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22353
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One view says objectivity is making a successful claim which captures the facts [Reiss/Sprenger]
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Full Idea:
One conception of objectivity is that the facts are 'out there', and it is the task of scientists to discover, analyze and sytematize them. 'Objective' is a success word: if a claim is objective, it successfully captures some feature of the world.
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From:
Reiss,J/Spreger,J (Scientific Objectivity [2014], 2)
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A reaction:
This seems to describe truth, rather than objectivity. You can establish accurate facts by subjective means. You can be fairly objective but miss the facts. Objectivity is a mode of thought, not a link to reality.
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22356
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An absolute scientific picture of reality must not involve sense experience, which is perspectival [Reiss/Sprenger]
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Full Idea:
Sense experience is necessarily perspectival, so to the extent to which scientific theories are to track the absolute conception [of reality], they must describe a world different from sense experience.
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From:
Reiss,J/Spreger,J (Scientific Objectivity [2014], 2.3)
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A reaction:
This is a beautifully simple and interesting point. Even when you are looking at a tree, to grasp its full reality you probably need to close your eyes (which is bad news for artists).
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22359
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Topic and application involve values, but can evidence and theory choice avoid them? [Reiss/Sprenger]
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Full Idea:
There may be values involved in the choice of a research problem, the gathering of evidence, the acceptance of a theory, and the application of results. ...The first and fourth do involve values, but what of the second and third?
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From:
Reiss,J/Spreger,J (Scientific Objectivity [2014], 3.1)
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A reaction:
[compressed] My own view is that the danger of hidden distorting values has to be recognised, but it is then possible, by honest self-criticism, to reduce them to near zero. Sociological enquiry is different, of course.
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22360
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The Value-Free Ideal in science avoids contextual values, but embraces epistemic values [Reiss/Sprenger]
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Full Idea:
According to the Value-Free Ideal, scientific objectivity is characterised by absence of contextual values and by exclusive commitment to epistemic values in scientific reasoning.
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From:
Reiss,J/Spreger,J (Scientific Objectivity [2014], 3.1)
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A reaction:
This seems appealing, because it concedes that we cannot be value-free, without suggesting that we are unavoidably swamped by values. The obvious question is whether the two types of value can be sharply distinguished.
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22362
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Value-free science needs impartial evaluation, theories asserting facts, and right motivation [Reiss/Sprenger]
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Full Idea:
Three components of value-free science are Impartiality (appraising theories only by epistemic scientific standards), Neutrality (the theories make no value statements), and Autonomy (the theory is motivated only by science).
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From:
Reiss,J/Spreger,J (Scientific Objectivity [2014], 3.3)
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A reaction:
[They are summarising Hugh Lacey, 1999, 2002] I'm not sure why the third criterion matters, if the first two are met. If a tobacco company commissions research on cigarettes, that doesn't necessarily make the findings false or prejudiced.
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22364
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Thermometers depend on the substance used, and none of them are perfect [Reiss/Sprenger]
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Full Idea:
Thermometers assume the length of the fluid or gas is a function of temperature, and different substances yield different results. It was decided that different thermometers using the same substance should match, and air was the best, but not perfect.
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From:
Reiss,J/Spreger,J (Scientific Objectivity [2014], 4.1)
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A reaction:
[summarising Hasok Chang's research] This is a salutary warning that instruments do not necessarily solve the problem of objectivity, though thermometers do seem to be impersonal, and offer relative accuracy (i.e. ranking temperatures). Cf breathalysers.
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17518
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Counting 'coin in this box' may have coin as the unit, with 'in this box' merely as the scope [Ayers]
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Full Idea:
If we count the concept 'coin in this box', we could regard coin as the 'unit', while taking 'in this box' to limit the scope. Counting coins in two boxes would be not a difference in unit (kind of object), but in scope.
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From:
M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Counting')
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A reaction:
This is a very nice alternative to the Fregean view of counting, depending totally on the concept, and rests more on a natural concept of object. I prefer Ayers. Compare 'count coins till I tell you to stop'.
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17292
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Avoid 'in virtue of' for grounding, since it might imply a reflexive relation such as identity [Audi,P]
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Full Idea:
We should not use 'in virtue of' where it might express a reflexive relation, such as identity. Since grounding is a relation of determination, and closely linked to the concept of explanation, it is irreflexive and asymmetric.
