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The gap and the error arguments for values in science: Structure and mutual relationship
Get PDFThe underdetermination or ‘gap’ argument (GA), and the inductive risk or ‘error’ argument (EA), are the two main arguments used to defend the influence of non-epistemic values on scientific reasoning. However, they are often presented in a superficial or imprecise way, and their mutual relationship is not clear. This article analyses their respective structures in detail, as well as their relationship with each other. The GA considers the logical structure of non-deductive inference (and of relative observation), and claims that (value-laden) background assumptions are needed to constitute (relative) observations and for those observations to confirm a hypothesis. It does not explicitly consider the consequences of these (value-laden) choices: rather, values are considered given and preexisting, so to speak. It is not normative: it claims that non-epistemic values are necessary to determine background assumptions in the sense that they are inevitable. By contrast, the EA considers the decision-theoretical problem of accepting or not a hypothesis, according to a (value-laden) required degree of confirmation. It is explicitly concerned with the consequences of these choices. It is normative: it claims that scientists should (in the sense of a moral obligation) take into account the non-epistemic consequences of their choices. By substituting the condition for hypothesis acceptance of the EA in the Bayesian account of the GA, one can provide a determinate limit when confirmation can be seen as sufficient to justify acceptance, thereby making the EA appear as a special case of the GA
Causal Thinking in Physiology: A Search for Vertically Organizing Principles
Get PDFPhysiology has excelled at elucidating biological mechanisms at specific scales of organization, yet it lacks a robust framework for understanding causality across these scales. This paper argues for a paradigm shift, moving from a primary focus on scale-specific, or "horizontal," causality to a search for "vertically organizing" principles that are invariant across biological levels. Drawing inspiration from concepts in physics such as scaling laws, emergence, coarse-graining, and action principles, we explore the limitations of current causal thinking in physiology, particularly the prevailing genome-centric bias.
This paper is the first in a series exploring vertically organizing principles in biology. Here we establish the philosophical and theoretical foundation, examining existing frameworks and their limitations. We review information-theoretic approaches including the Free Energy Principle and dissipative adaptation, acknowledging both their insights and their challenges in achieving scale invariance. We introduce the concept of network-weighted action principles (minAction.net) as a promising candidate for scale-invariant organization that may complement these existing frameworks.
Building on Schrödinger's two secrets of life — heredity and self-organization — we argue that a third secret lies in the scale-invariant action principles that give rise to biological design itself. We present evidence from immunometabolism, developmental biology, complex systems physiology, and computational evolution studies supporting multi-scale, information-centric views of biological organization. Notably, recent computational evidence demonstrates that minimizing connection costs—a key component of action functionals—spontaneously generates the modular, evolvable architectures ubiquitous in biological systems. Finally, we posit that meaning—operationally defined as the successful reduction of uncertainty through predictive modeling and efficient action—can be conceptualized as a candidate for a high-level, vertically organizing principle that operates from the cellular to the cognitive level. This manuscript lays the conceptual foundation for a more unified and scalable science of life
Theory Construction and The Projectability of Meta-Inductive Arguments
Get PDFScientists and philosophers of science often draw methodological lessons from successful theories to justify methods of theory construction and to guide research programs.This paper proposes an epistemic framework for this practice, articulated in terms of the notion of meta-induction. By analogy to Goodman's `New Riddle of Induction', it introduces the concept of projectability of meta-inductive arguments, and demonstrates its significance in any account of meta-inductive reasoning. Likewise to scientific induction, meta-induction is shown to be constrained by naturalist epistemology in determining which classifications of theoretical methods are `projectable'. Projectability judgments in meta-inductive arguments help ensure that when taking lessons from past theorizing (either as a part of scientific discussions or in a philosophical reflections about science), they would be based on the way evidence was exploited in theory construction or on theoretically plausible hypothesis about the natural world, rather than on human-made concepts. This framework emphasizes the primacy of empirically guided patterns of conjecture over purely formal considerations, enabling epistemic evaluation of research projects, even when theorizing is primarily grounded on abstract theoretical methods and at stages when direct evidence is unavailable. The paper discusses possible implications on philosophical debates concerning theory assessment in fundamental physics, particularly regarding meta-empirical justification, as well as discussions on model transfer in the special sciences
Proofs and Research Programmes: Lakatos at 100
Get PDFImre Lakatos was one of the most significant philosophers of science and math-ematics of the twentieth century, and his ideas remain important and relevant today. As the entry on Lakatos in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy attests “Lakatos’s influence, particularly in the philosophy of science, has been immense”. November 2022 saw the centenary of Lakatos’s birth, and the event was marked by an international conference held at the LSE—where Lakatos made his career after he had emigrated from Hungary to England—the conference focussing on the continuing influence and relevance of his work. With the exception of two papers, this volume consists of a selection of papers that were presented at the conference
Can Scientific Communities Profit from Evaluative Diversity?
