Scientific Metamethodology

L'analyse du renseignement présente de nombreuses similitudes épistémologiques importantes avec la science (résolution de problèmes, découverte, utilisation habile des outils, vérification des demandes de connaissances) et s'intéresse davantage aux connaissances a posteriori qu'aux a priori sur la manière ou la base sur laquelle une proposition peut être connue. Tant l'analyse du renseignement que la science se concentrent sur les connaissances acquises à partir d'observations empiriques, connaissances qui sont typiquement a posteriori. La métaphore du puzzle est utilisée à la fois dans (...) le renseignement et l'archéologie. Les deux disciplines impliquent la collecte de preuves pour construire une image aussi complète que possible. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.16740.09603 . (shrink)

La méthodologie, dans le renseignement, comprend les méthodes utilisées pour prendre des décisions sur les menaces, en particulier dans la discipline de l'analyse du renseignement. L'énorme volume d'informations collectées par les agences de renseignement les met souvent dans l'incapacité de les analyser toutes. La nature et les caractéristiques des informations collectées ainsi que leur crédibilité ont également un impact sur l'analyse du renseignement. Le paramètre de capacité est essentiel pour la compréhension actuelle de la menace.Les analystes utilisent deux approches pour (...) évaluer la capacité: utiliser des mesures indirectes et des mesures proxy. Les mesures indirectes sont des mesures indirectes utilisées pour effectuer des déductions de capacité. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.18134.37441. (shrink)

Le modèle atomique de Bohr a été l'un des exemples les plus brillants de la méthodologie des programmes de recherche d'Imre Lakatos. Les grandes lignes du programme de recherche de Bohr (Bohr 1913) peuvent être caractérisées par : 1. Le problème initial ; 2. Ses heuristiques négatives et positives ; 3. Les problèmes qu'il a tenté de résoudre au cours du développement ; 4. Son point de dégénérescence (point de saturation) et, enfin, 5. Le programme par lequel il a été (...) remplacé. 10.13140/RG.2.2.21718.68166 . (shrink)

Les services de renseignement sont des agences gouvernementales chargées de la collecte et de l'analyse du renseignement sensible afin de garantir la sécurité et la défense nationales. Les méthodes d'obtenir le renseignement peuvent inclure l'espionnage, l'interception de communications, l'analyse cryptographique, la coopération avec d'autres institutions et l'évaluation des sources publiques. Les services de renseignement se concentrent actuellement sur la lutte contre le terrorisme, ne laissant que relativement peu de ressources pour surveiller les autres menaces à la sécurité. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.21302.45126.

“Open access” has become a central theme of journal reform in academic publishing. In this article, I examine the consequences of an important technological loophole in which publishers can claim to be adhering to the principles of open access by releasing articles in proprietary or “locked” formats that cannot be processed by automated tools, whereby even simple copy and pasting of text is disabled. These restrictions will prevent the development of an important infrastructural element of a modern research enterprise, namely, (...) scientific data science, or the use of data analytic techniques to conduct meta-analyses and investigations into the scientific corpus. I give a brief history of the open access movement, discuss novel journalistic practices, and an overview of data-driven investigation of the scientific corpus. I argue that particularly in an era where the veracity of many research studies has been called into question, scientific data science should be one of the key motivations for open access publishing. The enormous benefits of unrestricted access to the research literature should prompt scholars from all disciplines to reject publishing models whereby articles are released in proprietary formats or are otherwise restricted from being processed by automated tools as part of a data science pipeline. (shrink)

The “reproducibility crisis” has been a highly visible source of scientific controversy and dispute. Here, I propose and review several avenues for identifying and prioritizing research studies for the purpose of targeted validation. Of the various proposals discussed, I identify scientific data science as being a strategy that merits greater attention among those interested in reproducibility. I argue that the tremendous potential of scientific data science for uncovering high-value research studies is a significant and rarely discussed benefit of the transition (...) to a fully open-access publishing model. (shrink)

What methodological approaches do research programs use to investigate the world? Elisabeth Lloyd’s Logic of Research Questions (LRQ) characterizes such approaches in terms of the questions that the researchers ask and causal factors they consider. She uses the Logic of Research Questions Framework to criticize adaptationist programs in evolutionary biology for dogmatically assuming selection explanations of the traits of organisms. I argue that Lloyd’s general criticism of methodological adaptationism is an artefact of the impoverished LRQ. My Ordered Factors Proposal extends (...) the LRQ to characterize approaches with sequences of questions and factors. I highlight the importance that ordering one’s investigation plays in approaches at the level of adaptationism by analyzing two research programs in community ecology: competitionists and neutralists. Competitionists and neutralists take opposed starting points and use explanatory and developmental heuristics to consider more factors in due time. On the Ordered Factors Proposal, these approaches are not only the ecological factors they are open to considering but also the order in which they will consider them. My disagreement with Lloyd’s over how to characterize methodological approaches reflects different views about methodological monism and pluralism. (shrink)

