological machine, and phenomenological laws, corresponding to material nomological machine, lie, being highly idealised relative to the empirical reality; and also laboratory measurement data do not describe properties inherent to the world independently of human understanding of it. 2) Therefore the naive, representational view of measurement and experimentation should be replaced with a more pragmatic or practice-based view. (shrink)

The current issue, titled The Philosophical Legacy of Rein Vihalemm: Reflections and Expansions, is a sequel to previous publications that have paid tribute to the work and legacy of Rein Vihalemm (1938–2015), all supported by the Estonian Research Council (grant PRG462). In 2019, Vihalemm’s 1981 philosophically informed history of chemistry was translated from Estonian and published as a special summer issue of Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum (Vihalemm, 2019).

Rein Vihalemm has defined the concept of φ-sciences primarily through scientific models, while emphasising that they are empirical sciences. His specification of such sciences includes references to Galileo, Kant, and Heidegger, but lacks in detail and, most notably, fails to explicate how the models of these sciences are linked to the material world they aim to describe. I first analyse Galileo’s theoretical proceedings in terms of preplanning, the essence of phaenomena, and mathematicity, which can either explicitly or implicitly be viewed (...) as important characteristics of φ-sciences, acknowledged by Vihalemm. Based on this new clarification and additional sources, I will then explore φ-scientific measurement as the link between models and matter and discuss whether Galileo’s own measurements can be regarded as such. (shrink)

[full article, abstract in English; only abstract in Lithuanian] In Normativity of Scientific Laws explicit and implicit normativities were discerned and it was shown, following Joseph Rouse, that scientific laws implicitly harbour what Alchourrón and Bulygin imply to be the core of normativity. Here I develop this claim by discerning six aspects of implicit normativity in scientific laws: general and special conceptual normativity, concerning analytical thinking and special scientific terminologies; theoretical and material epistemic normativity, concerning mathematical and experimental accountability of (...) the world; narrow and broad practical normativity, concerning technologies in both narrower and broader senses. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Unverborgenheit is truth in Heidegger's Greek-inspired view that happens in Entbergen, or bringing forth. Technology is a way of bringing forth and the truths brought forth in ancient and contemporary science-based technologies are essentially different, the latter being destined by enframing or Gestell that is the essence of contemporary science and technology. Here I give an etymological-ecological-feminist interpretation to the essences of ancient and contemporary technologies as ontogeneses and their unconcealments. A turning point is also identified, on the basis (...) of Carolyn Merchant's eco-feminist account of the mental-spiritual change due to technical change of earth-bound practices, specifically mining, during the commercial revolution and the rise of contemporary science. As Heidegger's wording strongly hints to mountains as salvaging the not-yet-concealed, and human relation to mountains as finding the concealed, Merchant's account of the female nature, or Mother Earth, and male science as penetrating her dark plots for secrets to be exploited by humans, and its connection to mining practices, seems in some respects to clarify Heidegger's somewhat dark notions of unconcealment and truth. RESUMEN Unverborgenheit es la verdad en el pensamiento heideggeriano de inspiración griega, esto ocurre en el Entbergen, o desocultamiento. La tecnología es una forma de desocultar, y las verdades desocultadas por las tecnologías de base científica en la antigüedad y en la época contemporánea son esencialmente diferentes; la última estaría determinada por lo dispuesto, o Gestell, que sería la esencia de la ciencia y tecnología contemporáneas. En este texto presento una interpretación etimológico-ecológico-feminista de las esencias de la tecnología antigua y contemporánea como ontogénesis y sus desvelamientos. También se puede apreciar un punto crucial en la aproximación eco-feminista de Carolyn Merchant al cambio mental-espiritual debido al cambio tecnológico de las prácticas ligadas a la tierra, en especial la minería, durante la revolución comercial y el surgir de la ciencia contemporánea. Como la terminología de Heidegger sugiere fuertemente a las montañas como salvando lo todavía no oculto, y a las relaciones humanas con las montañas como encontrar lo oculto, el enfoque de Merchant sobre la naturaleza mujer, o Madre Tierra, y la ciencia masculina que penetra en sus oscuras parcelas en busca de secretos para ser explotados por la humanidad, y su conexión con las prácticas mineras, parece clarificar en ciertos aspectos las oscuras nociones heideggerianas de desvelamiento y verdad. (shrink)

