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Ronald N. Giere [89]Ronald Giere [22]Ronald Nelson Giere [1]
  1. Scientific perspectivism.Ronald N. Giere - 2006 - Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
    Many people assume that the claims of scientists are objective truths. But historians, sociologists, and philosophers of science have long argued that scientific claims reflect the particular historical, cultural, and social context in which those claims were made. The nature of scientific knowledge is not absolute because it is influenced by the practice and perspective of human agents. Scientific Perspectivism argues that the acts of observing and theorizing are both perspectival, and this nature makes scientific knowledge contingent, as Thomas Kuhn (...)
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  2. Science without laws.Ronald N. Giere - 1999 - Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
    Debate over the nature of science has recently moved from the halls of academia into the public sphere, where it has taken shape as the "science wars." At issue is the question of whether scientific knowledge is objective and universal or socially mediated, whether scientific truths are independent of human values and beliefs. Ronald Giere is a philosopher of science who has been at the forefront of this debate from its inception, and Science without Laws offers a much-needed mediating perspective (...)
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  3. How models are used to represent reality.Ronald N. Giere - 2004 - Philosophy of Science 71 (5):742-752.
    Most recent philosophical thought about the scientific representation of the world has focused on dyadic relationships between language-like entities and the world, particularly the semantic relationships of reference and truth. Drawing inspiration from diverse sources, I argue that we should focus on the pragmatic activity of representing, so that the basic representational relationship has the form: Scientists use models to represent aspects of the world for specific purposes. Leaving aside the terms "law" and "theory," I distinguish principles, specific conditions, models, (...)
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  4. Understanding Scientific Reasoning.Ronald N. Giere, John Bickle & Robert F. Mauldin - 2006 - Fort Worth, TX, USA: Cengage Learning.
    Understanding Scientific Reasoning, Fifth Edition, develops critical reasoning skills and guides students in the improvement of their scientific and technological literacy. The authors teach students how to understand and critically evaluate the scientific information they encounter in both textbooks and the popular media. With its focus on scientific pedagogy, Understanding Scientific Reasoning helps students learn how to examine scientific reports with a reasonable degree of sophistication. The book also explains how to reason through case studies using the same informal logic (...)
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  5.  96
    Scientific Explanation and the Causal Structure of the World.Ronald N. Giere - 1988 - Philosophical Review 97 (3):444.
  6.  61
    Explaining Science.Ronald Giere - 1991 - Noûs 25 (3):386-388.
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  7. An agent-based conception of models and scientific representation.Ronald N. Giere - 2010 - Synthese 172 (2):269–281.
    I argue for an intentional conception of representation in science that requires bringing scientific agents and their intentions into the picture. So the formula is: Agents (1) intend; (2) to use model, M; (3) to represent a part of the world, W; (4) for some purpose, P. This conception legitimates using similarity as the basic relationship between models and the world. Moreover, since just about anything can be used to represent anything else, there can be no unified ontology of models. (...)
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  8. Using models to represent reality.Ronald N. Giere - 1999 - In L. Magnani, Nancy Nersessian & Paul Thagard (eds.), Model-Based Reasoning in Scientific Discovery. Kluwer/Plenum. pp. 41--57.
  9. Objective single-case probabilities and the foundations of statistics.Ronald N. Giere - 2010 - In Antony Eagle (ed.), Philosophy of Probability: Contemporary Readings. New York: Routledge.
  10. Philosophy of science naturalized.Ronald N. Giere - 1985 - Philosophy of Science 52 (3):331-356.
    In arguing a "role for history," Kuhn was proposing a naturalized philosophy of science. That, I argue, is the only viable approach to the philosophy of science. I begin by exhibiting the main general objections to a naturalistic approach. These objections, I suggest, are equally powerful against nonnaturalistic accounts. I review the failure of two nonnaturalistic approaches, methodological foundationism (Carnap, Reichenbach, and Popper) and metamethodology (Lakatos and Laudan). The correct response, I suggest, is to adopt an "evolutionary perspective." This perspective (...)
