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TEKST 2. Durbin, Paul T. (1984). A Guide to The Culture of Science , Technology , and Medicine . – The Free Press. pp. 217-222. (Katkendid)

C. Frameworks for Philosophy of Science

In this section our aim is to examine alternative approaches to the philosophy of science from a logical point of view. Given the historical and sociological welter of views discussed, we want to be able to think about this or that particular question or approach as the realization of a logical possibility. Alternatively, one might say that our aim is to examine classificatory schemes that might be used to organize or systematize one’s thoughts about the philosophy of science.
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Seven sets of approaches will be discussed here .
1. Activities vs. Results . In the first place , one may approach our subject assuming that it is science as a human activity or set of activities that should be the focus of one’s attention . The philosopher should be interested in discovering the sorts of things that scientists typically do. So one would raise questions like, How are scientific discoveries made? and, How are theories established or discredited? /…/
Alternatively, one might focus on science as a set of results that are generated by human activities. Then the center stage would be occupied by questions like, According to contemporary science, what is the nature of space and time? The objects of philosophers’ attention in this case are not space and time themselves, which are the objects of scientists’ attention, but scientists’ views about space and time. /…/ Insofar as one is committed to philosophical reflection about the world, scientific procedures may be less interesting than scientific results. One may speculate about the great questions of theology and philosophy as philosophers and theologians have always speculated, but one must try to accommodate the results of science in one’s speculations. Of course, if one abandons all attempts at accommodation, then one’s philosophy of nature and science will be indistinguishable from purely speculative metaphysics. /…/
2. Functional and Formal . Second, one may proceed from a functional or a formal point of view. In the former case, one would raise questions such as, How do scientific laws function ? or What role do laws play in the scientific enterprise? In the latter case on might ask, What is the logical structure of scientific laws and theories? A systematic structural analysis of the key concepts in science would yield what some authors have referred to as a “theory of science.” It would provide not only unifying threads among diverse disciplines, but clear structural or formal lines of demarcation. /…/
3. Broad Synthetic vs. Narrow Analytic. Third, one may approach science from a narrow analytic or a broad synthetic point of view. That is, one could see one’s task as primarily dissecting various features of science to see how they look or work , or as primarily locating science within a broader framework of human activities and artifacts. Questions about, for example, the form and function of scientific explanations would be relevant to the former (analytic) approach, while questions about the relevance of morality to science would merit special attention in the latter (synthetic) approach. /…/
Perhaps one of the reasons for the lack of communication between Anglo-American and European philosophers of science is that most of the former have been analytic and most of the latter have been synthetic in their approaches. Where the analysts have been interested in investigating science as a splendid truth - finding enterprise, the synthesists have been interested in giving a critique of science as one cultural artifact among many others , with peculiar advantages and disadvantages for other cultural artifacts and for human development. Were the analysts have sought to understand the object of their admiration, the synthesists have sought to put that object to work for a wide variety of interests of human beings. In a sense , then, the synthesists have been more pragmatic in their aims than the analysts. Although , because their immediate goals have been so different , the two schools have found little to talk about, recent efforts by Anglo-Americans to investigate the evaluative and ethical implications of science suggest that there may be more opportunities for dialogue in the future. /…/.
4. Descriptive and Prescriptive. Fourth, one may think critically about science as it is (or has been) on the one hand , or as it ought to be on the other. In the former case, one’s task is essentially that of accurately reporting the nature of the enterprise, while in the latter one is prescribing the nature of the enterprise as it should be in order to satisfy certain normative requirements. /…/
As one might expect, it is often difficult to determine whether a particular philosophical account of some feature of science is an accurate report of what is the case or a persuasive characterization of what ought to be the case. Logical positivists or empiricists often talk about providing “ rational reconstruction” of various aspects of science. It remains an open question, however , whether any particular reconstruction does what it is supposed to do or merely provides a reasonable but largely fictional account of some event in the history of science. For example, although it is possible to describe the process of theory appraisal as subjecting theories to severe tests in the interests of destroying bad theories as soon as possible, it is questionable whether most scientists are conscious of such interests. An explication of the concept of theory corroboration in terms of severe testing with particular aims in mind may rationalize but fictionalize scientific practice . /…/
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5. Syntactic, Semantic, and Pragmatic. Fifth, in the task of analyzing or explicating key concepts in science, three distinct approaches have been devised, with technical names : “syntactic,” “semantic,” and “pragmatic.” For example, suppose one wanted to explicate the concept of probability . A syntactical explication would be purely formal and would consist of a set of principles indicating the mathematical structure of probability. It would, in fact, be virtually identical with the mathematician’s calculus of probability.