Good physical experiments conform to the basic methodological standards of experimental design: they are objective, reliable, and valid. But is this also true of thought experiments? Especially problems of personal identity have engendered hypothetical scenarios that are very distant from the actual world. These imagined situations have been conspicuously ineffective at resolving conflicting intuitions and deciding between the different accounts of personal identity. Using prominent examples from the literature, I argue that this is due to many of these thought experiments (...) not adhering to the methodological standards that guide experimental design in nearly all other disciplines. I also show how empirically unwarranted background assumptions about human physiology render some of the hypothetical scenarios that are employed in the debate about personal identity highly misleading. (shrink)

I distinguish three primary notions of objectivity that may be applied to the sciences. There is an ontological sense of objectivity which relates to the way in which the natural world exists independently of human thought. There is a semantic form of objectivity which relates to the nature of truth. There is an epistemic notion of objectivity which relates to the methodological norms and procedures which are employed in the sciences, and the epistemic justification of beliefs and theories which are (...) licensed by those norms and procedures. These three forms of objectivity may be brought into conjunction. It is because we employ methods of scientific inquiry which function to exclude subjective factors and to incorporate only genuinely epistemic factors that the results and theories of the sciences should be accepted. They should be accepted because by employing such methods we have the best chance of arriving at true beliefs about the nature of reality. In short, it is the epistemic objectivity of the methods of science that leads us to the objective truth about the objective world. (shrink)

Presenting sixty theoretical ideas, David Zeitlyn asks ‘How to write about anthropological theory without making a specific theoretical argument.’ To answer, he offers a series of mini essays about an eclectic collection of theoretical concepts that he has found helpful over the years. The book celebrates the muddled inconsistencies in the ways that humans live their messy lives. There are, however, still patterns discernible: the actors can understand what is going on, they see an event unfolding in ways that are (...) familiar, as belonging to a certain type and therefore, Zeitlyn suggests, so can researchers. -/- From the introduction: This book promotes an eclectic, multi-faceted anthropology in which multiple approaches are applied in pursuit of the limited insights which each can afford…. I do not endorse any one of these idea as supplying an exclusive path to enlightenment: I absolutely do not advocate any single position. As a devout nonconformist, I hope that the following sections provide material, ammunition and succour to those undertaking nuanced anthropological analysis (and their kin in related disciplines)…. Mixing up or combining different ideas and approaches can produce results that, in their breadth and richness, are productive for anthropology and other social sciences, reflecting the endless complexities of real life. -/- …This is my response to the death of grand theory. I see our task as learning how to deal with that bereavement and how to resist the siren lures of those promising synoptic overviews. -/- This book is relevant to anthropology, communication studies, cultural studies and sociology. -/- “David Zeitlyn has written a wryly engaging, short book on, essentially, why we should not become theoretical partisans—that, indeed, being a serious theorist means accepting precisely that principle.”—Michael Herzfeld, Harvard University -/- . (shrink)

The replication crisis has prompted many to call for statistical reform within the psychological sciences. Here we examine issues within Frequentist statistics that may have led to the replication crisis, and we examine the alternative—Bayesian statistics—that many have suggested as a replacement. The Frequentist approach and the Bayesian approach offer radically different perspectives on evidence and inference with the Frequentist approach prioritising error control and the Bayesian approach offering a formal method for quantifying the relative strength of evidence for hypotheses. (...) We suggest that rather than mere statistical reform, what is needed is a better understanding of the different modes of statistical inference and a better understanding of how statistical inference relates to scientific inference. (shrink)

This article argues that non-ideal theory fails to deliver on its promise of providing a more accurate account of the real world by which philosophers can address problems of racism, sexual violence, and poverty. Because non-ideal theory relies on abstractions of groups which are idealized as causes for social phenomena, non-idealists imagine that categories like race or gender predict how groups behave in the real world. This article maintains that non-idealist abstractions often result in inaccuracy and makes the case that (...) empirically informed theories and group-based analyses are needed to correct the course of race-gender theory. (shrink)

CAMILO, Bruno. O anarquismo e o estímulo à inovação científica. In: SOUZA, Poliana Mendes de. (org.). Inovação na educação superior brasileira: metodologia e casos. Recife: Even3 Publicações, 2021. p. 57-73. -/- Este trabalho, inserido na subárea da filosofia da ciência, possui como tema principal o “anarquismo metodológico” tal como é apresentado pelo filósofo da ciência Paul Feyerabend. O objetivo geral é apresentar o modo como o “anarquismo metodológico”, tal como exposto em Feyerabend (2007), pode contribuir para resolver o problema da (...) “educação científica” e estimular a inovação ou mudança, para em seguida refletir sobre a possibilidade de aplicar o “anarquismo metodológico” nas escolas do Brasil. Tal reflexão será pertinente se consideradas as dificuldades que afligem a “educação científica” no Brasil, sobretudo aquelas que dizem respeito a falta de desenvolvimento da inovação científica e tecnológica do país. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to give an account of the change in Feyerabend's philosophy that made him abandon methodological monism and embrace methodological pluralism. In this paper I offer an explanation in terms of a simple model of 'change of belief through evidence'. My main claim is that the evidence triggering this belief revision can be identified in Feyerabend's technical work in the interpretation of quantum mechanics, in particular his reevaluation of Bohr's contribution to it. This highlights an (...) under-appreciated part of Feyerabend's early work and makes it central to an understanding of the dynamics in his overall philosophy of science. (shrink)