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  11.  97
    15 Scientific cognition as distributed cognition.Ronald Giere - 2002 - In Peter Carruthers, Stephen P. Stich & Michael Siegal (eds.), The Cognitive Basis of Science. New York: Cambridge University Press. pp. 285.
  12. Distributed Cognition: Where the Cognitive and the Social Merge.Ronald N. Giere & B. Moffatt - 2003 - Social Studies of Science 33 (2):301--310.
    Among the many contested boundaries in science studies is that between the cognitive and the social. Here, we are concerned to question this boundary from a perspective within the cognitive sciences based on the notion of distributed cognition. We first present two of many contemporary sources of the notion of distributed cognition, one from the study of artificial neural networks and one from cognitive anthropology. We then proceed to reinterpret two well-known essays by Bruno Latour, ‘Visualization and Cognition: Thinking with (...)
     
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  13. Distributed cognition without distributed knowing.Ronald N. Giere - 2007 - Social Epistemology 21 (3):313-320.
    In earlier works, I have argued that it is useful to think of much scientific activity, particularly in experimental sciences, as involving the operation of distributed cognitive systems, as these are understood in the contemporary cognitive sciences. Introducing a notion of distributed cognition, however, invites consideration of whether, or in what way, related cognitive activities, such as knowing, might also be distributed. In this paper I will argue that one can usefully introduce a notion of distributed cognition without attributing other (...)
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  14.  78
    Scientific Rationality as Instrumental Rationality.Ronald N. Giere - 1989 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 20 (3):377.
  15.  12
    From W Issenschaftliche Philosophie to Philosophy of Science.Ronald N. Giere - 1999 - University of Chicago Press.
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  16. The cognitive structure of scientific theories.Ronald N. Giere - 1994 - Philosophy of Science 61 (2):276-296.
    This paper explores a new reason for preferring a model-theoretic approach to understanding the nature of scientific theories. Identifying the models in philosophers' model-theoretic accounts of theories with the concepts in cognitive scientists' accounts of categorization suggests a structure to families of models far richer than has commonly been assumed. Using classical mechanics as an example, it is argued that families of models may be "mapped" as an array with "horizontal" graded structures, multiply hierarchical "vertical" structures, and local "radial" structures. (...)
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  17. Discussion note: Distributed cognition in epistemic cultures.Ronald N. Giere - 2002 - Philosophy of Science 69 (4):637-644.
    In Epistemic Cultures (1999), Karin Knorr Cetina argues that different scientific fields exhibit different epistemic cultures. She claims that in high energy physics (HEP) individual persons are displaced as epistemic subjects in favor of experiments themselves. In molecular biology (MB), by contrast, individual persons remain the primary epistemic subjects. Using Ed Hutchins' (1995) account of navigation aboard a traditional US Navy ship as a prototype, I argue that both HEP and MB exhibit forms of distributed cognition. That is, in both (...)
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  18. Is computer simulation changing the face of experimentation?Ronald N. Giere - 2009 - Philosophical Studies 143 (1):59 - 62.
    Morrison points out many similarities between the roles of simulation models and other sorts of models in science. On the basis of these similarities she claims that running a simulation is epistemologically on a par with doing a traditional experiment and that the output of a simulation therefore counts as a measurement. I agree with her premises but reject the inference. The epistemological payoff of a traditional experiment is greater (or less) confidence in the fit between a model and a (...)
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  19. Why scientific models should not be regarded as works of fiction.Ronald Giere - 2008 - In Mauricio Suárez (ed.), Fictions in Science: Philosophical Essays on Modeling and Idealization. New York: Routledge. pp. 248--258.
     
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  20. Perspectival Pluralism.Ronald Giere - 2006 - In Geoffrey Hellman (ed.), ¸ Itekellersetal:Sp. pp. 26--41.
    In this paper I explore the extent to which a perspectival understanding of scientific knowledge supports forms of “scientific pluralism.” I will not initially attempt to formulate a general characterization of either perspectivism or scientific pluralism. I assume only that both are opposed to two extreme views. The one extreme is a (monistic) metaphysical realism according to which there is in principle one true and complete theory of everything. The other extreme is a constructivist relativism according to which scientific claims (...)
