A Realistic Look at Putnam's Argument Against Realism

Putnam's ``model-theoretic' argument against metaphysical realism presupposes that an ideal scientific theory is expressible in a first order language. The central aim of this paper is to show that Putnam's ``first orderization' of science, although unchallenged by numerous critics, makes his argument unsound even for adequate theories, never mind an ideal one. To this end, I will argue that quantitative theories, which dominate the natural sciences, can be adequately interpreted and evaluated only with the help of so-called theories of measurement whose epistemological and methodological purpose is to justify systematic assignments of quantitative values to objects in the world. And, in order to fulfill this purpose, theories of measurement must have an essentially higher order logical structure. As a result, Putnam's argument fails because much of science turns out to rest on essentially higher order theoretical assumptions about the world.     

Systems and Beliefs

Systems thinking provides insights into how ideas interact and change, and constructivism is an example of this type of systemic approach. In the 1970s constructivism emphasised the development of mathematical and scientific ideas in children. Recently constructivist ideas are applied much more generally. Here I use this approach to consider beliefs and their role in conflicts and the conditions needed for reconciliation. If we look at Reality in terms of how we construct it as a human cognitive process, we recognise two things. First, that we cannot go beyond our senses and thoughts to what exists independently of us, and second, if we construct what we know we have to take responsibility for this. This inevitably focuses our thinking on the relation we have with the physical and social world, we are a part of the universe rather than apart from it. This paper argues that accepting and understanding these limits of human knowing together with our interconnectedness provide opportunities to understand conflicting positions. To resolve conflict, people with opposing viewpoints have to be prepared to understand each other. That is a challenge because our own reality plays a vital role in our lives, for everything from personal survival to social support.     

Do We Need To Search For The Only True World View?

It is necessary to take into account that every ontology and also every scientific system draws a picture of the World according to the abstractions and presuppositions which were accepted, consciously or unconsciously, during the construction of the system. That is why Aristotle, Hegel, and the paraconsistent logics gave us different world views. On the basis of contemporary logics, including paraconsistent logics, we can better understand what the objects of the Aristotelian logic are, what are the presuppositions used in it, what are the meanings of its terms and how their meaning was changed when used in other theories. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

试论科学知识、技术知识与工程知识

本文首先通过对实证主义知识论的批判来建构立足于生活实践的知识论立场,在科学、技术、工程三元论的架构下,沿着知识论的两个基本追问——何谓知识?知识何以可能?即知识基于什么样的活动得以产生的追问,来分析已往科学知识、技术知识、工程知识的研究在流行的知识论框架下存在的问题与缺失。从立足于生活实践的知识论立场看,科学知识作为描述性知识,其目标与意图就是在于理解世界,描述世界的存在方式;技术知识作为行动的程序性和规范性知识,其目的在于解决实践过程中"做什么"和"怎样做"的问题;而工程知识作为造物行动中的情境化知识,其目的在于人工物在现实中的成功建造。三者有着本质的区别,但存在着十分紧密的联系。     

Towards a Radical Constructivist Understanding of Science

Constructivism is the idea thatwe construct our own world rather than it beingdetermined by an outside reality. Its mostconsistent form, Radical Constructivism (RC),claims that we cannot transcend ourexperiences. Thus it doesn't make sense to saythat our constructions gradually approach thestructure of an external reality. The mind isnecessarily an epistemological solipsist, incontrast to being an ontological solipsist whomaintains that this is all there is, namely asingle mind within which the only world exists.RC recognizes the impossibility of the claimthat the world does not exist. Yet, RC has thepotential to go much further. I claim that RCprovides the foundation of a new world-view inwhich we can overcome hard scientific problems.Thus, the paper is urging us to carry RCfurther, not just on philosophical grounds, butalso into the domain of science.     

Postphenomenology and the Politics of Sustainable Technology

In this paper I argue that Don Ihde??s ??postphenomenology?? may constitute a proper access to the question concerning sustainable technology and I do so in three steps. First, I lay bare how a modern framework that systematically separates facts and instruments from values, choices and responsibilities yields no space for engaged decisions and responsible action towards more sustainable societies. In a second step, I elaborate how postphenomenology??s ??in-between?? perspective opens up the possibility of questioning science and technology as an inherent part of our human existence. Building on this, I argue how a ??normativity of the in-between?? may be developed around the concept of ??topical measure?? and which is grounded in the foundationless foundation of postphenomenology??s relational ontology. In a last step, I show how such a ??topical measure?? opens up two fields of normative action vis-à-vis the question concerning sustainable technology: one critical, the other empowering. Whereas ??topical criticism?? focuses on bringing into the open the powerful subpolitics of science and technology, the field of ??topical responsibility?? rather aims at actively assuming responsibility in these political circles. Besides its main interest, which lies in forging a genuine and adequate way into the issue of sustainability, this paper also constitutes an entry into Ihde??s philosophical oeuvre. The question concerning sustainable technology does not only touch upon Ihde??s relational trinity human-technology-world, it also deals with the degree of normative inquiry present in Ihde??s philosophy, an issue he has been repeatedly questioned about by his interlocutors.     