Empirical philosophers of science aim to base their philosophical theories on observations of scientific practice. But since there is far too much science to observe it all, how can we form and test hypotheses about science that are sufficiently rigorous and broad in scope, while avoiding the pitfalls of bias and subjectivity in our methods? Part of the answer, we claim, lies in the computational tools of the digital humanities, which allow us to analyze large volumes of scientific literature. Here (...) we advocate for the use of these methods by addressing a number of large-scale, justificatory concerns—specifically, about the epistemic value of journal articles as evidence for what happens elsewhere in science, and about the ability of DH tools to extract this evidence. Far from ignoring the gap between scientific literature and the rest of scientific practice, effective use of DH tools requires critical reflection about these relationships. (shrink)

In Logik der Forschung (1934) and later works, Karl Popper proposed a set of methodological rules for scientists. Among these were requirements that theories should evolve in the direction of increasing content, and that new theories should only be accepted if some of their novel predictions are experimentally confirmed. There are currently two, viable theories of cosmology: the standard cosmological model, and a theory due to Mordehai Milgrom called MOND. Both theories can point to successes and failures, but only MOND (...) has repeatedly made novel predictions that were subsequently found to be correct. Standard-model cosmologists, by contrast, have almost always responded to new observations in a post-hoc manner, adjusting or augmenting their theory as needed to obtain correspondence with the facts. I argue that these methodological differences render a comparison of the two theories in terms of their ‘truthlikeness’ or ‘verisimilitude’ essentially impossible since the two groups of scientists achieve correspondence with the facts in fundamentally different ways, and I suggest that a better guide to the theories’ progress toward the truth might be the methodologies themselves. (shrink)

One of the main purposes of science is to explain natural phenomena by increasing our understanding of the physical world and to make predictions about the future based on these explanations. In this context, scientific theories can be defined as large-scale explanations of phenomena. In the historical process, scientists have made various choices among the theories they encounter at the point of solving the problems related to their fields of study. This process, which can be called ‘theory choice’, is one (...) of the most debated issues in the field of philosophy of science in the twentieth century, because this discussion is a very comprehensive problem because it includes important issues such as the use of logical arguments and the determination of the scientific method. At the point of solving this problem, members of the Vienna Circle and Karl Popper think that an objective criterion can be determined by which scientists can apply for theory choice. While the Vienna Circle emphasizes that the best-confirmed theory should be chosen among competing theories, Popper states that competing theories or theories should be tested ruthlessly with appropriate methods, and that successful or corroborated theories should be selected as a result of these tests. Contrary to these views Kuhn states that there are some non-obligatory subjective elements that scientists should follow at the point of theory choice. Accordingly, in this study, the problem of how scientists make their choices among competing theories will be discussed by highlighting Kuhn’s arguments regarding the subjective nature of theory selection. (shrink)

