Should scientists believe everything they say? Or would a more cautious attitude be preferable? On the one hand, the undisputed success of our contemporary scientific theories gives us good reasons to suppose that they are largely true; yet on the other hand, the undisputed failure of our past scientific theories give us cause for anxiety. Constructive empiricism - a view first formulated by the iconoclastic philosopher Bas van Fraassen - offers an answer to this question: scientists should believe what they say, insofar as they are talking about the observable phenomena. But constructive empiricism is not just a view regarding the aim of science; it is also a view regarding the epistemological framework in which such a debate is to be conducted. It is this meta-philosophical issue that is the focus of this book - not with scientific truth, but with how one should argue about scientific truth.
Should scientists believe everything they say? Or would a more cautious attitude be preferable? On the one hand, the undisputed success of our contemporary scientific theories gives us good reasons to suppose that they are largely true; yet on the other hand, the undisputed failure of our past scientific theories give us cause for anxiety. Constructive empiricism - a view first formulated by the iconoclastic philosopher Bas van Fraassen - offers an answer to this question: scientists should believe what they say, insofar as they are talking about the observable phenomena. But constructive empiricism is not just a view regarding the aim of science; it is also a view regarding the epistemological framework in which such a debate is to be conducted. It is this meta-philosophical issue that is the focus of this book - not with scientific truth, but with how one should argue about scientific truth.
For the last forty years, two claims have been at the core of disputes about scientific change- that scientists reason rationally and that science is progressive. For most of this time discussions...
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