Get PDFCurrent models of scientific inquiry assume scientists to all share the same evaluative standards. However, science is often characterised by multiple ones, that is by evaluative diversity. We investigate how scientific success is affected by evaluative diversity through computer-based simulations. Our results show that communities with diverse standards profit immensely from scientists sharing all the approaches they explored, regardless of whether they considered them
valuable. Moreover, we find that even a moderate degree of evaluative diversity can, under certain conditions, lead scientists to reach more satisfying results than those they would reach in homogeneous communities
Effective Realism and the Problem of Boltzmann Brains
Get PDFThe Boltzmann brain problem threatens to undermine our use of cosmological evidence. If our best-fit cosmological model, ΛCDM, holds indefinitely into the future, most observers with our evidence would be random fluctuations rather than ordinarily evolved observers like ourselves. This seems to erode the connection between our data and ΛCDM itself. Existing responses to the problem, such as denying our typicality, appealing to externalist evidence, or assigning zero priors to cognitively unstable theories, all face serious difficulties. I propose a different solution: ΛCDM should be interpreted as an effective theory whose domain of applicability does not extend to the extreme time scales that lead to a numerical domination by Boltzmann brains over ordinary observers. This is analogous to the case of quantum field theory, which is highly successful within its own domain of applicability, but breaks down at sufficiently short length scales. On this interpretation, the skeptical issue is resolved not by new epistemic rules but by recognizing that ΛCDM, like other effective theories, must be realized by a more fundamental description. The existence of many possible such descriptions compatible with our evidence, and the way they respond to evidence under self-locating uncertainty, already dissolves the skeptical problem
Feyerabend's Viennese Realisms
Get PDFThe paper tracks Feyerabend's evolving and recurring commitment to varieties of realism and traces it to a multiplicity of rich intellectual and scientific environments in Vienna, Great Britain, North America and Switzerland. The paper also tracks its varying significance, from empiricism to ontology and politics of action. The account relies on a revision, through the prism of the question and conceptions of realism, of narratives about turn-of-the-century Viennese philosophy, logical empiricism –and its legacy– and, even more novel, intellectual and geographical, Viennese-American and German-American, connections: a historical tangle of idealism, realism and pragmatism. The roster of relevant figures includes Mach, Schlick, Carnap, Frank, Neurath, Einstein, Popper, Kraft, Hollitscher, Feigl, Pap, Lenzen, R.W. Sellars, W. Sellars, Kuhn, Bohm and Primas
How to estimate the success chance of a scientific theory? On the no miracles argument and the base rate fallacy
Get PDFColin Howson (2000) claims that the no miracles argument in favor of a realist interpretation of a scientific theory falls prey to the base rate fallacy and is therefore invalid on logical grounds. In response, Dawid and Hartmann (2018) claim that Howson only reconstructs a limited part of the argument. They argue that a more complete reconstruction of the no miracles argument takes into account the success frequency of a wider spectrum of scientific theory building, and therefore avoids the base rate fallacy. In a critical response to Dawid and Hartmann, Boge (2020) presents two challenges to their approach, both of which are designed to provide reasons for skepticism about treating observed success frequencies in science as connected to the relevant base rates. In this paper, I argue that Boge’s challenges are not effective
The Geometric View of Theories
Get PDFRecent critiques of the semantic conception of scientific theories suggest that a theory is not best formulated as a collection of models satisfying some set of kinematical or dynamical conditions. Thus it has been argued that additional structure on the set of models is required. Furthermore, there are calls for developing a 'theory of theories', where what was formerly a 'theory' is seen as a 'model' within a larger theoretical structure. This paper makes a two-pronged proposal for the "shape" that physical theories should take, based on recent insights on dualities and quasi-dualities in physics. First, I develop a geometric view of theories, according to which a physical theory is a set of models with topological and geometric structure on it. This general view is briefly illustrated in an example from quantum cosmology. Second, I make a more specific proposal for a natural structure that can encompass various 'theories' as its models, with topological and algebraic-geometric structure on them. I call the latter more specific structure a 'model bundle', where the models are in the fibres and there is a moduli space in the base. I illustrate my second proposal in the Seiberg-Witten theory (Seiberg and Witten, 1994a,b), where the moduli space is the complex plane with three punctures, the states and quantities are in the fibres, and the modular group is the structure group that acts on the fibres. This view highlights the important role of quasi-dualities as local transition functions between fibres; dualities are recovered as global transition functions when the bundle is trivial. I discuss some philosophical issues that this geometric view of physical theories opens up, such as its realist interpretation
The many laws in the periodic table
Get PDFThere are many- not just one- periodic laws in chemistry. These laws correspond to non-accidental regularity relations about physical and chemical properties of (sets of) chemical elements. I support this by showing how these regularity relations can be understood from the perspective of a philosophical analysis of laws. Specifically, I show that these relations instantiate standard features associated with laws; they can be spelled out in terms of two standard accounts of laws; and, they can coherently figure in debates about the reality of laws as plausible candidates of ceteris paribus laws