Sciences are often regarded as providing the best, or, ideally, exact, knowledge of the world, especially in providing laws of nature. Ilya Prigogine, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for his theory of non-equilibrium chemical processes—this being also an important attempt to bridge the gap between exact and non-exact sciences [mentioned in the Presentation Speech by Professor Stig Claesson (nobelprize.org, The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1977)]—has had this ideal in mind when trying to formulate a new kind of science. Philosophers (...) of science distinguish theory and reality, examining relations between these two. Nancy Cartwright’s distinction of fundamental and phenomenological laws, Rein Vihalemm’s conception of the peculiarity of the exact sciences, and Ronald Giere’s account of models in science and science as a set of models are deployed in this article to criticise the common view of science and analyse Ilya Prigogine’s view in particular. We will conclude that on a more abstract, philosophical level, Prigogine’s understanding of science doesn’t differ from the common understanding. (shrink)

Rein Vihalemm's philosophy of science left two prominent philosophical legacies: a methodological distinction of scientific disciplines and the practical realist philosophy of science. The diverse perspectives in this book explore some of the ideas that have sprung from Vihalemm's philosophy of science, and the applications of these approaches.

Physics has for a long time been regarded as the most mature of all sciences due to strict mathematically formulated laws of physics and success of theories in applications, for which it has been taken as the example of scientificity which other sciences should strive towards. Just what aspect of physics it is that is regarded as the cause of its success and hence the yardstick of scientificity – this question has given rise to differing opinions. In his book Making (...) Social Sciences More Scientific. The Need For Predictive Models Rein Taagepera criticises the opinion that physics is a rigorous science ‘merely’ due to the use of mathematical operations and numerical accuracy of results. He shows that the strictness of physics consists instead in its method that allows to set numbers and mathematical formalism into correspondence with real phenomena in a way that enables application (first of all prediction), and to unite physical theories into uniform, integral systems. At the same time he teaches how it would be possible to reach the same in social sciences. In the first part of my review I will give an overview of the book’s chapters, describing in more detail Taagepera’s general understanding of science and scientific method. In the second part of the review I analyse the positions presented in the book from the point of view of philosophy of science (particularly that of constructive realism), providing examples from social sciences. With my critique I show that the society cannot be handled with strict theories similar to those of physics, and that in order to raise the applicational strength of social sciences, other means often suit better than rendering them similar to physics by developing mathematical formalism. (shrink)

Recently, philosophers have come forth with approaches to chemistry based on its actual practice, imparting to it a proper aim and character of its own. These approaches add to the currently growing movement of pluralist philosophies of science. We draw on recent pluralist accounts from chemistry and analyse three notions from modern chemical practice and theory in terms of these accounts, in order to complement the so far more general pluralist approaches with specific evidence. Our survey reveals that the concept (...) of element indicates conceptual pluralisms in chemistry. that electronegativity illustrates methodological pluralism in determining one and the same concept, and that acidity is an instance of plurality hidden behind ‘one notion’. (shrink)

En este artículo sostengo que Gabriel Marcel desarrolla una metafísica de la existencia humana a partir de una fenomenología. Para mostrar esta hipótesis, parto del diagnóstico que hace el autor de la situación del hombre contemporáneo. Marcel afirma que el ser humano ha sido reducido a un mero haz de funciones no dando espacio para el misterio. A partir de ese diagnóstico, desarrollo el concepto de exigencia ontológica el cual nos permite, sostengo, pasar de una fenomenología a una metafísica, desde (...) el momento en que Marcel plantea que la exigencia ontológica no es solo una necesidad subjetiva de sentido, sino el correlato del misterio ontológico en el cual nos encontramos insertos. La filosofía del misterio del Marcel, eje central de su metafísica de la existencia humana, es explicada y explicitada en la segunda parte de este trabajo, a partir del dato de la encarnación y del problema de la participación. In this article, I hold that Gabriel Marcel proposes a kind of metaphysics of human existence that arises from a phenomenology. In order to show this hypothesis, I start from the description that the author does of the situation of contemporary man. Marcel affirms that human being has been reduced to a mere assembly of functions, without leaving any room to mystery. Starting from this account, I develop the concept of ontological need, concept that allows us to go from phenomenology to metaphysis, because the concept of ontological need, according to Marcel, is not only the expression of a subjective need of finding sense, but the expression of the ontological mystery in which we find ourselves. The philosophy of mystery of Marcel, backbone of his metaphysics of the human existence, is explained in the second part of this article, by giving an account of the basic fact of being an incarnated being and by discussing the problem of participation. (shrink)

Classic of Russian philosophy Alexandr I. Vvedensky proposed a definition of metaphysics as a study of true reality contrary to apparent one. This definition seems to be useful in contemporary issues. It's an apt definition because it describes an ancient metaphysics as good as classical tradition and concerns all branches of the philosophical knowledge. A number of philosophical subjects are connected with the difference of true and apparent reality as their foundation. For instance, Philosophical Anthropology differentiates between real and formal (...) personal existence. Epistemology discusses a problem of a criterion of real existence and notes that any language does not contain such internal criterion. The Philosophy of science analyses a conventional reality created by people, and so does the Philosophy of art. Social and Political Philosophy due to understand a nature of special phenomena which have no substance but are real and objective. Finally, contemporary Philosophy of technology concentrates on the virtual reality as a special kind of existence. So, the problem of the distinction between true and apparent reality manifests itself in all philosophical disciplines, and this fact determines a major meaning of the metaphysics in the philosophy. (shrink)