Bilimi ve bilimsel bilgiyi kültür, değer ve öznel yargılardan izole ederek nesnel bir şekilde ortaya koyabilmeye yönelik hararetli tartışmaların yaşandığı yirminci yüzyıl bilim anlayışının temel gayesi, deney ve gözleme tabi olabilecek fiziki dünyadaki olguları, mantıksal çözümlemeye tabi tutarak birleştirilmiş bilime ulaşmaktır. Bu amaca giden yolda olgulara dayanmayan ve sınanamayan her türlü metafizik öge yok sayılır. Bilimsel bilginin sadece deney ve gözleme tabi olana, diğer bir deyişle olgu verilerine dayandığı iddiasını taşıyan bu düşünce sistemi, özellikle Viyana Çevresi üyeleri tarafından benimsenmiştir. Bu (...) bakımdan Çevre üyelerinin bilimsellik anlayışındaki temel ölçüt olgulara dayanan önermelerin ya da yargıların doğrulanabilmesidir. Bilimsel bilginin sadece olgusal dünyanın gözlemlenmesi ve bu gözlem sonucunda ortaya konulan önermelerin ya da ifadelerin doğrulanmasıyla sağlandığını düşünen Çevre üyelerinin bu savlarındaki amacı bilimi ve onun bilgisini her türlü kültür ve değer alanından uzaklaştırarak metafiziksel unsurlardan arındırılmış nesnel bilgiye ulaşmaktır. Çevre üyelerinin birçoğu bilim alanı içerisinde tartışmaya yol açan meselelerin aslında metafiziksel içerikli ve dolayısıyla bunların görünüşte problemler olduğunu belirterek bu tartışmaların bilimsel bilginin gelişimi önünde bir engel oluşturacağı kanaatindedir (Hızır, 1965, s. 254). Söz gelimi, Carnap’a göre, metafizik ögeler olgusal içeriğe sahip olmadığı ve sınanabilir nitelikte olmadıkları için bilim alanı içerisinde değerlendirilemez. Bu nedenle, metafizik ögeler hem doğrulanması mümkün olmadığı hem de dilin mantıksal dizimine genellikle uymadığı gerekçesiyle anlamsızdır (Öztürk, 2011, s. 155). Bu bakımdan Çevre üyelerine göre, olgulara dayanmayan ve bilimde yanılsamalara yol açan metafizik söylemler bilimden ayıklanmalı ve bilimsel bilgi ancak olgu ve deneye dayanan önermeler üzerinden yürütülmelidir. Öte yandan Çevre düşünürleri mantıksal çözümleme yoluyla olgulara dayanan önermelerin metafiziksel unsurlar içeren önermelerden ayırt edilebileceğini ifade etmiştir. Bu bağlamda metafizik önermeleri, metafizik olmayan önermelerden ayırt edecek ölçütün doğrulanabilirlik olduğunu savunurlar. Çevre üyelerinin bu tutumları bir bakıma bilim ve sözde bilim arasında ayrım yapma ve metafiziği bilimin dışında tutma çabası olarak da değerlendirilebilir (Kabadayı, 2011, s. 39-40). Yirminci yüzyıl bilim anlayışında bilimsel etkinlikte gözlemin ve gözlemi yürüten bilim insanlarının dolaysız öznel duyu verileriyle ilişkili olduğu bu nedenle gözlem verilerinin psikolojizmin etkisinde olduğu fikri ortaya atılır. Başta Neurath olmak üzere dönemin bilim felsefecileri bilimsel bilginin kültür, değer ve psikoloji gibi öznel unsurlardan uzaklaştığı sürece değerli olduğu kanısında olduğu için bu fikre karşı çıkmaktadır (Gillies, 2018, s. 123). Görüldüğü üzere, Çevre üyelerinin temel amacı metafizik önermelerden arındırılmış, olgulara dayanan bir bilime ulaşmaktır. Bu amacın gerçekleşmesine olanak sağlayacak yöntem ise mantıksal çözümlemedir. Bu bağlamda Çevre üyeleri olgulara dayanan ve doğrulanabilen önermelerin, söz dizimi (sentaks) ve anlamsal (semantik) açıdan incelemeye tabi tutulması gerektiğini düşünmektedir (Yardımcı, 2018, s. 13-15). Özellikle Carnap (1935, s. 9-10) doğrulamanın ancak öne sürülen önermenin mantıksal analize tabi tutularak yapılması gerektiğini iddia etmiştir (Irzık, 1962, s. 65). Bununla birlikte, felsefenin işlevi, önermeleri mantıksal analize tabi tutarak yalın hale getirmektir. İşte felsefenin bu yönü Neurath’da bilimin birliği, Carnap’ta ise bilimin sentaksı, yani bilimin mantığı üzerine çalışma anlamına gelir (Hızır, 1965, s. 252). Bilimi, bilim olmayandan ayırma yöntemi olarak kullanılan doğrulama işlemi, teorik bir söylem ve gözlem önermesi arasında yapılan bir işlem olması bakımından mantıksal ve dilsel bir özellik taşır. Buradaki temel sorun ise teorik bir önermenin gözlem önermelerine indirgenebilir nitelikte olması ve gözlem önermelerinin, gözlem ile nasıl ilişki kurduğunu saptamaktır. İşte Viyana Çevresi üyeleri bu ilişkinin protokol önermeleri ile kurulduğu kanaatindedir (Ural, 2012, s. 105-107) çünkü onlara göre; öznelerarası bir bilimin sağlanması için yansız ve anlam karmaşasından arındırılmış bir dil gereklidir (Serin, 2015, s. 55). Bu dil de ancak protokol önermeler aracılığıyla kurulabilir. Bu bağlamda Çevre üyelerinin, metafiziksel ifadeler barındıran önermelerin anlamsızlığı ve bilimleri ortak bir paydada birleştiren fiziksel bir dil oluşturma olmak üzere iki temel hedefinin olduğu söylenebilir (Godfrey-Smith, 2003, s. 25; Salgar, 2012, s. 187). (shrink)

Reasoning about analogical arguments is known to be subject to a variety of cognitive biases, and a lack of clarity about which factors can be considered strengths or weaknesses of an analogical argument. This can make it difficult both to design empirical experiments to study how people reason about analogical arguments, and to develop scalable tutoring tools for teaching how to reason and analyze analogical arguments. To address these concerns, we describe WG-A (Warrant Game — Analogy), a framework for people (...) to analyze analogical arguments based on Bartha’s (2010) Articulation Model of analogical argumentation. We carry out two experiments designed to probe WG-A’s effectiveness in improving participants’ ability to reason about analogical arguments and argumentation in general, and argue that WG-A is a promising approach, though it is in need of further development. (shrink)

