Abduction and Scientific Realism

I argue that there is nothing about the structure of inference to the best explanation (IBE) that prevents it from establishing a contradiction in general, though there are some potential limitations on when it can be used for this purpose. Studying the relationship between IBE and contradictions is worthwhile for three reasons. First, it enhances our understanding of IBE. We see that, in many cases, IBE does not require explanations to be consistent, though there are some cases where consistency may (...) be required. Second, the argument has implications for the debate over scientific realism. Many scientific theories appear to be inconsistent. The best argument for scientific realism, however, appeals to IBE. My argument thus shows that a certain kind of realist faces a threat from inconsistent theories. Third, the argument is important for dialetheism. Dialetheists maintain that some contradictions are true. Many of the arguments in favour of dialetheism appeal to explanatory considerations. What I say here provides support for defending dialethism using an IBE-based methodology. (shrink)

Van Fraassen explains rejections and asymmetries in science in terms of his contextual theory of explanation in the same way that scientists explain observable phenomena in the world in terms of scientific theories. I object that van Fraassen’s skeptical view regarding inference to the best explanation together with the English view of rationality jointly imply that the contextual theory is not rationally compelling, so van Fraassen and his epistemic colleagues can rationally disbelieve it. Prasetya replies that the truth of the (...) contextual theory coincides with its empirical adequacy, so the contextual theory is compelling. He also replies that the contextual theory is compelling, provided that van Fraassen’s argument for it instantiates a compelling subset of IBE. I argue that Prasetya’s replies either fail or help scientific realism. (shrink)

This chapter examines the status of inference to the best explanation in naturalistic metaphysics. The methodology of inference to the best explanation in metaphysics is studied from the perspective of contemporary views on scientific explanation and explanatory inferences in the history and philosophy of science. This reveals serious shortcomings in prevalent attempts to vindicate metaphysical "explanationism" by reference to similarities between science and naturalistic metaphysics. This critique is brought out by considering a common gambit of methodological unity: (1) Both metaphysics (...) and science employ inference to the best explanation. (2) One has no reason to think that if explanationism is truth-conducive in science, it is not so in metaphysics. (3) One has a positive reason to think that if explanationism is truth-conducive in science, it is also so in metaphysics. (shrink)

The debate between exceptionalists and anti-exceptionalists about logic is often framed as concerning whether the justification of logical theories is a priori or a posteriori (for short: whether logic is a priori or a posteriori). As we substantiate (S1), this framing more deeply encodes the usual anti-exceptionalist thesis that logical theories, like scientific theories, are abductively justified, coupled with the common supposition that abduction is an a posteriori mode of inference, in the sense that the epistemic value of abduction is (...) (and, indeed, must be) a posteriori. In past work, however, we have argued that this common supposition is incorrect: abduction is an a priori mode of inference, in the sense that the epistemic value of abduction is (and indeed, must be) a priori (Biggs and Wilson 2017a, 2017b, 2019). After sketching our two main argumentative strategies for this conclusion (S2), we go on (S3) to consider its import on the proper understanding of anti-exceptionalism about logic. (shrink)

Scientific realism driven by inference to the best explanation (IBE) takes empirically confirmed objects to exist,independent,paceempiricism, of whether those objects are observable or not. This kind of realism, it has beenclaimed, does not need probabilistic reasoning to justify the claim that these objects exist. But I show that thereare scientific contexts in which a non-probabilistic IBE-driven realism leads to a puzzle. Since IBE can be appliedin scientific contexts in which empirical confirmation has not yet been reached, realists will in these (...) contexts becommitted to the existence of empirically unconfirmed objects. As a consequence of such commitments, becausethey lack probabilistic features, the possible empirical confirmation of those objects is epistemically redundantwith respect to realism. (shrink)

In ‘Reichenbach's cubical universe and the problem of the external world’, Elliott Sober attempts a refutation of solipsism à la Reichenbach. I here contrast Sober's line of argument with observati...