     
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  21. The nature and function of models.Ronald N. Giere - 2001 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 24 (6):1060-1060.
    There is no best scientific model of anything; there are only models more or less good for different purposes. Thus, there is no general answer to the question of whether one should model biological behavior using computer simulations or robots. It all depends on what one wants to learn. This is not a question about models, but about scientific goals.
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  22.  62
    Origins of Logical Empiricism. Minnesota Studies in Philosophy of Science, Vol. XVI.Ronald N. Giere & Alan W. Richardson (eds.) - 1996 - Univ of Minnesota Press.
    This latest volume in the eminent Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science series examines the main features of the intellectual milieu from which logical empiricism sprang, providing the first critical exploration of this context by ...
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  23. The role of agency in distributed cognitive systems.Ronald N. Giere - 2006 - Philosophy of Science 73 (5):710-719.
    In previous publications I have argued that much scientific activity should be thought of as involving the operation of distributed cognitive systems. Since these contributions to the cognitive study of science appear in venues not necessarily frequented by philosophers of science, I begin with a brief introduction to the notion of a distributed cognitive system. I then describe what I take to be an exemplary case of a scientific distributed cognitive system, the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). I do not here (...)
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  24. Kuhn as Perspectival Realist.Ronald N. Giere - 2013 - Topoi 32 (1):53-57.
    In this essay I argue that T. S. Kuhn, at least in his later works, can be regarded as a perspectival realist. This is a retrospective interpretation based mainly on the essays published posthumously under the title The Road Since Structure (Kuhn 2000). Among the strongest grounds for this interpretation is that Kuhn explicitly states that one must have a “lexicon” in place before raising questions about the truth or falsity of claims made using elements of the lexicon. This, in (...)
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  25.  73
    A laplacean formal semantics for single-case propensities.Ronald N. Giere - 1976 - Journal of Philosophical Logic 5 (3):321 - 353.
    Even those generally skeptical of propensity interpretations of probability must now grant the following two points. First, the above single-case propensity interpretation meets recognized formal conditions for being a genuine interpretation of probability. Second, this interpretation is not logically reducible to a hypothetical relative frequency interpretation, nor is it only vacuously different from such an interpretation.The main objection to this propensity interpretation must be not that it is too vague or vacuous, but that it is metaphysically too extravagant. It asserts (...)
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  26. (1 other version)A new program for philosophy of science?Ronald N. Giere - 2003 - Philosophy of Science 70 (1):15-21.
    I contend that Janet Kourany's "A Philosophy of Science for the Twenty-First Century" contains three levels of projects: (1) a naturalistic project, (2) a critical project, and (3) a political project. The naturalistic project is already well established. The critical project is less valued and less established within the profession, but seems a worthy and achievable goal. The political project, I argue, takes one outside the professional pursuit of the philosophy of science. The critical project encompasses both the evaluation of (...)
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  27. The Problem of Agency in Scientific Distributed Cognitive Systems.Ronald Giere - 2004 - Journal of Cognition and Culture 4 (3-4):759-774.
    From the perspective of cognitive science, it is illuminating to think of much contemporary scientific research as taking place in distributed cognitive systems. This is particularly true of large-scale experimental and observational systems such as the Hubble Telescope. Clark, Hutchins, Knorr-Cetina, and Latour insist or imply such a move requires expanding our notions of knowledge, mind, and even consciousness. Whether this is correct seems to me not a straightforward factual question. Rather, the issue seems to be how best to develop (...)
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  28. Scientific perspectivism: behind the stage door.Ronald N. Giere - 2009 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 40 (2):221-223.
    Adopting the stage metaphor suggested in Brown’s review, and treating Scientific perspectivism as a play in five acts, I respond to his review as a playwright might respond to a generally favorable review. Taking the reader behind the stage door, I discuss the playwright’s intentions for each act, paying special attention to the expected audience for the play as a whole. The result, therefore, supplements the review from the standpoint of the playwright. It also provides answers to some of the (...)
