Explanation, Understanding, and Subjectivity

The Paideia Archive: Twentieth World Congress of Philosophy 45:190-195 (1998)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Many theorists of explanation from Hempel onward have worked with the explicit or implicit assumption that considerations of the subjective sense of understanding should be kept out of the formulation of a proper theory of explanation. They claim that genuine understanding of an event comes only from being in an appropriate cognitive relation to the true explanation of that event. I argue that considerations of the subjective sense of understanding cannot be completely removed from the process of formulating and justifying an acceptable theory of explanation. Although understanding is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for an explanation, understanding is necessary as an initial guide to the nature of explanation. The widespread method of providing counterexamples for criticizing theories of explanation presupposes that there is a neutral method of identifying at least some clear cases of explanation and some clear cases of non-explanations. I argue that the only plausible method to fill this role relies essentially on the subjective sense of understanding. Objective validation of judgments about explanatoriness comes only through a complex process of social correction of our initial intuitive judgments regarding explanation.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,593

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Scientific explanation and the sense of understanding.J. D. Trout - 2002 - Philosophy of Science 69 (2):212-233.
The Role of Explanation in Understanding.Kareem Khalifa - 2013 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 64 (1):161-187.
Explaining understanding (or understanding explanation).Wesley Van Camp - 2014 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 4 (1):95-114.
Understanding and the Norm of Explanation.John Turri - 2015 - Philosophia 43 (4):1171-1175.
The psychology of scientific explanation.J. D. Trout - 2007 - Philosophy Compass 2 (3):564–591.
The goal of explanation.Stephen Bird - 2010 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 41 (4):337-344.
The goal of explanation.Stephen R. Grimm - 2010 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 41 (4):337-344.
Explaining Explanation.David-Hillel Ruben - 1990 - Abingdon, UK: Routledge.
Explanation and Ontological Reasoning.Dwayne Hudson Mulder - 1997 - Dissertation, Loyola University of Chicago
Explanation and the Nature of Scientific Knowledge.Kevin McCain - 2015 - Science & Education 24 (7-8):827-854.

Analytics

Added to PP
2020-05-08

Downloads
0

6 months
0

Historical graph of downloads

Sorry, there are not enough data points to plot this chart.
How can I increase my downloads?

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

No references found.

Add more references