In science and everyday life, we often infer that something is true because it would explain some set of facts better than any other hypothesis we can think of. But what if we have reason to believe that there is a better way to explain these facts that we just haven't thought of? Wouldn't that undermine our warrant for believing the best available explanation? Many philosophers have assumed that we can solve such underconsideration problems by stipulating that a hypothesis should (...) not only be 'the best' explanation available; rather, it should also be 'good enough'. Unfortunately, however, the only current suggestion for what it might mean to say that an explanation is 'good enough' is, well, not good enough. This paper aims to provide a better account of what is required for an explanatory hypothesis to be considered 'good enough'. In brief, the account holds that a `good enough' hypothesis is one that has gone through a process that I call explanatory consolidation, in which accumulating evidence and failed attempts to formulate better alternatives gradually make it more plausible that the explanation we currently have is better than any other that could be formulated. (shrink)

I’m grateful to Aleta Quinn and Studies in History and Philosophy of Science for hosting this book forum for my book, The Relativity of Theory (Springer, 2020). I’m also grateful to Margaret Greta Turnbull and Joseph Martin for their commentaries. In what follows, I address their comments as I understand them.

Van Fraassen infers the truth of the contextual theory from his observation that it has passed a crucial test. Mizrahi infers the comparative truth of our best theories from his observation that they are more successful than their competitors. Their inferences require, according to the argument from double spaces, the prior belief that it is more likely that their target theories were pulled out from the T-space than from the O-space. The T-space is the logical space of unconceived theories whose (...) appearances agree with their realities; the O-space is the logical space of unconceived theories whose appearances may agree or disagree with their realities. (shrink)

This book proposes a novel position in the debate on scientific realism: Modal Empiricism. Modal empiricism is the view that the aim of science is to provide theories that correctly delimit, in a unified way, the range of experiences that are naturally possible given our position in the world. The view is associated with a pragmatic account of scientific representation and an original notion of situated modalities, together with an inductive epistemology for modalities. It purports to provide a faithful account (...) of scientific practice and of its impressive achievements, and defuses the main motivations for scientific realism. More generally, Modal Empiricism purports to be the precise articulation of a pragmatist stance towards science. This book is of interest to any philosopher involved in the debate on scientific realism, or interested in how to properly understand the content, aim and achievements of science. (shrink)

A fundamental question for philosophy of science asks, How is knowledge of the world created? A pragmatist approach is constructed to show how discovery and justification are tightly related during the creation of scientific knowledge. Procedural abduction, at the scientific level of Strict Abduction and higher, integrates the learnable and the logical quite thoroughly. Discovery and justification are functionally fused together within the organized process of procedural abduction by scientific communities. Four questions posed at the start are answered by this (...) pragmatist philosophy of science as follows. Is scientific creativity methodologically related to scientific justification? Answer: scientific creativity is integral to abductive procedures yielding scientific justification. Can a distinction between genuine science and pseudo-science be clearly defined? Answer: genuine science is distinguished by the application of procedural abduction at the level of Strict Abduction or higher. Does scientific knowledge achieve the legitimacy of scientific realism? Answer: procedural abduction legitimates the credibility of highly-confirmed hypotheses and hence justifies scientific realism. How are scientific communities responsible for establishing scientific knowledge? Answer: scientific communities using procedural abduction realize scientific knowledge. (shrink)

This book offers a close and rigorous examination of the arguments for and against scientific realism and introduces key positions in the scientific realism/antirealism debate, which is one of the central debates in contemporary philosophy of science. On the one hand, scientific realists argue that we have good reasons to believe that our best scientific theories are approximately true because, if they were not even approximately true, they would not be able to explain and predict natural phenomena with such impressive (...) accuracy. On the other hand, antirealists argue that the success of science does not warrant belief in the approximate truth of our best scientific theories. This is because the history of science is a graveyard of theories that were once successful but were later discarded. The author eventually settles on a middle ground position between scientific realism and antirealism called "relative realism.". (shrink)

