Abstract

The Nature of Explanation is the only work published by Kenneth Craik before his death in 1945. In his brief career he was particularly interested in exploring physiological and mechanistic hypotheses about human thought and behaviour. This interest was caused, basically, by the conviction that philosophy must adopt a bold experimental approach to its problems. Explanations are best constructed experimentally because ultimately they must confront and satisfy the tests of experience. In the spirit of this approach he outlines a symbolic ‘modelling’ theory of thought: ‘the nervous system is viewed as a calculating machine capable of modelling or paralleling external events’. ‘The possessor of a nervous system is thus able to anticipate events instead of making invariable empirical trial. Such a view is tentatively applied to a number of philosophical and psychological problems where ontological explanations, in my opinion, have failed.…Finally, a few possible experimental methods for testing such theories are reviewed and some criticisms considered. I hope, however, that experiment will be thought the final arbiter’.