A Confrontation of Convergent Realism

Synthese, 2011

The papers collected in this special issue are written versions of talks delivered at the Theoretical Frameworks and Empirical Underdetermination workshop which we organised at the University of Duesseldorf on April 11-12 2008. Early in the summer of 2007 we were still immersed in the planning stages of the workshop. At the time our main concern was to invite philosophers that were making and would continue to make significant contributions to the scientific realism debate. With this aim in mind, we prepared a list of invitees. One of the names at the top was that of Peter Lipton. His work on inference to the best explanation had established him as one of the most prominent and formidable defenders of scientific realism. When Peter accepted the invitation our confidence in the workshop's prospects was greatly enhanced. Alas it was not meant to be. Peter unexpectedly passed away in November 2007. His absence from the workshop was strongly felt not least because quite a few of the participants had known Peter both on a professional as well as on a personal basis. David Papineau was drafted in as a replacement. Since David had a long and entwined history with Peter he was entrusted with the honourable task of delivering a eulogy on the opening day of the workshop. We are very thankful to David for delivering a moving eulogy as well as for agreeing to replace Peter at such short notice. We would like to dedicate this special issue of Synthese to the memory of Peter Lipton, a fellow philosopher and to some of us a dear friend.

dialectica, 1989

This paper argues that the much discussed issue between "scientific realism" and "instrumentalism" has not been clearly drawn. Particular attention is paid to the claim that only realism can "explain" the success of scientific theories andmore especiallythe progressively increasing success of such theories in a coherent line of inquiry. This claim is used to attempt to reach a clearer conception of the content of the realist thesis that underlies it; but, it is here contended, that attempt fails, and the claim itself hangs in the air. A series of increasingly sophisticated versions of the "instrumentalist" thesis is considered, and both these and the contentions of realism are placed in relation both to particular examples of scientific development and positions historically maintained by philosophers and by scientists. The author's conclusion is that, when the positions are assessed against the background of the actual history of science, (a) each of the contrary doctrines, interpreted with excessive simplicity, is inadequate as a theory of the dialectic of scientific development; (b) each, so interpreted, has contributed in important instances to actual damage to investigations by great scientists (Huygens, Kelvin, PoincarC); whereas (c) in both the theoretical statements and the actual practice of (in the author's opinion) the most sophisticated philosophers/scientists, important aspects of realism and instrumentalism are present together in such a way that the alleged contradiction between them vanishes.

Synthese, 2011

I aim to clarify the relationship between the success of a theory and the truth of that theory. This has been a central issue in the debates between realists and anti-realists. Realists assume that success is a reliable indicator of truth, but the details about the respects in which success is a reliable indicator or test of truth have been largely left to our intuitions. Lewis (Synthese 129:371-380, 2001) provides a clear proposal of how success and truth might be connected, comparing a test of success of our theories to medical tests with low rates of false positives and false negatives. But, contrary to what Lewis claims, I argue that it is not enough for the realist to undercut the claim that success is not a reliable indicator of truth. Rather, the realist must show that our current best theories are likely true. Further, I argue that tests in science are unlike medical tests in a number of important ways.

2005

The paper considers the two main challenges to scientific realism, stemming from confirmation holism and the underdetermination thesis as well as from semantic holism and the incommensurability thesis. Against the first challenge, it is argued that there are other criteria besides agreement with experience that enable a rational evaluation of competing theories. Against the second challenge, it is argued that at most a thesis of local incommensurability can be defended that is compatible with a minimal version of scientific realism, namely conjectural realism. However, in order to establish a fully-fledged scientific realism, one has to refute the local incommensurability thesis as well, showing how a comparison is possible on the level of the proper concepts of the theories in question. The paper examines the prospects for such a comparison, distinguishing three cases.

