Diversity Reading List

Abstract: Ontic structural realism is at its core the view that 'structure is ontologically fundamental.' Informed from its inception by the scientific revolutions that punctuated the 20th century, its advocates often present the position as the perspective on ontology best befitting of modern physics. But the idea that structure is fundamental has proved difficult to articulate adequately, and what OSR's claimed naturalistic credentials consist in is hard to precisify as well. Nor is it clear that the position is actually supported by our most fundamental physical theories. What is clear, however, is that structuralists have revealed a seam of material at the core of modern physics that is replete with implications for metaphysics. This article surveys some positions subsumed under the rubric of OSR, considering both their warrant and the interconnections that exist between them. The author argues that the fundamental kind properties pose a challenge to ontic structuralism, because it seems that these properties do not supervene upon the relevant structures. The development of structuralist metaphysics will require both an engagement with the details of modern physical theories and the deployment of tools more typically developed in a priori metaphysics. As such, it seems armchair metaphysicians have not just a stake in whether OSR's claims may ultimately be shown to stand up, but a crucial role to play in getting them to the point where they can be subjected to scrutiny in the first place.

Publisher's Note: Why should anybody take an interest in philosophy? Is it just another detailed study like metallurgy? Or is it similar to history, literature and even religion: a study meant to do some personal good and influence our lives? In her last published work, Mary Midgley addresses provocative questions, interrogating the various forms of our current intellectual anxieties and confusions and how we might deal with them. In doing so, she provides a robust, yet not uncritical, defence of philosophy and the life of the mind. This defence is expertly placed in the context of contemporary debates about science, religion, and philosophy. It asks whether, in light of rampant scientific and technological developments, we still need philosophy to help us think about the big questions of meaning, knowledge, and value.

Abstract: Recent discussions in the philosophy of biology have brought into question some fundamental assumptions regarding evolutionary processes, natural selection in particular. Some authors argue that natural selection is nothing but a population-level, statistical consequence of lower-level events (Matthen and Ariew [2002]; Walsh et al. [2002]). On this view, natural selection itself does not involve forces. Other authors reject this purely statistical, population-level account for an individual-level, causal account of natural selection (Bouchard and Rosenberg [2004]). I argue that each of these positions is right in one way, but wrong in another; natural selection indeed takes place at the level of populations, but it is a causal process nonetheless.

Abstract: Biological knowledge does not fit the image of science that philosophers have developed. Many argue that biology has no laws. Here I criticize standard normative accounts of law and defend an alternative, pragmatic approach. I argue that a multidimensional conceptual framework should replace the standard dichotomous law/ accident distinction in order to display important differences in the kinds of causal structure found in nature and the corresponding scientific representations of those structures. To this end I explore the dimensions of stability, strength, and degree of abstraction that characterize the variety of scientific knowledge claims found in biology and other sciences.

Summary: Uses Maxwell's model of the ether as a case study in accounting for the role of fictions in science. Argues that we should understand idealisation and abstraction as being different from fiction. Fictional models for Morrison are those that are deliberately intended to be such that the relationship between their structure and the structure of the concrete systems they model is not (immediately) apparent. This is different from mere idealisation, where certain structural features are omitted to make calculations more tractable.

Summary: Morrison and Morgan argue for a view of models as 'mediating instruments' whose role in scientific theorising goes beyond applying theory. Models are partially independent of both theories and the world. This autonomy allows for a unified account of their role as instruments that allow for exploration of both theories and the world.

Summary: It is customary to distinguish experimental from purely observational sciences. The former include physics and molecular biology, the latter astronomy and palaeontology. Surprisingly, mainstream philosophy of science has had rather little to say about the observational/experimental distinction. For example, discussions of confirmation usually invoke a notion of 'evidence', to be contrasted with 'theory' or 'hypothesis'; the aim is to understand how the evidence bears on the hypothesis. But whether this 'evidence' comes from observation or experiment generally plays no role in the discussion; this is true of both traditional and modern confirmation theories, Bayesian and non-Bayesian. In this article, the author sketches one possible explanation, by suggesting that observation and experiment will often differ in their confirmatory power. Based on a simple Bayesian analysis of confirmation, Okasha argues that universal generalizations (or 'laws') are typically easier to confirm by experimental intervention than by pure observation. This is not to say that observational confirmation of a law is impossible, which would be flatly untrue. But there is a general reason why confirmation will accrue more easily from experimental data, based on a simple though oft-neglected feature of Bayesian conditionalization.

Back Matter: What is science? Is there a real difference between science and myth? Is science objective? Can science explain everything? This Very Short Introduction provides a concise overview of the main themes of contemporary philosophy of science. Beginning with a short history of science to set the scene, Samir Okasha goes on to investigate the nature of scientific reasoning, scientific explanation, revolutions in science, and theories such as realism and anti-realism. He also looks at philosophical issues in particular sciences, including the problem of classification in biology, and the nature of space and time in physics. The final chapter touches on the conflicts between science and religion, and explores whether science is ultimately a good thing.

Summary: Sundar Sarukkai's Indian Philosophy and Philosophy of Science shows how the two very different approaches from East and West can illuminate each other. It is not an introduction to the philosophy of science, but rather an invitation to look at philosophy of science in a new way, using the approaches of classical Indian logic, in particular Navya Nyāya . Sarukkai's major thesis is that in the West philosophy of science tries to put logic into science, and that in the East Indian logic seeks to put science into logic. The naïve Western approach takes an abstract view of logic and formulates science using abstract logical and mathematical theories. Indian logic looks at the world and remains involved with the world throughout. Because of this, logical arguments have to involve contingent matters of fact or observation .Western readers may find the lack of distinction between induction and deduction disturbing, but the Eastern involvement with the world, not merely abstraction, reflects a different way of looking at what logic is and where its origins lie.

Summary: This book serves as an excellent introduction to Indian philosophy from the standpoint of the Nyãya-Vaisesika worldview. The book is divided into six chapters: (i) Introduction; (ii) Doubt (including sections like "Types of Doubt" and "Limits of Doubt"); (iii) Indian Logic (in which Dignaga, Dharmakïrti, and a "Summary of Themes in Indian Logic Relevant to Philosophy of Science" are discussed); (iv) Logic in Science: The Western Way (dealing, among other things, with induction, deduction, and laws and counterfactuals); (v) Science in Logic: The Indian Way? ; and (vi) Knowledge, Truth and Language (including sections with titles like the Pramäna Theory, Truth in Western and Indian Philosophies and Science, Effability, and Bhartrhai).

Abstract: The paper intends to identify some particular basic assumptions, approaches and means of proceeding, which are spontaneously shared by philosophers, sociologists and historians of science, besides the common interchange of meta-notions describing science. To this end, the specific subject matter, scope, meta-cognitive goals and methodological background of each of the three domains of science study is first outlined. Only two shared proceedings are further discussed in details: the objective attitude, called 'playing a stranger', and the historiographers' involvement in demarcational problem resolution. A far-reaching prospect is finally suggested for philosophers and historiographers: methodological partnership, leading towards the elaboration of an impending integral metatheory of science.