Attempts to apply the mathematical tools of dynamical systems theory to cognition in a systematic way has been well under way since the early 90s and has been recognised as a “third contender” to computationalist and connectionist approaches :441–463, 1996). Nevertheless, it was also realised that such an application will not lead to a solid paradigm as straightforwardly as was initially hoped. In this paper I explicate a method for assessing such proposals by drawing upon Lakatos’s Criticism and the growth (...) of knowledge, Cambridge University Press, London, pp 91–195, 1970) methodology of scientific research programs. MSRP focuses on the heuristics of a particular field and gauges the model/theory building stratagems by reference to theoretical and empirical progress, on the one hand, and the continuity and the autonomy of the way the field’s heuristic generates its series of models/theories, on the other. The requirement of continuity and autonomy afford distinct senses of ad hoc-ness, which serve as an effective tool to detect various subtleties which may otherwise be missed: the present approach identifies shortcomings missed by Chemero’s radical embodied cognitive science and falsifies Chemero’s claim that the methodological powers of his model-based account is on a par with computationalism. In general, I claim that MSRP is relevant to current methodological issues in cognitive science and can supplement debates regarding “local” assessments of methodologies, such as that between mechanical versus covering-law explanations. MSRP must at least be viewed as a necessary constraint for any methodological considerations in cognitive science. (shrink)

While science is taken to differ from non-scientific activities in virtue of its methodology, metaphysics is usually defined in terms of its subject matter. However, many traditional questions of metaphysics are addressed in a variety of ways by science, making it difficult to demarcate metaphysics from science solely in terms of their subject matter. Are the methodologies of science and metaphysics sufficiently distinct to act as criteria of demarcation between the two? In this chapter we focus on several important overlaps (...) in the methodologies used within science and metaphysics in order to argue that focusing solely on methodology is insufficient to offer a sharp demarcation between metaphysics and science, and consider the consequences of this for the wider relationship between science and metaphysics. (shrink)

In this paper I defend the claim that Paul Feyerabend held a robust metaphilosophical position for most of his philosophical career. This position I call Decision-Based Epistemology and reconstruct it in terms of three key components: a form of epistemic voluntarism concerning the justification of philosophical positions and a behaviorist account of philosophical beliefs, which allows him to cast normative arguments concerning philosophical beliefs in scientific methodology, such as realism, in terms of means-ends relations. I then introduce non-naturalist and naturalist (...) variants of his conception of normativity, which I trace back to his mentors Viktor Kraft and Karl Popper, respectively. This distinction, introduced on the metaphilosophical level, can can be put to use to explain key changes in Feyerabend’s philosophical proposals, such as the viability of his methodological argument for realism. I conclude that this Decision-Based Epistemology should be further explored by historically embedding Feyerabend’s metaphilosophy in a voluntarist tradition of scientific philosophy. (shrink)

This paper is a reply to Richard Lauer’s “Is Social Ontology Prior to Social Scientific Methodology?” (2019) and an attempt to contribute to the meta-social ontological discourse more broadly. In the first part, I will give a rough sketch of Lauer’s general project and confront his pragmatist approach with a fundamental problem. The second part of my reply will provide a solution for this problem rooted in a philosophy of the social sciences in practice.

Carnap suggests that philosophy can be construed as being engaged solely in conceptual engineering. I argue that since many results of the sciences can be construed as stemming from conceptual engineering as well, Carnap’s account of philosophy can be methodologically naturalistic. This is also how he conceived of his account. That the sciences can be construed as relying heavily on conceptual engineering is supported by empirical investigations into scientific methodology, but also by a number of conceptual considerations. I present a (...) new conceptual consideration that generalizes Carnap’s conditions of adequacy for analytic–synthetic distinctions and thus widens the realm in which conceptual engineering can be used to choose analytic sentences. I apply these generalized conditions of adequacy to a recent analysis of scientific theories and defend the relevance of the analytic–synthetic distinction against criticisms by Quine, Demopoulos, and Papineau. (shrink)

Schlusslogische Letztbegründung is a collection of essays in honor of Kurt Walter Zeidler. Mr. Zeidler is a distinguished Kant- and Neo-Kantian-scholar who has reconstructed Kant's concept of transcendental logic in connection with the logic of the concept of Hegel and the logic of symbolization of Peirce. (cf. Zeidler: Grundriss der transzendentalen Logik, 3rd ed., Wien 2017) He has most notably inquired intensively into the relation of transcendental logic to philosophy of science (cf. Zeidler: Prolegomena zur Wissenschaftstheorie, Wien 2000) and to (...) phenomenology (cf. Zeidler: Vermittlungen. Zum antiken und neueren Idealismus, Wien 2016). He has also published several studies on Neo-Kantianism (cf. Zeidler: Provokationen. Zu Problemen des Neukantianismus, Wien 2018). This is refelected in the collection of essays by distinguished scholars who discuss and critically examine Zeidler's work. It includes contributions by Steinar Mathisen (Oslo), Wolfdietrich Schmied-Kowarzik (Vienna), Werner Flach (Lichtenau), Thomas Knoppe (Straberg), Geert Edel (Wyk/Föhr), Martin Bunte (Münster), Reinhard Hiltscher (Dresden), Walter Tydecks (Bensheim), Christian Krijnen (Amsterdam), Hartwig Wiedebach (Zürich), Max Gottschlich (Linz), Thomas Sören Hoffmann (Hagen), Rudolf Meer (Kaliningrad), Hans-Jürgen Müller (Frankfurt am Main), Robert König (Vienna), Ulrich Blau (Marburg), Karen Gloy (Luzern/Munich), Reinhold Breil (Aachen), Erhard Oeser (Vienna), Hans-Dieter Klein (Vienna), Hans Martin Dober (Tübingen), Kurt Walter Zeidler (Vienna) and Lois Marie Rendl (Vienna). (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to document Laudan's rejection of the appeal to intuition in the context of his development of normative naturalism. At one point in the development of his methodological thinking, Laudan appealed to pre-analytic intuitions, which might be employed to identify episodes in the history of science against which theories of scientific methodology are to be tested. However, Laudan came to reject this appeal to intuitions, and rejected this entire approach to the evaluation of a theory (...) of method. This is an important stage in the development of his normative naturalist meta-methodology. (shrink)