Scientific realists claim that the best of successful rival theories is (approximately) true. Relative realists object that we cannot make the absolute judgment that a theory is successful, and that we can only make the relative judgment that it is more successful than its competitor. I argue that this objection is undermined by the cases in which empirical equivalents are successful. Relative realists invoke the argument from a bad lot to undermine scientific realism and to support relative realism. In response, (...) I construct the argument from double spaces. It is similar to the argument from a bad lot, but threatens many philosophical inferences, including relative realists’ inference from comparative success to comparative truth. (shrink)

It has been claimed that kinetic energy is an objective physical quantity whilst at the same time maintaining that potential energy is not. However, by making use of the method of ‘inference to the best explanation’, it may be readily concluded that potential energy is indeed an objective physical quantity. This is done for an example drawn from the foundations of modern chemistry. In order to do so, the criteria of what counts as ‘most probable’ and ‘most reasonable’ are defined (...) and then employed for choosing the best explanation. (shrink)

Like scientific theories, metaphysical theories can and should be justified by the inference of creative abduction. Two rationality conditions are proposed that distinguish scientific from speculative abductions: achievement of unification and independent testability. Particularly important in science is common cause abduction. The justification of metaphysical realism is structurally similar to scientific abductions: external objects are justified as common causes of perceptual experiences. While the reliability of common cause abduction is entailed by a principle of causality, the latter principle has an (...) abductive justification based on statistical phenomena. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is studying the importance of the antithetical pair sympathy-antipathy, as an interpretive instrument of the human phýsis in the Hippocratic medical epistemology. His study aims to be a contribution to the understanding of the methods of inference developed by ancient medicine, in parallel to the demonstrative method.

In a recent work published in this journal, “Van Fraassen e a inferência da melhor explicação” (2016), Minikoski and Rodrigues da Silva identify four critical lines proposed by Bas van Fraassen against the form of abductive reasoning known as ‘inference to the best explanation’ (IBE). The first one, put forward by the Dutch philosopher in his seminal book The Scientific Image (1980), concerns the distinction between observable and unobservable entities. Minikoski and Rodrigues da Silva consider that the distinction is of (...) no relevance to the scientific practice. For this reason, they address van Fraassen’s allegations against IBE qua justification of the existence of unobservable entities in a couple of pages and prefer focusing on the other lines they identified. The aim of this work is to pour over the analysis that the two authors perform about van Fraassen’s mentioned argument and some realists’ replies, particularly in the section that Minikoski and Rodrigues da Silva devote to this topic. This will allow us to clarify van Fraassen’s vision on scientific practice and on the ‘immersion in the theoretical world-picture’. The importance and the relevance of the distinction between observables and unobservables will also be reaffirmed. (shrink)

Van Fraassen (2007, 2017) consistently uses the English view of rationality to parry criticisms from scientific realists. I assume for the sake of argument that the English view of rationality is tenable, and then argue that it has disastrous implications for van Fraassen’s (1980) contextual theory of explanation, for the empiricist position that T is empirically adequate, and for scientific progress. If you invoke the English view of rationality to rationally disbelieve that your epistemic colleagues’ theories are true, they might, (...) in turn, invoke it to rationally disbelieve that your positive theories are true. (shrink)

Structural realism has been suggested as the best compromise in the debate on scientific realism. It proposes that we should be realist about the relational structure of the world, not its nature. However, it faces an important objection, first raised by Newman against Russell: if relations are not qualified, then the position is either trivial or collapses into empiricism, but if relations are too strongly qualified, then it is no longer SR. A way to overcome this difficulty is to talk (...) about modal, or nomological relations instead of purely extensional relations. I argue that this is insufficient, for then, SR collapses into modal empiricism. I suggest, however, that ME could be the best position in the debate on scientific realism. 1Introduction2Objections to Structural Realism3How to Escape Newman’s Objection4Which Modal Relations Are Retained in Theory Change?5Are Modal Relations Real?6Relativity and Fundamentality7Is Modal Empiricism Really Empiricism?8Could Modal Empiricism Be the Best of Both Worlds? (shrink)