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  29. Modest Evolutionary Naturalism.Ronald N. Giere - 2006 - Biological Theory 1 (1):52-60.
    I begin by arguing that a consistent general naturalism must be understood in terms of methodological maxims rather than metaphysical doctrines. Some specific maxims are proposed. I then defend a generalized naturalism from the common objection that it is incapable of accounting for the normative aspects of human life, including those of scientific practice itself. Evolutionary naturalism, however, is criticized as being incapable of providing a sufficient explanation of categorical moral norms. Turning to the epistemological norms of science itself, particularly (...)
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  30. 1. Preface Preface (p. vii).Michael Dickson, Don Howard, Scott Tanona, Mathias Frisch, Eric Winsberg, Arnold Koslow, Paul Teller, Ronald N. Giere, Mary S. Morgan & Mauricio Suárez - 2004 - Philosophy of Science 71 (5).
  31.  52
    ESP and Psychokinesis: A Philosophical Examination.Ronald N. Giere & Stephen E. Braude - 1982 - Philosophical Review 91 (2):288.
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  32. Laws, theories, and generalizations.Ronald Giere - 1988 - In A. Grünbaum & W. Salmon (eds.), Limitstions of Deductivism. University of California Press, Berkeley, Ca. pp. 37--46.
  33.  81
    Scientific cognition: human centered but not human bound.Ronald N. Giere - 2012 - Philosophical Explorations 15 (2):199 - 206.
    While agreeing that cognition in the sciences is usefully thought of as involving processes encompassing both humans and artifacts, I object to attributing cognitive states to extended systems. I argue that cognitive states, such as ?knowing?, should be confined to the human components of cognitive systems. My argument appeals to the large dimensions, both spatial and temporal, of many scientific cognitive systems, the existence of epistemic norms, and the need for agents in science.
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  34. The role of computation in scientific cognition.Ronald N. Giere - unknown
    This paper is a contribution to that part of science studies known as 'the cognitive study of science'. The general goal of such studies is to understand cogni-.
     
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  35. Models as parts of distributed cognitive systems.Ronald Giere - manuscript
    Recent work on the role of models in science has revealed a great many kinds of models performing many different roles. In this paper I suggest that one can find much unity among all this diversity by thinking of many models as being components of distributed cognitive systems. I begin by distinguishing the relevant notion of a distributed cognitive system and then give examples of different kinds of models that can be thought of as functioning as components of such systems. (...)
     
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  36. Scientific Realism: Old and New Problems.Ronald N. Giere - 2005 - Erkenntnis 63 (2):149-165.
    Scientific realism is a doctrine that was both in and out of fashion several times during the twentieth century. I begin by noting three presuppositions of a succinct characterization of scientific realism offered initially by the foremost critic in the latter part of the century, Bas van Fraassen. The first presupposition is that there is a fundamental distinction to be made between what is “empirical” and what is “theoretical”. The second presupposition is that a genuine scientific realism is committed to (...)
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  37. Models in Science and in Learning Science: Focusing Scientific Practice on Sense-making.Cynthia Passmore, Julia Svoboda Gouvea & Ronald Giere - 2014 - In Michael R. Matthews (ed.), International Handbook of Research in History, Philosophy and Science Teaching. Springer. pp. 1171-1202.
    The central aim of science is to make sense of the world. To move forward as a community endeavor, sense-making must be systematic and focused. The question then is how do scientists actually experience the sense-making process? In this chapter we examine the “practice turn” in science studies and in particular how as a result of this turn scholars have come to realize that models are the “functional unit” of scientific thought and form the center of the reasoning/sense-making process. This (...)
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  38.  76
    Feyerabend's perspectivism.Ronald N. Giere - 2016 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 57:137-141.
    Although, Feyerabend himself seems never to have used the term ‘perspectivism’ to designate a philosophical position, I think his views about science are very well characterized as perspectival. In fact, his later writings contain much that contributes to current thinking about perspectivism. I would like, therefore, to distinguish my own perspectivism from Feyerabend's. In the end, I will argue, his perspectivism is lacking enough of the critical bite that the younger Feyerabend found so attractive in Popper's philosophy.