This paper aims to show that the development of Feyerabend’s philosophical ideas in the 1950s and 1960s largely took place in the context of debates on quantum mechanics. In particular, he developed his influential arguments for pluralism in science in discussions with the quantum physicist David Bohm, who had developed an alternative approach to quantum physics which (in Feyerabend’s perception) was met with a dogmatic dismissal by some of the leading quantum physicists. I argue that Feyerabend’s arguments for theoretical pluralism (...) and for challenging established theories were connected to his objections to the dogmatism and conservatism he observed in quantum physics. However, as Feyerabend gained insight into the physical details and historical complexities which led to the development of quantum mechanics, he gradually became more modest in his criticisms. His writings on quantum mechanics especially engaged with Niels Bohr; initially, he was critical of Bohr’s work in quantum mechanics, but in the late 1960s, he completely withdrew his criticism and even praised Bohr as a model scientist. He became convinced that however puzzling quantum mechanics seemed, it was methodologically unobjectionable – and this was crucial for his move towards ‘anarchism’ in philosophy of science. (shrink)

Retractions play an important role in research communication by highlighting and explaining how research projects have failed and thereby preventing these mistakes from being repeated. However, the process of retraction and the data it produces is often sparse or incomplete. Drawing on evidence from 2046 retraction records, Quan-Hoang Vuong discusses the emerging trends this data highlights and argues for the need to enforce reporting standards for retractions, as a means of de-stigmatising retraction and rewarding practising integrity in the scholarly record.

This chapter clarifies the concept of validation of computer simulations by comparing various definitions that have been proposed for the notion. While the definitions agree in taking validation to be an evaluationEvaluation, they differ on the following questions: What exactly is evaluated—results from a computer simulation, a model, a computer codeCode? What are the standardsStandard of evaluationEvaluation––truthTruth, accuracyAccuracy, and credibilityCredibility or also something else? What type of verdict does validation lead to––that the simulation is such and such good, or that (...) it passes a testTest defined by a certain threshold? How strong needs the case to be for the verdict? Does validation necessarily proceed by comparing simulation outputsOutput with measured dataData? Along with these questions, the chapter explains notions that figure prominently in them, e.g., the concepts of accuracy and credibility. It further discusses natural answers to the questions as well as arguments that speak in favor and against these answers. The aim is to obtain a better understandingUnderstanding of the options we have for defining validation and how they are related to each other. (shrink)

Scientific knowledge is the most solid and robust kind of knowledge that humans have because of its inherent self-correcting character. Nevertheless, anti-evolutionists, climate denialists, and anti-vaxxers, among others, question some of the best-established scientific findings, making claims unsupported by empirical evidence. A common aspect of these claims is reference to the uncertainties of science concerning evolution, climate change, vaccination, and so on. This is inaccurate: whereas the broad picture is clear, there will always exist uncertainties about the details of the (...) respective phenomena. This book shows that uncertainty is an inherent feature of science that does not devalue it. In contrast, uncertainty advances science because it motivates further research. This is the first book on this topic that draws on philosophy of science to explain what uncertainty in science is and how it makes science advance. It contrasts evolution, climate change, and vaccination, where the uncertainties are exaggerated, and genetic testing and forensic science, where the uncertainties are usually overlooked. The goal is to discuss the scientific, psychological, and philosophical aspects of uncertainty in order to explain what it really is, what kinds of problems it actually poses, and why in the end it makes science advance. Contrary to public representations of scientific findings and conclusions that produce an intuitive but distorted view of science as certain, people need to understand and learn to live with uncertainty in science. This book is intended for anyone who wants to get a clear view of the nature of science. (shrink)

We philosophers of science have before us an important new task that we need urgently to take up. It is to convince the scientific community to adopt and implement a new philosophy of science that does better justice to the deeply problematic basic intellectual aims of science than that which we have at present. Problematic aims evolve with evolving knowledge, that part of philosophy of science concerned with aims and methods thus becoming an integral part of science itself. The outcome (...) of putting this new philosophy into scientific practice would be a new kind of science, both more intellectually rigorous, and one that does better justice to the best interests of humanity. (shrink)

The Methods of Science and Religion is a philosophical analysis of the conflict between science and religion, which challenges the popular, contemporary view that science and religion are complementary worldviews. It exposes their methodological incompatibility and concludes that religious modes of investigation are unreliable.