A success-to-truth inference has always been at the heart of scientific realist positions. But all attempts to articulate the inference have met with very significant challenges. This paper reconstructs the evolution of this inference, and brings together a number of qualifications in an attempt to articulate a contemporary success-to-truth inference which is realistic. I argue that this contemporary version of the inference has a chance, at least, of overcoming the historical challenges which have been proffered to date. However, there is (...) a price to pay: the developments which help the realist answer the historical challenges also serve to increase the number of non-historical challenges. (shrink)

Inferences from the absence of evidence to something are common in ordinary speech, but when used in scientific argumentations are usually considered deficient or outright false. Yet, as demonstrated here with the help of various examples, archaeologists frequently use inferences and reasoning from absence, often allowing it a status on par with inferences from tangible evidence. This discrepancy has not been examined so far. The article analyses it drawing on philosophical discussions concerning the validity of inference from absence, using probabilistic (...) models that were originally developed to show that such inferences are weak and inconclusive. The analysis reveals that inference from absence can indeed be justified in many important situations of archaeological research, such as excavations carried out to explore the past existence and time-span of sedentary human habitation. The justification is closely related to the fact that archaeology explores the human past via its material remains. The same analysis points to instances where inference from absence can have comparable validity in other historical sciences, and to research questions in which archaeological inference from absence will be problematic or totally unwarranted. (shrink)

Objetivamos discutir a crítica, avançada por Colin Howson em Hume's problem, segundo a qual o argumento do milagre (doravante, AM) comete a falácia da taxa-base. Por falácia da taxa-base, entende-se a negligência do valor da probabilidade prévia de determinada hipótese ou teoria T, P(T). Por sua vez, em uma de suas versões, AM assere que apenas assumindo que uma teoria científica madura T é aproximadamente verdadeira não faz de seu sucesso preditivo um milagre. Formalizado probabilisticamente, Howson argumenta que a conclusão (...) de AM, a probabilidade de que a teoria T seja aproximadamente verdadeira é grande, apenas se segue se assumirmos para T um valor não-negligenciável. Tal crítica de Howson despertou duas categorias de reação na literatura especializada: supondo que AM comete a falácia da taxa base, alguns autores propuseram abandonar AM enquanto um argumento para a tese epistemológica do realismo científico, ao passo que outros defenderam que apenas uma versão de AM comete a falácia da taxa-base; defendendo que AM não comete a falácia da taxa base, certos autores alegaram alguns problemas na formalização probabilística de AM, enquanto outros buscaram refinar tal formalização de modo que a nova evite a falácia em questão. Tendo apresentado esse estado da arte, investigaremos se a formalização probabilística do argumento do milagre é razoável. Discutiremos se ela acomoda a natureza de inferência à melhor explicação pressuposta no AM. Por fim, indicaremos, brevemente, algumas dificuldades para a crítica de Howson ao assumir-se que AM instancia, na verdade, uma abdução Peirceana. (shrink)

This book examines the philosophical conception of abductive reasoning as developed by Charles S. Peirce, the founder of American pragmatism. It explores the historical and systematic connections of Peirce's original ideas and debates about their interpretations. Abduction is understood in a broad sense which covers the discovery and pursuit of hypotheses and inference to the best explanation. The analysis presents fresh insights into this notion of reasoning, which derives from effects to causes or from surprising observations to explanatory theories. The (...) author outlines some logical and AI approaches to abduction as well as studies various kinds of inverse problems in astronomy, physics, medicine, biology, and human sciences to provide examples of retroductions and abductions. The discussion covers also everyday examples with the implication of this notion in detective stories, one of Peirce’s own favorite themes. The author uses Bayesian probabilities to argue that explanatory abduction is a method of confirmation. He uses his own account of truth approximation to reformulate abduction as inference which leads to the truthlikeness of its conclusion. This allows a powerful abductive defense of scientific realism. This up-to-date survey and defense of the Peircean view of abduction may very well help researchers, students, and philosophers better understand the logic of truth-seeking. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that if one is already an advocate of scientific realism, then one would be also a realist about laws of nature. To show this, I argue that only scientific realists would accept that non-accidental regularities require explanation and that their genuine explanation is given by laws of nature. Then, from this conclusion, it seems that scientific realists have reason to believe that there are laws of nature in an objective sense. If this is correct, the (...) conclusion is that there are no reasons for advocates of scientific realism to be skeptics about laws of nature. (shrink)