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From:
Paul Audi (Clarification and Defense of Grounding [2012], 3.2)
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A reaction:
E.g. he says someone isn't a bachelor in virtue of being an unmarried man, since a bachelor just is an unmarried man. I can't disagree. 'Determination' looks like the magic word, even if we don't know how it cashes out.
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17302
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Ground is irreflexive, asymmetric, transitive, non-monotonic etc. [Audi,P]
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Full Idea:
The logical principles about grounding include irreflexivity, asymmetry, transitivity, non-monotonicity, and so forth.
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From:
Paul Audi (Clarification and Defense of Grounding [2012], 3.8)
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A reaction:
[It can't ground itself, there is no mutual grounding, grounds of grounds ground, and grounding judgements are not fixed]
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17294
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Grounding is a singular relation between worldly facts [Audi,P]
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Full Idea:
On my view, grounding is a singular relation between facts. ...Facts, on this view, are obtaining states of affairs.
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From:
Paul Audi (Clarification and Defense of Grounding [2012], 3.2)
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A reaction:
He rest this claim on his 'worldly' view of facts, Idea 17293. I seem to be agreeing with him. Note that it is not between types of fact, even if there are such general truths, such as in chemistry.
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17300
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If grounding relates facts, properties must be included, as well as objects [Audi,P]
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Full Idea:
Taking facts to be the relata of grounding has the interesting consequence that it does not relate ordinary particulars, objects, considered apart from their properties.
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From:
Paul Audi (Clarification and Defense of Grounding [2012], 3.4)
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A reaction:
It will depend on what you mean by properties, and it seems to me that something like 'powers' must be invoked, to get the active character that seems to be involved in grounding.
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17301
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Reduction is just identity, so the two things are the same fact, so reduction isn't grounding [Audi,P]
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Full Idea:
I deny that when p grounds q, q thereby reduces to p, and I deny that if q reduces to p, then p grounds q. ...On my view, reduction is nothing other than identity, so p is the same fact as q.
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From:
Paul Audi (Clarification and Defense of Grounding [2012], 3.5)
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A reaction:
Very good. I can't disagree with any of it, and it is crystal clear. Philosophical heaven.
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17510
|
Speakers need the very general category of a thing, if they are to think about it [Ayers]
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Full Idea:
If a speaker indicates something, then in order for others to catch his reference they must know, at some level of generality, what kind of thing is indicated. They must categorise it as event, object, or quality. Thinking about something needs that much.
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From:
M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], Intro)
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A reaction:
Ayers defends the view that such general categories are required, but not the much narrower sortal terms defended by Geach and Wiggins. I'm with Ayers all the way. 'What the hell is that?'
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17513
|
If there are two objects, then 'that marble, man-shaped object' is ambiguous [Ayers]
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Full Idea:
The statue is marble and man-shaped, but so is the piece of marble. So not only are the two objects in the same place, but two marble and man-shaped objects in the same place, so 'that marble, man-shaped object' must be ambiguous or indefinite.
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From:
M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Prob')
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A reaction:
It strikes me as basic that it can't be a piece of marble if you subtract its shape, and it can't be a statue if you subtract its matter. To treat a statue as an object, separately from its matter, is absurd.
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22357
|
The 'experimenter's regress' says success needs reliability, which is only tested by success [Reiss/Sprenger]
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Full Idea:
The 'experimenter's regress' says that to know whether a result is correct, one needs to know whether the apparatus is reliable. But one doesn't know whether the apparatus is reliable unless one knows that it produces correct results ...and so on.
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From:
Reiss,J/Spreger,J (Scientific Objectivity [2014], 2.3)
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A reaction:
[H. Collins (1985), a sociologist] I take this to be a case of the triumphant discovery of a vicious circle which destroys all knowledge turning out to be a benign circle. We build up a coherent relationship between reliable results and good apparatus.
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17299
|
There are plenty of examples of non-causal explanation [Audi,P]
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Full Idea:
There are a number of explanations where it seems clear that causation is not involved at all: normative grounded in non-normative, disposition grounded in categorical, aesthetic grounded in non-aesthetic, semantic in social and psychological.
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From:
Paul Audi (Clarification and Defense of Grounding [2012], 3.3)
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A reaction:
Apart from dispositions, perhaps, these all seem to be experienced phenomena grounded in the physical world. 'Determination' is the preferred term for non-causal grounding.
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