The indisputable success of experimental science caused a division in philosophy at the turn of the 21st century. A substantial part of philosophers was inspired by ground-breaking writings of W. V. O. Quine and they followed philosophical naturalism that considers hypothetical-deductive method the most effective or the only way to acquire justified true beliefs. Other philosophers are worried about the hegemony of empirical sciences and warn against excessive ambitions of scientific methodology. Scientism or scientific imperialism is a point of view, (...) according to which there are no boundaries of scientific knowledge. According to its supporters, science can describe and explain what is to be described and explained. In my paper I will introduce some common ways how to define and criticize scientism and scientific imperialism. The aim is to demonstrate that criticism of scientism and scientific imperialism is based on the incorrect understanding of what scientific methodology is, how scientific knowledge emerges from natural cognition and in which ways science differs from its alternatives. (shrink)

The author asks whether there was a “scientific ‘68”, and focuses on aspects of two specific methodological proposals defined in the 1940s and 50s by the terms “action research” and “mixing methods”, applied particularly to social sciences. In the first, the climate surrounding the events of 1968 contributed to heightening the participative element to be found –by definition– in “action research”; that is: the importance of making the research subjects themselves participants in the design, execution and application of the study (...) of which they are the focus. This approach captured the democratic and anti-authoritarian spirit at the heart of the proposal, which was part of the prevailing climate in those days. The repercussions of 1968 on “mixing methods” focused on studying what had actually occurred, especially between the youth and workers, and therefore, particularly from the point of view of sociology and social psychology, using a “mixed methods” approach. The author explores the proposal of Norman Denzin; but traces the recent origins of both “mixing methods” and “action research” back to the proposals of mainly Kurt Lewin and the Chicago School. (shrink)

Causation is the main foundation upon which the possibility of science rests. Without causation, there would be no scientific understanding, explanation, prediction, nor application in new technologies. How we discover causal connections is no easy matter, however. Causation often lies hiddenfrom view and it is vital that we adopt the right methods for uncovering it. The choice of methods will inevitably reflect what one takes causation to be, making an accurate account of causation an even more pressing matter. This enquiry (...) informs the correct norms for an empirical study of the world. In Causation in Science and the Methods of Scientific Discovery, Rani Lill Anjum and Stephen Mumford propose nine new norms of scientific discovery. A number of existing methodological and philosophical orthodoxies are challenged as they argue that progress in science is being held back by an overlysimplistic philosophy of causation. (shrink)

One of the most enduring contributions of Sir Karl Popper to the philosophy of science was his deductive approach to the scientific method, as opposed to Hilary Putnam’s absolute faith in science as an inductive process. Popper’s logic of discovery counters the whole inductive procedure that modern science is so often identified with. While the inductive method has generally characterized how scientists commence their work in laboratories, for Popper scientific theories actually start with generalizations inside our mind whose validity the (...) scientific method must test until those come to be falsified. A step further in the scientific method is the function of paradigms that Thomas Kuhn’s revolutionary science has developed. Kuhn’s community and consensus-based approach and Popper’s hypothesis-based approach are both important in the development of science as it is. This paper seeks to show how models of development may be integrated in the above debate in order to derive insightful implications that are crucial to the understanding of economic progress and human development. (shrink)

Replicability and reproducibility of computational models has been somewhat understudied by “the replication movement.” In this paper, we draw on methodological studies into the replicability of psychological experiments and on the mechanistic account of explanation to analyze the functions of model replications and model reproductions in computational neuroscience. We contend that model replicability, or independent researchers' ability to obtain the same output using original code and data, and model reproducibility, or independent researchers' ability to recreate a model without original code, (...) serve different functions and fail for different reasons. This means that measures designed to improve model replicability may not enhance (and, in some cases, may actually damage) model reproducibility. We claim that although both are undesirable, low model reproducibility poses more of a threat to long-term scientific progress than low model replicability. In our opinion, low model reproducibility stems mostly from authors' omitting to provide crucial information in scientific papers and we stress that sharing all computer code and data is not a solution. Reports of computational studies should remain selective and include all and only relevant bits of code. (shrink)

Ce chapitre reprend, en l’enrichissant, un article antérieur sur la philosophie de la biologie de l’empirisme logique, en en examinant les thèses centrales telles qu’elles sont exprimées lors des rencontres de Prague, de Paris et de Copenhague, rencontres décisives pour le développement du mouvement et son rayonnement dans le monde occidental. Je montre que l’empirisme logique n’a pas contribué au développement de la philosophie de la biologie, comme il l’a fait pour celui de la philosophie de la physique ou des (...) mathématiques. Les raisons de cet échec sont triples: 1o) les empiristes logiques n’avaient qu’une vague connaissance des sciences biologiques; 2o) ils se sont focalisés sur un cadre stérile, l’antivitalisme et le réductionisme, qu’ils prenaient pour la philosophie de la biologie; 3o) cela les a empêchés de traiter des véritables problèmes de la biologie. Entre les différentes sections de ce chapitre, j’insère des « intermezzos» qui replacent différents protagonistes de ces rencontres dans un contexte plus large. (shrink)

What role does the imagination play in scientific progress? After examining several studies in cognitive science, I argue that one thing the imagination does is help to increase scientific understanding, which is itself indispensable for scientific progress. Then, I sketch a transcendental justification of the role of imagination in this process.