Reframing Architecture

I would like to thank Prof. Stephen Read (2011) and Prof. Andrew Benjamin (2011) for both giving inspiring and elaborate comments on my article “Dwelling in-between walls: the architectural surround”. As I will try to demonstrate below, their two different responses not only supplement my article very nicely, but also augment each other’s. In the beginning of Read’s comment, as he sets the stage for his observations, he unknowingly also points in the direction of Benjamin’s remarks: “I propose not to de-construct therefore, or add a point of view from an orthogonal position, but to try in the spirit of multidisciplinarity to talk in languages not well practiced—to begin to build what Bowker and Star call ‘boundary objects’ between different starting positions; points we can gather around to think further together” (Read 2011). Whereas Read facilitates a multidisciplinary dialogue, Benjamin focuses on how the absence of an initial distinction might threaten the endeavour of my paper. In my reply to Read and Benjamin, I will discuss their suggestions and arguments, while at the same time hopefully clarifying the postphenomenological approach to architecture.     

How Not to Attack Intelligent Design Creationism: Philosophical Misconceptions About Methodological Naturalism

In recent controversies about Intelligent Design Creationism (IDC), the principle of methodological naturalism (MN) has played an important role. In this paper, an often neglected distinction is made between two different conceptions of MN, each with its respective rationale and with a different view on the proper role of MN in science. According to one popular conception, MN is a self-imposed or intrinsic limitation of science, which means that science is simply not equipped to deal with claims of the supernatural (Intrinsic MN or IMN). Alternatively, we will defend MN as a provisory and empirically grounded attitude of scientists, which is justified in virtue of the consistent success of naturalistic explanations and the lack of success of supernatural explanations in the history of science (Provisory MN or PMN). Science does have a bearing on supernatural hypotheses, and its verdict is uniformly negative. We will discuss five arguments that have been proposed in support of IMN: the argument from the definition of science, the argument from lawful regularity, the science stopper argument, the argument from procedural necessity, and the testability argument. We conclude that IMN, because of its philosophical flaws, proves to be an ill-advised strategy to counter the claims of IDC. Evolutionary scientists are on firmer ground if they discard supernatural explanations on purely evidential grounds, instead of ruling them out by philosophical fiat.     

《物种起源》的论证结构

20世纪60年代到80年代中期，学界多是事先假定达尔文遵循着某种单一的科学方法，相信《物种起源》有单一的论证结构；80年代中期开始，一些学者放弃了寻找《物种起源》中某种单一论证结构的努力，相信达尔文在《物种起源》中采用了多种论证策略。根据不同的理论有不同的理论成功标准，自然选择理论是由多个理论构成的，这就决定了《物种起源》中不可能存在单一的论证逻辑。     

The Anti-philosophical Stance, the Realism Question and Scientific Practice

In recent years a general consensus has been developing in the philosophy of science to the effect that strong social constructivist accounts are unable to adequately account for scientific practice. Recently, however, a number of commentators have formulated an attenuated version of constructivism that purports to avoid the difficulties that plague the stronger claims of its predecessors. Interestingly this attenuated form of constructivism finds philosophical support from a relatively recent turn in the literature concerning scientific realism. Arthur Fine and a number of other commentators have argued that the realism debate ought to be abandoned. The rationale for this argument is that the debate is sterile for it has, it is claimed, no consequence for actual scientific practice, and therefore does not advance our understanding of science or its practice. Recent “softer” accounts of social constructivism also hold a similar agnostic stance to the realism question. I provide a survey of these various agnostic stances and show how they form a general position that I shall refer to as “the anti-philosophical stance”. I then demonstrate that the anti-philosophical stance fails by identifying difficulties that attend its proposal to ban philosophical interpretation. I also provide examples of instances where philosophical stances to the realism question affect scientific practice.     

海德格尔对科学视域中存在的批判

海德格尔认为,科学是从存在者的角度看待存在并展开研究的。第一,科学将存在看作可把握的实在,即现成存在的具有规律性的东西;第二,科学把存在看作与主体对立的并由主体摆置的物件;第三,科学将存在最终看作可控制的持存物,进而支配整个世界。科学将它们当作真正的存在,而海德格尔则对此进行了批判,认为科学将与自身密切相关的存在本身弃置一旁,造成了存在的蜕变和异化。在他看来,存在本身是科学不可回避的东西,是使科学成为可能的基础和条件。     

Mathematics,Philosophical and Semantic Considerations on Infinity (II): Dialectical Vision

Human language has the characteristic of being open and in some cases polysemic. The word “infinite” is used often in common speech and more frequently in literary language, but rarely with its precise meaning. In this way the concepts can be used in a vague way but an argument can still be structured so that the central idea is understood and is shared with to the partners. At the same time no precise definition is given to the concepts used and each partner makes his own reading of the text based on previous experience and cultural background. In a language dictionary the first meaning of “infinite” agrees with the etymology: what has no end. We apply the word infinite most often and incorrectly as a synonym for “very large” or something that we do not perceive its completion. In this context, the infinite mentioned in dictionaries refers to the idea or notion of the “immeasurably large” although this is open to what the individual’s means by “immeasurably great.” Based on this linguistic imprecision, the authors present a non Cantorian theory of the potential and actual infinite. For this we have introduced a new concept: the homogon that is the whole set that does not fall within the definition of sets established by Cantor.     