This chapter examines issues surrounding inference to the best explanation, its justification, and its role in different arguments for scientific realism, as well as more general issues concerning explanations’ ontological commitments. Defending the reliability of inference to the best explanation has been a central plank in various realist arguments, and realists have drawn various ontological conclusions from the premise that a given scientific explanation best explains some phenomenon. This chapter stresses the importance of thinking carefully about the nature of explanation (...) in connection with evaluating realists’ appeals to explanatory reasoning and inference to the best explanation. (shrink)

In this book K. Brad Wray provides a comprehensive survey of the arguments against scientific realism. In addition to presenting logical considerations that undermine the realists' inferences to the likely truth or approximate truth of our theories, he provides a thorough assessment of the evidence from the history of science. He also examines grounds for a defence of anti-realism, including an anti-realist explanation for the success of our current theories, an account of why false theories can be empirically successful, and (...) an explanation for why we should expect radical changes of theory in the future. His arguments are supported and illustrated by cases from the history of science, including a sustained study of the Copernican Revolution, and a study of the revolution in early twentieth century chemistry, when chemists came to classify elements by their atomic number rather than by their atomic weight. (shrink)

J. D. Trout has recently developed a new defense of scientific realism, a new version of the No Miracles Argument. I critically evaluate Trout’s novel defense of realism. I argue that Trout’s argument for scientific realism and the related explanation for the success of science are self-defeating. In the process of arguing against the traditional realist strategies for explaining the success of science, he inadvertently undermines his own argument.

Here we challenge the orthodoxy according to which abduction is an a posteriori mode of inference. We start by providing a case study illustrating how abduction can justify a philosophical claim not justifiable by empirical evidence alone. While many grant abduction's epistemic value, nearly all assume that abductive justification is a posteriori, on grounds that our belief in abduction's epistemic value depends on empirical evidence about how the world contingently is. Contra this assumption, we argue, first, that our belief in (...) abduction’s epistemic value is not and could not be justified a posteriori, and second, that attention to the roles experience plays in abductive justification supports taking abduction to be an a priori mode of inference. We close by highlighting how our strategy for establishing the a priority of abduction positively contrasts with strategies in Bonjour (1998), Swinburne (2001), and Peacocke (2004) aiming to establish the a priority of certain ampliative modes of inference or abductive principles. (shrink)

Scientific antirealists run the argument from underconsideration against scientific realism. I argue that the argument from underconsideration backfires on antirealists’ positive philosophical theories, such as the contextual theory of explanation (van Fraassen, 1980), the English model of rationality (van Fraassen, 1989), the evolutionary explanation of the success of science (Wray, 2008; 2012), and explanatory idealism (Khalifa, 2013). Antirealists strengthen the argument from underconsideration with the pessimistic induction against current scientific theories. In response, I construct a pessimistic induction against antirealists that (...) since antirealists generated problematic philosophical theories in the past, they must be generating problematic philosophical theories now. (shrink)

The no-miracles argument (Putnam, 1975) holds that science is successful because successful theories are (approximately) true. Frost-Arnold (2010) objects that this argument is unacceptable because it generates neither new predictions nor unifications. It is similar to the unacceptable explanation that opium puts people to sleep because it has a dormative virtue. I reply that on close examination, realism explains not only why some theories are successful but also why successful theories exist in current science. Therefore, it unifies the disparate phenomena.

