| 1980 | The Scientific Image |
| p.131 | 13066 | An explanation is just descriptive information answering a particular question | |
| Full Idea: On van Fraassen's theory an explanation is simply an answer to a why-question; it is nothing other than descriptive information that, in a given context, answers a particular type of question. | |||
| From: report of Bas C. van Fraassen (The Scientific Image [1980]) by Wesley Salmon - Four Decades of Scientific Explanation 4.3 | |||
| A reaction: Presumably we would need some sort of criterion for a 'good' explanation, and it seems to me that a very good explanation might be given which was nevertheless beyond the grasp of the questioner. |
| p.143 | 6783 | To 'accept' a theory is not to believe it, but to believe it empirically adequate | |
| Full Idea: To 'accept' a theory is not to believe it, but is instead to believe it to be empirically adequate. | |||
| From: report of Bas C. van Fraassen (The Scientific Image [1980]) by Alexander Bird - Philosophy of Science Ch.4 | |||
| A reaction: The second half of this doesn't avoid the word 'belief'. Nevertheless the suggestion is that we never believe (i.e. commit to truth) ever again. So you avoid an on-coming bus because the threat appears to be 'empirically adequate'. Hm. |
| p.145 | 6784 | Why should the true explanation be one of the few we have actually thought of? | |
| Full Idea: Van Fraassen asks why we should think that the actual explanation of the evidence should be found among the theories we are considering, when there must be an infinity of theories which are also potential explanations of the evidence? | |||
| From: report of Bas C. van Fraassen (The Scientific Image [1980]) by Alexander Bird - Philosophy of Science Ch.4 | |||
| A reaction: This has become one of the leading modern anti-realist arguments. We must introduce an element of faith here; presumably evolution makes us experts on immediate puzzles, competent on intermediate ones, and hopeful on remote ones. |
| p.12 | p.95 | 14917 | To accept a scientific theory, we only need to believe that it is empirically adequate |
| Full Idea: Science aims to give us theories which are empirically adequate; and acceptance of a theory involves as belief only that it is empiricially adequate. | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Scientific Image [1980], p.12), quoted by J Ladyman / D Ross - Every Thing Must Go 2.3.1 | |||
| A reaction: This won't tell us what to do if there is a tie between two theories, and we will want to know the criteria for 'adequate'. Presumably there are theories which are empirically quite good, but not yet acceptable. Theories commit beyond experience. |
| p.202 | p.99 | 14919 | Empiricists deny what is unobservable, and reject objective modality |
| 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. | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Scientific Image [1980], p.202), quoted by J Ladyman / D Ross - Every Thing Must Go 2.3.1 | |||
| 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. |
| 2002 | The Empirical Stance |
| 1.5 | p.14 | 12769 | Inference to best explanation contains all sorts of hidden values |
| Full Idea: The very phrase 'inference to the best explanation' should wave a red flag for us. What is good, better, best? What values are slipped in here, under a common name, and where do they come from? | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Empirical Stance [2002], 1.5) | |||
| A reaction: A point worth making, but overstated. If we are going to refuse to make judgements for fear that some wicked 'value' might creep in, our lives will be reduced to absurdity. |
| 1.5 | p.14 | 12768 | We accept many scientific theories without endorsing them as true |
| Full Idea: The choice among theories in science may be a choice to accept in some sense falling far short of endorsement as true. | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Empirical Stance [2002], 1.5) | |||
| A reaction: When put like this, it is hard to deny the force of Van Fraassen's reservations about science. Lots of people, including me, use scientific theories as working assumptions for life, with nothing like full confidence in their truth. |
| 1.5 | p.16 | 12770 | We may end up with a huge theory of carefully constructed falsehoods |
| Full Idea: The specter that faces us is that we may end up having explained all that is dreamt of in our philosophies by intricately crafted postulates that are false. | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Empirical Stance [2002], 1.5) | |||
| A reaction: This is more persuasive that Idea 12769. People who cannot bear to live with a total absence of explanation (with Keats's 'negative capability') are most in danger from this threat. |
| 1.5 | p.17 | 12771 | Is it likely that a successful, coherent, explanatory ontological hypothesis is true? |
| Full Idea: How likely is it that a truly successful, coherent, explanatory ontological hypothesis is true? | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Empirical Stance [2002], 1.5) | |||
| A reaction: Van Fraassen announces "I reject metaphysic" (p.3), so we know where he stands. Anything becomes less certain as it moves to a higher level of generality. Should we abandon generalisation? There is much illumination in metaphysics. |
| 1.5 | p.17 | 12772 | Philosophy is a value- and attitude-driven enterprise |
| Full Idea: Philosophy is a value- and attitude-driven enterprise; philosophy is in false consciousness when it sees itself otherwise. | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Empirical Stance [2002], 1.5) | |||
| A reaction: It is one thing to be permeated with values, and another to be value-driven. Truth, reason and logic are (I take it) granted a high value in philosophy, just as the offside rule is in football. I am trying to place reality in charge, not humanity. |
| 1.6 | p.18 | 12773 | Analytic philosophy has an exceptional arsenal of critical tools |
| Full Idea: Analytical philosophy can rightly pride itself on having produced the greatest critical arsenal the world has ever known. | |||
| From: Bas C. van Fraassen (The Empirical Stance [2002], 1.6) | |||
| A reaction: This is, of course, in the context of a scathing attack on the desire to use analytical methods to do speculative metaphysics. I say that if these are the best tools, then we should push forward with them to see how far we can get. |