Skip to main content
Log in

Scientific Understanding

  • Published:
Foundations of Science Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Knowledge of many facts does not amount to understanding unless one also has a sense of how the facts fit together. This aspect of coherence among scientific observations and theories is usually overlooked in summaries of scientific method, since the emphasis is on justification and verification rather than on understanding. I argue that the inter-theoretic coherence, as the hallmark of understanding, is an essential and informative component of any accurate description of science.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Armstrong D. (1983), What Is a Law of Nature?. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Bhaskar R (1975), A Realist Theory of Science. Leeds, Leeds Books

    Google Scholar 

  • Collingwood R.G (1946), The Idea of History. Oxford, Oxford University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Daumal R (1979) (original in French, 1938), A Night of Serious Drinking. Boulder, Shambala

    Google Scholar 

  • de Regt H., Dieks D. (2005), A Contextual Approach to Scientific Understanding. Synthese 144: 137–170

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dretske F (1977), Laws of Nature. Philosophy of Science 44: 248–268

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Duhem P (1954), The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory. Princeton, Princeton University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Elgin C (1996), Considered Judgment. Princeton, Princeton University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Kitcher P,: (1989), Explanatory Unification and the Causal Structure of the World. In P. Kitcher and W. Salmon (eds.), Scientific Explanation. University of Minnesota Press, 410–505

  • Kosso P, (1996), Scientific Method and Hermeneutics. The Southern Journal of Philosophy 34: 169–182

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Longrigg J (1998), Greek Medicine from the Heroic to the Hellenistic Age. New York, Routledge

    Google Scholar 

  • McAllister J (1996), Beauty and Revolution in Science. Ithaca, Cornell University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Newton R (1997), The Truth of Science. Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Salmon W (1998), Causality and Explanation. Oxford, Oxford University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Schurz G., K. Lambert (1994), Outline of a Theory of Scientific Understanding. Synthese 101: 65–120

    Google Scholar 

  • Swoyer C (1985), The Concept of Physical Law. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Thucydides (1985), History of the Peloponnesian War (translated by C.F. Smith). Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Toulmin S (1961), Foresight and Understanding. New York, Harper & Row

    Google Scholar 

  • van Fraassen B, (1989) Laws and Symmetry. New York, Oxford University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Weinberg S (1992), Dreams of a Final Theory. New York, Random House

    Google Scholar 

  • Weinert F (1993), Laws of Nature. Philosophia Naturalis 30(2): 147–171

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Peter Kosso.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Kosso, P. Scientific Understanding. Found Sci 12, 173–188 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-006-0002-3

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-006-0002-3

Keywords

Navigation