In this article I try to show that the epistemological component of abductions is creativity and, to do so, I will use an analysis of Thagard's concept of projected-truth as well as reflections on Łukasiewicz's creativity. In the third part I present a real case, using Thagard's theory and introducing Hanson, to make the transition from logical and computational discourse to philosophy of science. At the end I will address one of the current challenges in order to explain creativity namely (...) the necessary and absolute interaction of each thinking subject, and therefore creative in action, with everything around him. To do this, I intend to introduce Feyerabend into the debate, which cleverly analyzes and dismantles the individualist idea of creation. (shrink)

Historians occasionally use timelines, but many seem to regard such signs merely as ways of visually summarizing results that are presumably better expressed in prose. Challenging this language-centered view, I suggest that timelines might assist the generation of novel historical insights. To show this, I begin by looking at studies confirming the cognitive benefits of diagrams like timelines. I then try to survey the remarkable diversity of timelines by analyzing actual examples. Finally, having conveyed this (mostly untapped) potential, I argue (...) that neglecting timelines might mean neglecting significant aspects of reality that are revealed only by those signs. My overall message is that once we accept that relations are as important for the mind as what they relate, we have to pay closer attention to any semiotic device that enables or facilitates the discernment of new relations. (shrink)

This book consolidates and extends the authors’ work on the connection between iconicity and abductive inference. It emphasizes a pragmatic, experimental and fallibilist view of knowledge without sacrificing formal rigor. Within this context, the book focuses particularly on scientific knowledge and its prevalent use of mathematics. To find an answer to the question “What kind of experimental activity is the scientific employment of mathematics?” the book addresses the problems involved in formalizing abductive cognition. For this, it implements the concept and (...) method of iconicity, modeling this theoretical framework mathematically through category theory and topoi. Peirce's concept of iconic signs is treated in depth, and it is shown how Peirce's diagrammatic logical notation of Existential Graphs makes use of iconicity and how important features of this iconicity are representable within category theory. Alain Badiou’s set-theoretical model of truth procedures and his relational sheaf-based theory of phenomenology are then integrated within the Peircean logical context. Finally, the book opens the path towards a more naturalist interpretation of the abductive models developed in Peirce and Badiou through an analysis of several recent attempts to reformulate quantum mechanics with categorical methods. Overall, the book offers a comprehensive and rigorous overview of past approaches to iconic semiotics and abduction, and it encompasses new extensions of these methods towards an innovative naturalist interpretation of abductive reasoning. (shrink)

Henrike Jansen’s “The strategic formulation of abductive arguments in everyday reasoning” insightfully explores the terrain of abductive argumentation. The purpose of this note is to continue the exploration along lines marked out by her paper. This further exploration proceeds in two stages. Section 2 of the paper addresses the nature of abductive inference by distinguishing two types of abduction, identifying some of abduction’s formal and nonformal properties, and relating abduction to enthymematic inference. Section 3 focuses on some of Jansen’s examples, (...) paying particular attention to the distinction between abduction and argument from sign. Whereas Jansen maintains that some arguments from sign are not abductive, the paper suggests an alternative perspective from which arguments from sign can generally be viewed as one sort of abductive inference. (shrink)

Although many aspects of Inference to the Best Explanation have been extensively discussed, very little has so far been said about what it takes for a hypothesis to count as a rival explanatory hypothesis in the context of IBE. The primary aim of this article is to rectify this situation by arguing for a specific account of explanatory rivalry. On this account, explanatory rivals are complete explanations of a given explanandum. When explanatory rivals are conceived of in this way, I (...) argue that IBE is a more plausible and defensible rule of inference than it would otherwise be. The secondary aim of the article is to demonstrate the importance of accounts of explanatory rivalry by examining a prominent philosophical argument in which IBE is employed, viz. the so-called Ultimate Argument for scientific realism. In short, I argue that a well-known objection to the Ultimate Argument due to Arthur Fine fails in virtue of tacitly assuming an account of explanatory rivalry that we have independent reasons to reject. (shrink)