A semantic explication of probability would begin with an analysis of the meaning of the term in an informal sense. Assuming that there is general agreement about the formal properties of probability, semanticists focus their attention on what it is that probability statements are supposed to be about. As we will see below , some people hold that when we talk about probability we are talking about a logical relation; others insist that the term designates physical features of the world; and still others are committed to the view that it designate diverse psychological states. Semantics put flesh of one sort or another on syntactical skeletons.
A pragmatic explication of probability would attempt to particularize or historicize various semantic explications. It is unfortunate that the term “pragmatic” has been used in this context, because it carries some unfortunate historical connotations. In the present context the term is used to designate the view that words do not have meanings in the abstract . Words are used by people in particular sociohistorical situations, and they mean whatever those people take them to mean. The pragmatist accepts the need for the robust explications of the semanticists, but insists that they must be bound by spatiotemporal and cultural constraints. For example, instead of talking about the meaning of probability, pragmatists would prefer to talk about what this or that group of people mean by the term probability, or how they use the term. /…/
6. Approaches Emphasizing the Philosophical or Scientific Literature . Sixth , one may proceed to think critically about science primarily from a consideration of relevant philosophical literature and practice, or from relevant scientific literature and practice. Since the 1940s probably, and the 1950s certainly, it has been possible for students to specialize in the philosophy of science within traditional philosophy departments. Moreover, philosophers of science tend to read the work of other philosophers and to write for them as well. However, some philosophers of science would prefer to work with scientists rather than with philosophers. They try to identify and solve problems in science that they, and perhaps scientists, regard as philosophical. Thus, for example, philosophically oriented philosophers of science have shed a lot of ink on the so-called “paradox of the ravens ” and, what is worse, the “grue-bleen” problem; while scientifically oriented philosophers have emptied their pens on the proper interpretation of quantum theory. It should come as no surprise , then, to find that people who are inclined to one or the other camp are occasionally inclined to look upon what the other side is doing as irrelevant if not downright wasteful. Scientifically oriented philosophers complain that what the other side is doing has nothing to do with science, while philosophically oriented philosophers complain that what the other side is doing has nothing to do with philosophy. However, together, these two orientations have contributed a richer stock of literature to the philosophy of science than either could have contributed alone . /…/
7. The Philosophy of Particular Sciences , Methods, or Theories. Seventh and finally , one may approach the philosophy of science from a single scientific discipline or from several. Some people specialize in the philosophy of mathematics, physics , biology, psychology, history, economics, or sociology. Others move up a notch conceptually to work in the philosophy of the physical or of the social sciences generally.
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Some important issues arise in certain sciences and have virtually no discernible implications outside those sciences. Thus, an exhaustive analysis of issues that are common to several disciplines will necessarily omit any discussion of interesting but idiosyncratic topics. Since we have an enormous variety of more or less common ideas to draw upon (e.g., discovery, theory, model, measurement, etc.), there are actually fewer significant unique topics than one might imagine. For example, the concept of unconscious mental acts may be treated as a unique problem of psychology or psychoanalytic theory, or as a species of the more general problem of unobservable entities. The Heisenberg indeterminacy relation may be regarded as a unique problem of quantum theory or as a particular kind of measurement problem, and so on.
The most notable examples of issues that have received considerable attention by philosophers of science and are not easily subsumed under more general types of problems concern the concepts of space and time, and the foundations of mathematics. /…/ Alternative analyses of the notions of space and time have been offered since the time of Plato and Aristotle, but they apparently have few implications outside of physics, metaphysics, and the philosophy of physics. /…/
Recent work in the foundations of mathematics has tended to cluster about four distinct views. So-called “logicists” claim that mathematics is derivable from logic, provided that set theory is regarded as a branch of logic. “Platonists” take the ancient view that mathematics is finally grounded in some special realm of objects which is apprehended directly by the mind. “Formalists” take an alternative ancient view, nominalism ; for them, mathematics must be grounded in more or less visual , finite, and discriminable entities. “Intutionists” hold that mathematics is a creation of the mind, and that there are mathematical assertions that cannot be proven true or false and must be regarded as neither.
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