The Empirical Stance

Bas C. van Fraassen

Published by Yale University Press 2008

The Empirical Stance

Bas C. van Fraassen

In the series The Terry Lectures Series

https://doi.org/10.12987/9780300127966

Overview
Contents

About this book

What is empiricism and what could it be? Bas C. van Fraassen, one of the world’s foremost contributors to philosophical logic and the philosophy of science, here undertakes a fresh consideration of these questions and offers a program for renewal of the empiricist tradition. The empiricist tradition is not and could not be defined by common doctrines, but embodies a certain stance in philosophy, van Fraassen says. This stance is displayed first of all in a searing, recurrent critique of metaphysics, and second in a focus on experience that requires a voluntarist view of belief and opinion.
Van Fraassen focuses on the philosophical problems of scientific and conceptual revolutions and on the not unrelated ruptures between religious and secular ways of seeing or conceiving of ourselves. He explores what it is to be or not be secular and points the way toward a new relationship between secularism and science within philosophy.

Author / Editor information

Bas C. van Fraassen is McCosh Professor of Philosophy at Princeton University.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Preface Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	xiii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	xvii
Lecture 1. Against Analytic Metaphysics Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Lecture 2. What Is Empiricism and What Could It Be? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	31
Lecture 3. Scientific Revolution/Conversion as a Philosophical Problem Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	64
Lecture 4. Experience: (Epistemic) Life Without Foundations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	111
Lecture 5. What Is Science—and What Is It to Be Secular? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	153
Appendix A. Scientific Cosmology Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	197
Appendix B. A History of the Name ‘‘Empiricism’’ Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	201
Appendix C. Bultmann’s Theology Is Not a Philosophy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	226
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	231
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	261
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	275

Language: English
Publisher: Yale University Press
Pages
- Main content: 304

eBook

Published: October 1, 2008
ISBN: 9780300127966