In this article, I argue that arguments from the history of science against scientific realism, like the arguments advanced by P. Kyle Stanford and Peter Vickers, are fallacious. The so-called Old Induction, like Vickers's, and New Induction, like Stanford's, are both guilty of confirmation bias—specifically, of cherry-picking evidence that allegedly challenges scientific realism while ignoring evidence to the contrary. I also show that the historical episodes that Stanford adduces in support of his New Induction are indeterminate between a pessimistic and (...) an optimistic interpretation. For these reasons, these arguments are fallacious, and thus do not pose a serious challenge to scientific realism. (shrink)

Richard Boyd and Nicholas Sturgeon develop distinctive naturalistic arguments for scientific realism and moral realism. Each defends a realist position by an inference to the best explanation. In this paper, I suggest that these arguments for realism should be reformulated, with the law of likelihood replacing inference to the best explanation. The resulting arguments for realism do not work.

This work proposes an understanding of deductive, default and abductive reasoning as different instances of the same phenomenon: epistemic dynamics. It discusses the main intuitions behind each one of these reasoning processes, and suggest how they can be understood as different epistemic actions that modify an agent’s knowledge and/or beliefs in a different way, making formal the discussion with the use of the dynamic epistemic logic framework. The ideas in this paper put the studied processes under the same umbrella, thus (...) highlighting their relationship and allowing a better understanding of how they interact together. (shrink)

The Commens Papers (http://www.commens.org/papers) publishes preprints, reports, and communications that deal with the philosophy, scientific contributions, and life of C. S. Peirce. The Commens Papers are primarily meant for scholarly products that lack other means of publication, but which the author wishes to bring to the attention of the research community. The papers must meet editorial approval, but they are not fully peer reviewed. -/- The Commens Papers accepts a broad variety of intellectual products in various formats, including: Conference papers, (...) Manuscripts made available for comments and criticism before submission for peer review, Reports of original research, such as archival research, Catalogues or other systematic summaries of (parts of) Peirce’s writings, Reports from scientific meetings Lectures, as text, video, or audio, Posters presented at academic conferences . (shrink)

This paper focuses on abduction as explicit or readily formulatable inference to possible explanatory hypotheses--as contrasted with inference to conceptual innovations or abductive logic as a cycle of hypotheses, deduction of consequences and inductive testing. Inference to an explanation is often a matter of projection or extrapolation of elements of accepted theory for the solution of outstanding problems in particular domains of inquiry. I say "projections or extrapolation" of accepted theory, but I mean to point to something broader and suggest (...) how elements of accepted theory constrain emergent models and plausible inferences to explanations--in a quasi-rationalist fashion. I draw on illustrations from quantum gravity below just because there is so little direct evidence available in the field. It is in such cases that Peirce's discussions of abductive inference provide the most plausible support for the idea of a logic of abduction--as inference to readily formulatable explanatory hypotheses. The possible need for conceptual innovation points to the limits on the possibility of a logic of abduction of a more rationalistic character--selecting uniquely superior explanations. Abduction conceived as a repeated cycle of inquiry also points to limits on our expectations for an abductive logic. My chief point is that the character of inference to an explanation, viewed below as embedded within arguments from analogy, is so little compelling, as a matter of logical form alone, that there will always be a pluralism of plausible alternatives among untested hypotheses and inferences to them--calling for some comparative evaluation. This point leads on to some consideration of the virtues of hypotheses--as a description of the range of this pluralism. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to argue for a new version of ‘inference-to-the-best-explanation’ scientific realism, which I characterize as Best Theory Realism or ‘BTR’. On BTR, the realist needs only to embrace a commitment to the truth or approximate truth of the best theories in a field, those which are unique in satisfying the highest standards of empirical success in a mature field with many successful but falsified predecessors. I argue that taking our best theories to be true is (...) justified because it provides the best explanation of the predictive success of their predecessors and their own special success. Against standard and especially structural realism, I argue against the claim that the best explanations of the success of theories is provided by identifying their true components, such as structural relations between unobservable, which are preserved across theory change. In particular, I criticize Ladyman's and Carrier’s structural account of the success of phlogiston theory, and Worrall's well-known structural account of the success of Fresnel’s theory of light. I argue that these accounts tacitly assume the truth of our best theories, which in any case provides a better explanation of these theories’ success than the structural account. Structural realism is now defended as the only version of realism that is able to surmount the pessimistic meta-induction and the general problem that successful theories involve ontological claims concerning unobservable entities that are abandoned and falsified in theory-change. I argue that Best Theory Realism can overcome the pessimistic meta-induction and this general problem posed by theory-change. Our best theories possess a characteristic which sharply distinguishes them from their successful but false predecessors. Furthermore ‘inference-to-the-best-explanation’ confirmation can establish the truth of our best theories and thus trumps the pessimistic inductive reasoning which is supposed to show that even our best theories are most likely false in their claims concerning unobservable entities and processes. (shrink)