Despite the increasing recognition that heuristics may be involved in myriad scientific activities, much about how to use them prudently remains obscure. As typically defined, heuristics are efficient rules or procedures for converting complex problems into simpler ones. But this increased efficiency and problem-solving power comes at the cost of a systematic bias. As Wimsatt showed, biased modelling heuristics can conceal errors, leading to poor decisions or inaccurate models. This liability to produce errors presents a fundamental challenge to the philosophical (...) value of heuristic analyses. Heuristics may be powerful and efficient procedures, but their practical value for science and epistemology is significantly mitigated if we do not have a principled methodology for knowing how to use them wisely. In this essay, I extend Wimsatt’s analyses to argue that this challenge for a heuristic methodology can be met by appealing to second-order, or meta-, heuristics—that is, practical guidelines that prescribe the appropriate conditions for a first-order heuristic’s use. 1 Introduction2 Background3 Heuristics and Meta-heuristics4 A Hierarchical Model and Three Applications4.1 Decision making in emergency medicine4.2 Mathematical explanation in physics4.3 Resilience in ecological management5 Conclusion. (shrink)

Fallgeschichten werden seit dem 18. Jahrhundert zunehmend genutzt, um juristisches, psychologisches und medizinisches Wissen einer grösseren Öffentlichkeit zu vermitteln. In den letzten zehn Jahren haben sie auch in den Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften mehr Aufmerksamkeit erfahren. Die Diskussion über paradigmatische Fälle in diesem Band zielt darauf ab, Fallgeschichten in ihrer Funktion als besonders anschauliche oder lehrreiche Beispiele in verschiedenen historischen Kontexten zu untersuchen und zu vergleichen. Die in diesem Heft versammelten Texte gehen der Frage nach, wie Fälle dazu beitragen, Debatten zu (...) verdichten und Entwicklungen erzählbar zu machen, wie sie über den Einzelfall hinausgehendes Wissen generieren und so paradigmatischen Status erlangen. Neben konzeptuellen Gesichtspunkten widmen sich die Beiträge mehreren Forschungsfeldern, darunter der Rechts- und Medizingeschichte, der Geschichte der Geschichtsschreibung, literarischen Fällen, den Sozialwissenschaften und der Technikgeschichte. (shrink)

Peer review is an opportunity to perform an unlawful censorship which ensures that no apostate notion ever get published in mainstream journals. Or such peer review censorship is an opportunity to steal any content and to claim afterward the priority of first publication. And last but not least, the peer review is an academic tool to promote the mainstream pseudoscience.

I examine the topic of training scientific generalists. To focus the discussion, I propose the creation of a new graduate program, analogous in structure to existing MD/PhD programs, aimed at training a critical mass of scientific researchers with substantial intellectual breadth. In addition to completing the normal requirements for a PhD, students would undergo an intense, several year training period designed to expose them to the core vocabulary of multiple subjects at the graduate level. After providing some historical and philosophical (...) context for this proposal, I outline how such a program could be implemented with little institutional overhead by existing research universities. Finally, I discuss alternative possibilities for training generalists by taking advantage of contemporary developments in online learning and open science. (shrink)

Contemporary scientific research faces major cultural and institutional hurdles. Some of the primary challenges include an exploding knowledge base and organizational complexity of many scientific projects, the overproduction of PhDs relative to the availability of faculty positions, and protracted educational trajectories for many aspiring researchers. Perhaps the most serious set of consequences caused by the fierce competition of modern science are low rates of reproducibility in research studies across many disciplines, a startling reality which undermines the scientific process and institutional (...) authority itself. In an increasingly interconnected intellectual world, where fundamental and applied research are deeply interwoven, the implications of this state of affairs extend well beyond the research laboratory. In this article, I explore one possible strategy among the many necessary interventions for addressing these critical global issues, namely, new graduate programs to train scientific generalists. Rather than focus on developing niche technical skills, these programs would train outstanding communicators and decision makers who have been exposed to multiple subjects at the graduate level. The motivation for creating such programs is to introduce a large number of exceptionally trained individuals across all industries and organizations who have been encouraged to think critically about the practical realities and contemporary cultural trends of scientific research. I suggest possible avenues for structuring such programs and examine the roles that generalists might play in the modern research, policy, and industrial landscape. (shrink)

In several recent articles, I proposed the creation of new graduate programs aimed at training scientific generalists. Here, I collect and respond to a number of comments and criticisms raised in response to these proposals.