The late Robert Veatch, one of the United States’ founders of bioethics, never tired of reminding us that the paradigm-shifting contribution that bioethics made to patient care was to liberate patients out of the hands of doctors, who were traditionally seen to know best, even when they decidedly did not know best. It seems to us that with the advent of COVID-19, health policy has come full-circle on this. COVID-19 gave rise to a large number of purportedly “ethical” guidance documents (...) aiming to assist health care providers and practitioners with responding to the ethical challenges that might arise in their response to the pandemic. Ethics has two primary functions: provide clear action guidance, and provide clear action justification. The documents in question arguably reflect the ultimate policy triumph of bioethical “principlism”, and, perhaps surprisingly, as a corollary, the ultimate triumph of “doctor-knows-best”. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to free Aristotle's Metaphysics, especially book XII (Lambda), frome some metaphysical and theological presuppositions by detecting their inappropriate conceptual framwork, which once was progressive, but now holds an obsolete position. Ousia, being (not substance, a much later concept, construed to solve other problems than Aristotle's), stand for a question, not for an answer. Book Lambda develops a highly speculative argument for this queston. The famous noesis noeseos says that empirical being and knowledge is the (...) realization of a noetic structure (noesis), laid down in our most fundamental opinioons about being. (shrink)

In telling the story of Tereus, Procne, and Philomela , Ovid transformed tragedy—the Tereus of Sophocles1—into epic. The result was a narrative that followed the tragic plot but with a very different presentation. For example, Ovid incorporated into his episode events from the play's prologue, such as the marriage of Procne and Tereus , the birth of Itys , and the voyage of Tereus to Athens . In addition, he brought offstage action into the limelight, including the violation of Philomela (...) , the slaughter of Itys , and the metamorphoses of Tereus and the sisters . Finally, he explicated innermost thoughts, like the lust of Tereus and the rage of Procne — emotions whose external manifestations would have been clear in performance, but whose effects the reader perceives from the inside out. So sequential and immediate a treatment owes much to the shift from one genre to the other. (shrink)

Internalism and externalism are both false. What is needed to convert true belief into knowledge is the appropriate blend of subjective and objective factors to yield the appropriate sort of connection between mind and the world. The sort of knowledge explicated is calledmetaknowledge and is knowledge that involves the evaluation of incoming information in terms of a background system. It is proposed that knowledge is equivalent to undefeated justification which is justification on the basis of every system that eliminates or (...) corrects any error in what a person accepts. The system of such system is called the ultrasystem of the person. This account appeals both to internal factors and external factors and involves appeal to both normative requirements and empirical constraints. Justification is defined in terms of a comparative notion of rationality adapted from Chisholm. (shrink)

We summarise the contributions to the discussion and the links between them. The complex relationship between the physical and biological sciences demonstrates three “axes of tension”: the role of simulation, the interplay between levels of explanation, and the generality of “laws”. We identify examples of true synergy between approaches that genuinely explore new research territory, and underscore the contemporary value of the type of discussions contained in this volume.

In zijn werk uit de jaren voor zijn dood in 1984 verruilt Foucault de nadruk op de ‘macht’ voor een onderzoek naar de ‘zorg voor zichzelf’. Dit artikel geeft een overzicht en interpretatie van dit late werk van Foucault. Bovendien wordt de actuele betekenis ervan geïllustreerd door het in te zetten voor een analyse van maatschappelijke problemen rond nieuwe technologieën. Juist de wending in Foucaults late werk maakt dat zijn benadering blijvende waarde krijgt voor de analyse van actuele problemen, omdat (...) hij meer dan ooit tevoren op positieve wijze zijn eigen gedachten uitwerkt. De ontmanteling van ‘het subject’ uit zijn eerdere werk wordt nu aangevuld met aanknopingspunten om te onderzoeken hoe in onze eigen tijd nieuwe vormen van subjectiviteit worden voortgebracht. (shrink)

Op 25 juni 2009 is het vijfentwintig jaar geleden dat Michel Foucault overleed. Naar aanleiding daarvan belicht Wijsgerig Perspectief de betekenis van Foucaults werk en actuele relevantie ervan. Wat was in de toenmalige filosofische en maatschappelijke context de vernieuwing die Foucault bracht met concepten als discours, biomacht en bestaanskunst? En wat is de waarde van Foucaults filosofie met betrekking tot actuele vragen?