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  39. Propensity and necessity.Ronald N. Giere - 1979 - Synthese 40 (3):439 - 451.
  40.  90
    Causal Models with Frequency Dependence.Ronald N. Giere - 1984 - Journal of Philosophy 81 (7):384.
  41.  63
    The scientist as adult.Ronald N. Giere - 1996 - Philosophy of Science 63 (4):538-541.
    My concern is with the possible implications of research in developmental psychology for understanding the workings of modern science. I agree both with Gopnik's general naturalistic orientation and with her more specific claims about scientists as cognitive agents. Neither the formal structure of propositions nor the social structure of scientific communities provides sufficient resources for the understanding we seek. So I agree that the empirical study of human cognition is not only relevant, but necessary, for understanding how science works.
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  42. Models, metaphysics, and methodology.Ronald Giere - manuscript
    This paper constitutes my first attempt publicly to comment on Nancy Cartwright’s philosophy of science. That I have not done this earlier is primarily due to the great similarities in our views on topics where our interests overlap.2 But Cartwright’s work also covers topics I have never seriously considered, such as the use of linear models in economics and the measurement problem in quantum mechanics. Even the subject of probabilistic causation, to which I once contributed, is not one I now (...)
     
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  43. The units of analysis in science studies.Ronald N. Giere - 1989 - In Steve Fuller (ed.), The Cognitive turn: sociological and psychological perspectives on science. Boston: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
     
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  44. The cognitive study of science.Ronald N. Giere - 1987 - In Nancy Nersessian (ed.), The Process of science: contemporary philosophical approaches to understanding scientific practice. Hingham, MA, USA: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
  45.  13
    Contingency, Conditional Realism, and the Evolution of the Sciences.Ronald Giere - unknown
    A little over a decade ago, Ian Hacking posed the question: “How inevitable are the results of successful science?” “This is,” he claimed, “one of the few significant philosophical issues that arises in constructionism debates about science.” (Hacking 2000, 61) While perhaps not attaining the status it deserves, this question has attracted sufficient interest so that it is becoming increasingly difficult to add something new to the debate....
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  46.  35
    A New Framework for Teaching Scientific Reasoning.Ronald N. Giere - 2001 - Argumentation 15 (1):21-33.
  47.  26
    What does explanatory coherence explain?Ronald N. Giere - 1989 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 12 (3):475-476.
  48.  41
    Representing with physical models.Ronald Giere - 2011 - In Paul Humphreys & Cyrille Imbert (eds.), Models, Simulations, and Representations. New York: Routledge.
    Physical models have long been used to represent a great many things. By and large, however, the representational powers of physical models have been taken for granted in recent philosophy of science. Interest has focused on more ubiquitous and seemingly more important theoretical models, particularly those found in mathematical physics. In this paper, I focus on physical models, comparing them with theoretical models and finally with recently popular computational models. My aim is to show that the representational aspects of models (...)
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  49.  69
    Bayesian statistics and biased procedures.Ronald N. Giere - 1969 - Synthese 20 (3):371 - 387.
    A comparison of Neyman's theory of interval estimation with the corresponding subjective Bayesian theory of credible intervals shows that the Bayesian approach to the estimation of statistical parameters allows experimental procedures which, from the orthodox objective viewpoint, are clearly biased and clearly inadmissible. This demonstrated methodological difference focuses attention on the key difference in the two general theories, namely, that the orthodox theory is supposed to provide a known average frequency of successful estimates, whereas the Bayesian account provides only a (...)
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  50.  53
    Viewing Science.Ronald N. Giere - 1994 - PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association 1994:3 - 16.
    This address focuses on those of us engaged in viewing science, particularly philosophers and sociologists of science. I begin with a historical perspective on the philosophy of science, focusing on the historical contingencies which have shaped its development since the 1930s. I then turn my gaze to the more recent history of the sociology of science. For both disciplines I hold up to view the reflexive problem of the status of that discipline's claims from its own perspective. I conclude with (...)
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