Point-particle explanations: the case of gravitational waves
Synthese:1-21 (2017)
Abstract
This paper explores the role of physically impossible idealizations in model-based explanation. We do this by examining the explanation of gravitational waves from distant stellar objects using models that contain point-particle idealizations. Like infinite idealizations in thermodynamics, biology and economics, the point-particle idealization in general relativity is physically impossible. What makes this case interesting is that there are two very different kinds of models used for predicting the same gravitational wave phenomena, post-Newtonian models and effective field theory models. The paper contends that post-Newtonian models are explanatory while effective field theory models are not, because only in the former can we eliminate the physically impossible point-particle idealization. This suggests that, in some areas of science at least, models invoking ineliminable infinite idealizations cannot have explanatory power.Author's Profile
DOI
10.1007/s11229-017-1638-y
My notes
Similar books and articles
Expanding the Scope of Explanatory Idealization.Andrew Wayne - 2011 - Philosophy of Science 78 (5):830-841.
Indeterminism, classical gravitation and non-collision singularities.Jon Pérez Laraudogoitia - 2001 - International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 15 (3):269 – 274.
Which explanatory role for mathematics in scientific models? Reply to “The Explanatory Dispensability of Idealizations”.Silvia De Bianchi - 2016 - Synthese 193 (2):387-401.
Explaining with Models: The Role of Idealizations.Julie Jebeile & Ashley Graham Kennedy - 2015 - International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 29 (4):383-392.
Idealizations, ceteris paribus clauses, idealizational laws, and all that.Igor Hanzel - 2015 - Filozofia Nauki 89 (1):5-26.
Embedding of Particle Waves in a Schwarzschild Metric Background.David Zareski - 2000 - Foundations of Physics 30 (2):253-285.
Idealization in Quantum Field Theory.Stephan Hartmann - 1998 - In Niall Shanks (ed.), Idealization in Contemporary Physics. pp. 99-122.
A resolution of the classical wave-particle problem.J. P. Wesley - 1984 - Foundations of Physics 14 (2):155-170.
On Relativistic Generalization of Gravitational Force.Anatoli Andrei Vankov - 2008 - Foundations of Physics 38 (6):523-545.
Design Explanation and Idealization.Dingmar van Eck & Julie Mennes - 2016 - Erkenntnis 81 (5):1051-1071.
Approximations, idealizations, and models in statistical mechanics.Chuang Liu - 2004 - Erkenntnis 60 (2):235-263.
Analytics
Added to PP
2017-12-01
Downloads
32 (#367,514)
6 months
2 (#300,644)
2017-12-01
Downloads
32 (#367,514)
6 months
2 (#300,644)
Historical graph of downloads
Author's Profile
Citations of this work
Explanatory Asymmetry in Non-Causal Explanation.Andrew Wayne - 2022 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 53 (4):555-571.
References found in this work
Making Things Happen: A Theory of Causal Explanation.James Woodward - 2003 - Oxford University Press.
Scientific Explanation and the Causal Structure of the World.Wesley C. Salmon - 1984 - Princeton University Press.
Aspects of scientific explanation.Carl G. Hempel - 1965 - In Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. Free Press. pp. 504.
Making Things Happen. A Theory of Causal Explanation.Michael Strevens - 2007 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 74 (1):233-249.
The Devil in the Details: Asymptotic Reasoning in Explanation, Reduction, and Emergence.Robert W. Batterman - 2001 - Oxford University Press.