Academia Letters, 2021

Scientific realism is generally believed to be supported by an argument from the success of science, also known as the no miracle argument (NMA). As Putnam put it, "Realism is the only philosophy that doesn't make the success of science a miracle (1975, p.73).The idea is simple and at first sight indisputable. Theories invoking entities such as electrons or genes are successful in explaining and predicting numerous phenomena.If electrons and genes exist and what our theories tell us about them is true (or approximately true), then the success of these theories makes sense. But if these entities do not exist, or what science tells us about them is false, then this success is totally incomprehensible-a miracle. I would like to reverse this argument by arguing first, that realism is not unique in providing an explanation of the success of science, and second, that the occasional failures of science provide a much better argument for realism than its success. NMA also figures in the debate over the optimistic versus the pessimistic meta-induction. The optimist proposes an inductive inference from the numerous successes of science in the past to the likelihood of its success in the future. And similarly for the pessimist, except that here past failures of science, rather than successes, are projected onto the future. These inferences are mostly discussed in the context of the controversy about scientific realism. Both realists and their opponents employ an inference to the best explanation: the truth of scientific theories is claimed (by champions of the optimistic meta-induction) to constitute the best explanation of their success, whereas their falsity is claimed (by upholders of the pessimist meta-induction) to constitute the best explanation of their frequent failures. Armed with NMA, and with historical data about the successes or failures of science, optimists use their meta-induction to support realism while pessimists use theirs to undermine realism. Note that realists and nonrealists agree that realism could be reinforced by the argument from suc

Philosophy of Science, 2000

I develop an account of predictive similarity that allows even Antirealists who accept a correspondence conception of truth to answer the Realist demand (recently given sophisticated reformulations by Musgrave and Leplin) to explain the success of particular scientific theories by appeal to some intrinsic feature of those theories (notwithstanding the failure of past efforts by van Fraassen, Fine, and Laudan). I conclude by arguing that we have no reason to find truth a better (i.e., more plausible) explanation of a theory's success than predictive similarity, even of its success in making novel predictions. 1. Introduction. The strongest plank in the support for Scientific Realism is an argument classically articulated by Popper (1963), Smart (1968), Putnam (1975, 1978), and Boyd (1984) and which has received a powerful new formulation in the hands of such authors as Alan Musgrave (1988) and Jarrett Leplin (1997). The argument is that the only satisfactory explanation for the success of our scientific theories is that they are true (or approximately true, or true in those respects which are actually responsible for their success) in something very like the classical correspondence senses of these terms. This is sometimes called the Ultimate Argument for Scientific Realism (first by van Fraassen (1980)), or the Miracle argument

Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective, 2020

Scientific realists claim that the best of successful rival theories is (approximately) true. Relative realists object that we cannot make the absolute judgment that a theory is successful, and that we can only make the relative judgment that it is more successful than its competitor. I argue that this objection is undermined by the cases in which empirical equivalents are successful. Relative realists invoke the argument from a bad lot to undermine scientific realism and to support relative realism. In response, I construct the argument from double spaces. It is similar to the argument from a bad lot, but threatens many philosophical inferences, including relative realists' inference from comparative success to comparative truth.

Spontaneous Generations: A Journal for the History and Philosophy of Science, 2018

It is widely assumed that it is the anti-realist who stakes his case on evidence from the history of science. I argue that (i) realists have failed to recognize the need to collect evidence from the history of science to support their methodological claims, and (ii) anti-realists do not rely on evidence from the history of science to the extent that many suggest.

The no-miracles argument (Putnam, 1975) holds that science is successful because successful theories are (approximately) true. Frost-Arnold (2010) objects that this argument is unacceptable because it generates neither new predictions nor unifications. It is similar to the unacceptable explanation that opium puts people to sleep because it has a dormative virtue. I reply that on close examination, realism explains not only why some theories are successful but also why successful theories exist in current science. Therefore, it unifies the disparate phenomena.

2003

Fine, and the members of a number of graduate seminars i I have addressed these issues for helpful discussion, suggestions, and comme material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundatio Grant No. SES-0094001. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recomme expressed in this material are those of the author and do not necessarily re views of the National Science Foundation (NSF). 'Two anonymous referees rightly note that I here follow the regrettably practice of characterizing the relevant sorts of success at a painfully vague or level, though I am happy to accept the appealingly commonsensical account success (grounded in the potential for solving practical problems of pr and intervention) offered by Kitcher (in "Real Realism: The Galilean Strate