Lipton contends that the no-miracle argument is illegitimate, because it fails to adduce new evidence beyond that cited by scientists for their theories. The debate on this issue between Lipton and Psillos has focussed on whether there is a construal of the no-miracle argument in relation to first-order scientific inferences that can yield new evidence. I move away from this focus without taking sides, and argue that the no-miracle argument, on its two popular interpretations, is as legitimate, cogent, and useful (...) an inductive argument for scientific realism as first-order scientific inferences to the best explanation even if it does not add to scientific evidence. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that Constructive Empiricism (CE) is ambiguous between two interpretations: CE as a normative epistemology of science and CE as a descriptive philosophy of science. When they present CE, constructive empiricists write as if CE is supposed to be more than a normative epistemology of science and that it is meant to be responsible to actual scientific practices. However, when they respond to objections, constructive empiricists fall back on a strictly normative interpretation of CE. This ambiguity (...) seems to make CE immune to objections in a rather ad hoc fashion. (shrink)

There are nine antirealist explanations of the success of science in the literature. I raise difficulties against all of them except the latest one, and then construct a pessimistic induction that the latest one will turn out to be problematic because its eight forerunners turned out to be problematic. This pessimistic induction is on a par with the traditional pessimistic induction that successful present scientific theories will be revealed to be false because successful past scientific theories were revealed to be (...) false. (shrink)

Defences of inference to the best explanation (IBE) frequently associate IBE with scientific realism, the idea that it is reasonable to believe our best scientific theories. I argue that this linkage is unfortunate. IBE does not warrant belief, since the fact that a theory is the best available explanation does not show it to be (even probably) true. What IBE does warrant is acceptance: taking a proposition as a premise in theoretical and/or practical reasoning. We ought to accept our best (...) scientific theories since they are the theories that are most likely to lead to the goal of science, which is that of knowledge. In support of this claim I invoke Bill Lycan's Panglossian reflections regarding Mother Nature.1. (shrink)

In this essay, I critically evaluate the approaches to explaining the success of science in Kuhn and the works of inference-to-the-best-explanation scientific realists. Kuhn ’s challenge to realists, who invoke the truth of theories to explain their success, is two-fold. His paradigm-account of success confronts realists with the problem of theory change, and the historical fact of successful theories later rejected as false. Secondly, Kuhn ’s account of the success of science has no need to bring truth into the explanation. (...) In turn, I argue that weakness in Kuhn and the prevailing forms of scientific realism motivate a better account of realism which I characterize as ‘best current theory realism’ and defend against the pessimistic meta-induction and the problem of theory-change. This realism argues that the best explanation of the success of current and past scientific theories only requires the simple claim that our best current theories are true. Kuhn ’s account can explain how normal science succeeds but cannot account for why its problem solutions work where they do and why they fail for other puzzles. (shrink)

In The Inference That Makes Science, Ernan McMullin recounts the clear historical progress he saw toward a vision of the sciences as conclusions reached rationally on the basis of empirical evidence. Distinctive of this vision was his view of science as driven by a specific form of inference, retroduction. To understand this properly, we need to disentangle the description of retroductive inference from the claims made on its behalf. To end I will suggest that the real rival to McMullin's vision (...) of science is not the methodologies he criticizes so successfully but a more radical empiricist alternative in epistemology. (shrink)