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  1.  13
    Deep conflicts and deep disagreements.Manuel Almagro - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 39 (1):23-42.
    This paper tackles the following puzzle. On the one hand, a growing body of literature suggests that most of our current political disagreements are pernicious and difficult to resolve because they are instances of deep disagreement. On the other hand, there does not seem to be anything inherent to a deep disagreement that necessarily makes it pernicious nor irresolvable. To address this issue, I distinguish two senses in which a disagreement can be deemed “deep”, and show that they are conflated (...)
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  2.  7
    Two dimensions of the biological function debate.Bohang Chen - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 39 (1):109-129.
    This article adopts a minimal definition of biological usage to demonstrate that the debate over biological function encompasses two distinct dimensions: descriptive and prescriptive. In the descriptive dimension, biological usage serves as the final arbiter for evaluating different accounts of biological function. Conversely, in the prescriptive dimension, accounts are formulated despite biological usage. The main thesis of this article is that the descriptive/prescriptive distinction helps make better sense of the biological function debate from a novel perspective. This is elucidated by (...)
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  3.  5
    Thought experiments in the Jefferson-Turing controversy: A Kuhnian perspective.Pío García - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 39 (1):43-65.
    In this article we propose an analysis of the controversy between Geoffrey Jefferson and Alan Turing in terms of a Kuhnian account of thought experiments. In this account, the main task is not to evaluate intuitions or (only) to rearrange concepts. Instead, we propose that the main task is to construct scenarios by proposing relevant experiences in which shared assumptions and conflicting lines of inquiry can be made explicit. From this perspective, we can understand the arguments and assumptions in the (...)
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  4.  7
    Testimony and inferential justification.Fernando Rudy Hiller - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 39 (1):5-22.
    Reductionists about testimony think that testimony is never a basic source of justification. By contrast, anti-reductionists claim that, at least in some paradigmatic cases, testimony is a basic and independent source of justification. In support of their position, anti-reductionists usually claim that paradigmatic testimony-based beliefs are non-inferential in that recipients of testimony usually don’t reason their way from the fact that they were told that p to the belief that p—they simply come to believe that p. In this paper I (...)
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  5.  10
    An epistemic argument for evolutionary dispositions.Cristina Villegas & Felipe Morales Carbonell - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 39 (1):89-108.
    The use of dispositions has been put into question many times in the philosophical literature, especially with regards to how dispositional attributions can be justified. Yet, dispositions are an important part not only of our everyday talk but also of our scientific practices. In this paper, we develop an argument that infers the epistemic justification of dispositional talk from itsindispensability for carrying out basic epistemological projects, and we apply it to the use of dispositions in evolutionary biology. For doing this, (...)
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  6.  27
    Some reflections on Mitchell’s pragmatist variant of scientific realism.Marta Bertolaso & Fabio Sterpetti - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 38 (3):389-407.
    This article aims at discussing an interesting variant of scientific realism recently proposed and defended by Sandra Mitchell (forthcoming), namely an affordances-based and pragmatist variant of scientific realism. We firstly place Mitchell’s proposal in the context of the current state of the debate over scientific realism. Secondly, we summarize the salient features of Mitchell’s proposal. Thirdly, we point out some aspects of that proposal that might require some further refinement and clarification in order to make it less prone to criticisms (...)
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  7.  20
    Pluralism and complexity without integration? A critical appraisal of Mitchell’s integrative pluralism.Roger Deulofeu & Javier Suárez - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 38 (3):299-317.
    This paper critically examines Mitchell’s integrative pluralism. Integrative pluralism is the view that scientific explanations should primarily aim to integrate descriptions from different ontological levels. We contend that, while integrative pluralism is a fundamental strategy in contemporary science, there are specific reasons why one should not expect integration in the sense developed by Mitchell to be the optimal strategy and the one that scientists should always aim for. Drawing on some examples from contemporary biology, we argue that integration is sometimes (...)
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  8.  25
    The landscape of integrative pluralism.Sandra D. Mitchell - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 38 (3):261-297.
    In this essay, I revisit and extend my arguments for a view of science that is pluralistic, perspectival and pragmatist. I attempt to resolve mismatches between metaphysical assumptions, epistemological desiderata, and scientific practice. I consider long-held views about unity of science and reductionism, emergent properties and physicalism, exceptionless necessity in explanatory laws, and in the justification for realism. My solutions appeal to the partiality of representation, the perspectivism of theories and data, and the interactive co-construction of warranted claims for realism.
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  9.  14
    Sometimes you ride the Pegasus, sometimes you take the road: Mitchell on laws in biology.Anya Plutynski - 2024 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 38 (3):373-388.
    Mitchell’s philosophical contributions are part of an ongoing conversation among philosophers and scientists about laws and unification in biology, going back at least to Darwin. This article situates Mitchell in this conversation, explains why and how she has correctly guided us away from false idols, and engages several difficult questions she leaves open. I argue that there are different epistemic roles laws (or models describing lawlike regularities) play in biological inquiry. First, they play the role of “how possibly” explanations, akin (...)
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