Reasoning to Hypotheses: Where Do Questions Come?

Detectives and scientists are in the business of reasoning from observations to explanations. This they often do by raising cunning questionsduring their inquiries. But to substantiate this claim we need to know how questions arise and how they are nurtured into more specific hypotheses. I shall discuss what the problem is, and then introduce the so-called interrogative model of inquiry which makes use of an explicit logic of questions. On this view, a discovery processes can be represented as a model-based game in which an inquirer subjects a source of information to a series of strategically organized questions. Strategic principles and why-questions are especially important in heuristical reasoning. Why-questions have their own peculiar nature among questions. They indicate that the inquirer's expectations are somehow disappointed, and that is cognitively challenging. In a finished argument why-questions can be omitted, but in the search for more specific questions they are highly important. As a detetective example I shall analyze Sherlock Holmes reasoning in Silver Blace, the scientific one is A.R. Wallace's discovery of the principle of natural selection. In both of these examples the meaning of questions, especially of well-chosen why-questions, of strategic principles, and of highly structured background knowledge come to the fore. Good questions frequent those who have orderly expectations, based on experience and expertise (detectives!) or highly structured background theories (scientists!).     

Coherence of Our Best Scientific Theories

Putnam in Realism in mathematics and Elsewhere, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (1975) infers from the success of a scientific theory to its approximate truth and the reference of its key term. Laudan in Philos Sci 49:19–49 (1981) objects that some past theories were successful, and yet their key terms did not refer, so they were not even approximately true. Kitcher in The advancement of science, Oxford University Press, New York (1993) replies that the past theories are approximately true because their working posits are true, although their idle posits are false. In contrast, I argue that successful theories which cohere with each other are approximately true, and that their key terms refer. My position is immune to Laudan’s counterexamples to Putnam’s inference and yields a solution to a problem with Kitcher’s position.     

劳丹悲观归纳中的两个统计学错误

劳丹借助科学史对科学实在论的观点进行反驳,特别是通过一组曾经取得成功但无指称的理论列表来否认成功和近似真理之间的关联。为了使反驳有效,劳丹归纳出的列表必须具有统计学的意义,但同时又犯了统计学错误。刘易斯认为悲观归纳犯了假阳性错误,米兹拉西认为悲观归纳犯了样本错误。米兹拉西同样以科学史为依据提出了一种支持实在论观点的乐观归纳,乐观归纳能同时避免以上两种错误,比无奇迹论证更有力。     

研究式地解读科学人文经典

本文在表达作者主编<科学人文读本>的理念和总结有关教师使用这个读本的经验基础上,提出一种新的旨在提高学生的综合科学素养的自然辩证法课程教学模式.作者把科学划分为自然知识形态的解释层面、器物形态的技术层面、精神形态的态度和方法层面、组织形态的建制层面、与背景和效果相联系的社会层面.按照这5个层面,并且联系科学生活和相关的社会生活,作者设计了由8个板块组成的阅读框架,以此选择科学人文经典读物.在这个模式中,教师的作用是组织和引导研究生分析地、扩展地、研究地解读这些读物,而不是照本宣科地讲述教科书.     

从视觉文化论太空美术与科学传播

太空美术是建立在太空科学与宇航学发展基础上的美术形式,同时具有科学与艺术的特质。它把科学知识融入了图像世界,成为我们了解太空世界的重要方式之一,太空美术和太空摄影相近,但又是不可代替的两种视觉语言形式,太空美术在传播科学知识、科学思想和科学文化中发挥着不可替代的作用,并且给现时期的科学传播提供了一种新的路径模式和启示。     

认真对待“现象”——意识科学中的“纯粹经验”及其哲学意义

在认知科学中,"现象"一词指人类在感知外部事物或内在状态时,于意识中直接呈现的纯粹经验。受到一种可以称之为"概念全能主义"的观念影响,当代哲学和认知科学普遍坚持,现象的存在必须依赖其他更重要的认知能力,也即注意力或概念能力,纯粹现象因而遭到否定。然而通过对"斯佩林-兰德曼实验"的数据与结果进行分析权衡,可以在经验科学的意义上证明纯粹现象的存在,进而揭露概念全能主义的谬误。纯粹现象及其证明过程揭示出:处在人类认知界限之外的经验与世界是不能被摒弃和偷换的,它们是实在论链条的必要环节,并且能够在经验科学中得到认真的研究和对待。