Philosophy 2301

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Philosophy 2301

• Class 5

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Admin

• Tests are in the process of being marked- still
  need to have the make-up midterm.

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Upcoming topics (for essay)

• Already discussed
• Various Problems of Discovery
• Various Problems of Evaluation/Justification
• To be discussed
• Problems of Causation (Hume)
• Positivists, Logical Positivists(Comte, Hempel)
• Duhem-Quine Hypothesis (Realism/Anti-Realism)
• Karl Popper (Truth and Falsity for hypotheses)
• Kuhn (Paradigm Shift, Relative Truth of Science)

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Inkshedding

• What have you learned in this class, so far, that
  has made you think about science in a different
  way?

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Last Few Classes

• Problems with inductive logic
• Recall where this fits in
• Problem of Discovery
• Problems of Evaluation/Justification
• Problems of Explanation

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Humes Challenge
Hume (1711-1776)

• Empiricist
• Sceptic
• Philosopher of Science

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Causation

• properties of objects give them causal powers.
• one event can cause another.

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Scandal of Philosophy
causation
?
inductive logic
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Head in the sand?
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Group Discussion Question

• What do you think about Humes problem with
  causation? Can you see any way around it for
  science, or are you convinced by Hume?
• On the board
• Yes- Why? (a sentence or two)
• No- Why? (a sentence or two)
• If you cant decide, do both

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Patching up causation
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The Soup Problem

• Possibility 1. The presence of the antecedent
  circumstance in common is just coincidental

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The Soup Problem

• Possibility 2 The circumstance causing the
  phenomenon is not considered and therefore not
  added to the list of circumstances to be
  considered

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The Soup Problem

• Possibility 3 The phenomenon is caused by a
  combination of circumstances, not just one
  circumstance in isolation-

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The Soup Problem

• Possibility 4 The phenomenon of interest is
  being caused by multiple antecedent circumstances.

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Experiments!

• The deliberate, controlled manipulation of
  nature, in an effort to generate the phenomenon
  of interest.
• Hypothesis Feeding oat-bran to swans will make
  them grow much bigger than they otherwise would.

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Experiments

• some knowledge of the populations
• randomly choose members of the populations
• rule out other possible causes two groups- the
  control group and the test group.
• hypothesis operationalized made observable and
  concrete.

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Goodbye Problems of Justification/Evaluation!

• Problems with direct observation (Galileo and
  Objectivity)
• Problems with auxiliary hypotheses (Copernicus)
• Problems with induction
• Proving Universal Hypotheses (All swans are
  white)
• Statistics and Statistical Assumptions (Average
  Age of Students)
• Humes Problem of Causation
• Other Problems with Induction and Causation (The
  sick soup example)

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The Problem of Explanation

• So far- observational science

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Robert Boyle and the Gas Law

• Pressure k/volume

(1627-1691)
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Theories
Explanations which seek to describe the
underlying causes and entities of nature in order
to explain specific phenomenon.
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Unobservable phenomena
?
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John Dalton
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From the observable to unobservable

• We want to explain observable phenomenon.
• But sometimes the objects involved in phenomenon
  aren't themselves directly observable.
• So we require a way to connect the unobservable
  objects to the observable world.

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Internal Principles and Bridge Principles

• Internal principles describe unobservable
  entities- their properties and their behaviours.
• Bridge principles explain the connection between
  the unobservable entities and observable
  behaviour.

bridge
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Dalton and Bridge Principles

• ?Internal Principle Atoms are not divisible
• ?Internal Principle Atoms combine to form new
  compounds.
• ?Internal Principle Combinations can only occur
  in certain ways. All combinations involve small
  whole number ratios
• ?Bridge Principle pure material is composed of a
  certain type of atom. The volume and weight of
  the observable material are determined by the
  number and type of atoms that compose that
  material
• Prediction If two pure materials are weighed,
  allowed to combine to form a new material and the
  material left over is weighed to determine how
  much of each has combined, the ratio of weights
  will be composed of whole numbers.