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14. Science / D. Explanation / 1. Explanation / b. Aims of explanation

[what explanations are trying to achieve]

26 ideas
A good explanation totally rules out the opposite explanation (so Forms are required) [Plato, by Ruben]
Understanding moves from the less to the more intelligible [Aristotle]
We know a thing if we grasp its first causes, principles and basic elements [Aristotle]
What we seek and understand are facts, reasons, existence, and identity [Aristotle]
Explanation is of the status of a thing, inferences to it, initiation of change, and purpose [Aristotle]
Explanation is generally to deduce it from something better known, which comes in degrees [Boyle]
Explanation is just showing the succession of things ever more clearly [Nietzsche]
Good explications are exact, fruitful, simple and similar to the explicandum [Carnap, by Salmon]
Explanation gives understanding by revealing the full multiplicity of the thing [Wittgenstein]
Explanation and understanding are the same [Wittgenstein]
Scientific explanation is not reducing the unfamiliar to the familiar [Salmon]
Why-questions can seek evidence as well as explanation [Salmon]
Scientific explanation aims at a unifying account of underlying structures and processes [Hempel]
Only changes require explanation [Harré/Madden]
Explanation is for curiosity, control, understanding, to make meaningful, or to give authority [Stanford]
Audience-relative explanation, or metaphysical explanation based on information? [Stanford]
Does a good explanation produce understanding? That claim is just empty [Lewis]
An explanation gives the reason the phenomenon occurred [Lipton]
An explanation is what makes the unfamiliar familiar to us [Lipton]
An explanation is what is added to knowledge to yield understanding [Lipton]
Seaching for explanations is a good way to discover the structure of the world [Lipton]
If all possibilities are equal, order seems (a priori) to need an explanation - or does it? [Robinson,H]
An explanation presupposes something that is improbable unless it is explained [Robinson,H]
We can't reject all explanations because of a regress; inexplicable A can still explain B [Bird]
Scientists eventually seek underlying explanations for every pattern [Scerri]
A good explanation captures the real-world dependence among the phenomena [Koslicki]