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Full Idea
To be an empiricist is to withhold belief in anything that goes beyond the actual, observable phenomena, and to recognise no objective modality in nature.
Gist of Idea
Empiricists deny what is unobservable, and reject objective modality
Source
Bas C. van Fraassen (The Scientific Image [1980], p.202), quoted by J Ladyman / D Ross - Every Thing Must Go 2.3.1
Book Ref
Ladyman,J/Ross,D: 'Every Thing Must Go' [OUP 2007], p.99
A Reaction
To only believe in what is actually observable strikes me as ridiculous. It might be, though, that we observe modality, in observing dispositions. If you pull back a bowstring, you feel the possibilities.
| 6783 | To 'accept' a theory is not to believe it, but to believe it empirically adequate [Fraassen, by Bird] |
| 6784 | Why should the true explanation be one of the few we have actually thought of? [Fraassen, by Bird] |
| 13066 | An explanation is just descriptive information answering a particular question [Fraassen, by Salmon] |
| 14917 | To accept a scientific theory, we only need to believe that it is empirically adequate [Fraassen] |
| 14919 | Empiricists deny what is unobservable, and reject objective modality [Fraassen] |