- Paperback: 256 pages
- Publisher: Clarendon Press (May 1 1995)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0198244274
- ISBN-13: 978-0198244271
- Product Dimensions: 21.4 x 13.8 x 1.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 322 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #354,656 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Details |
Product Description
Review
"An excellent extre� to the current debates on this topic, as seen by van Fraassenn who is probably the most direct and severe opponent of scientific realism."--Review of Metaphysics
"A most useful and stimulating book. It brings together some of the main strands in the 'dialectic' of post-positivist analytic philosophy, and moreover, it does this with lucidity, charm, erudition, and great intelligence....Would make an excellent text for a middle to upper-level course in contemporary philosophy of science."--Journal of Philosophy
"Would make an excellent introduction to the philosophical issues clustering around scientific realism for undergraduates if set in conjunction with the recent realist literature.
"Important not only for its contributions to special topics such as the theory of explanation and the use of probability, but important also for its detailed and sustained critique of scientific realism."--Philosophy of Science
Product Description
The aim of The Scientific Image is to develop an empiricist alternative to both logical positivism and scientific realism. Against positivism, the author insists on a literal interpretation of the language of science, and on an irreducibly pragmatic dimension of theory acceptance. Against realism he argues that the central aim of science is empirical adequacy, and that the only belief involved in the acceptance of a scientific theory is belief that the theory fits the observable phenomena. To substatiate this, the book presents three mutually supporting theories concerning science. The first is an account of the relation between a scientific theory and the empirical world. The second is a new theory of explanation and why-questions, according to which the explanatory power of a theory is a pragmatic aspect which goes beyond its empirical import, but which provides no additional reasons for believing it. And the third is an interpretation of probability in physical theory, with reference to both classical and quantum physics. The presentation of these three central theses is preceded by two chapters which provide an informal introduction to current debates in the philosophy of science, particularly concerning scientific realism.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
THE opposition between empiricism and realism is old, and can be introduced by illustrations from many episodes in the history of philosophy. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
THE opposition between empiricism and realism is old, and can be introduced by illustrations from many episodes in the history of philosophy. Read the first page
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Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
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Most helpful customer reviews
2.0 out of 5 stars
A book on very contemporary philosophy of science,
This review is from: The Scientific Image (Paperback)
In this book, van Fraassen put forth a 'constructive empiricist' anti-realist account of science. The book contains many metaphors and even a short story. Yet it is often unclear whether he is prescribing norms for scientists, and merely describing their practice. (This may result from his counterfactual account, which strangely seems to warrant belief in propositions containing terms allegedly referring to unobservables that have nevertheless not been observed. At best, the account makes perfect agnosticism preferable to belief-formation with respect to propositions containing unobservable terms, where such prescriptions are justified on the basis of something other than facts.) The book represents what positivist philosophy might have become in the absence of thinkers who were more sensitive to the subtleties between the philosophy of language and ontology.
4.0 out of 5 stars
van fraassen's endorsement of unobservable entities,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Scientific Image (Paperback)
bas van fraassen in claiming to offer a viable alternativve to scientific realism has indirectly acknowledged the existence of unobservable entities in saying that we will nnot know eveything there is to know or everything thaat can be known in the universe/life.As an empiricist or form of it he generously engages the dicourse that unobservable entities DO have meaning but that they cant exist because any such admission would be a saving of realist theory(scientific realism posits the view that these objects have not only existence but meaning too).scientific realism is optimistic in that it belives that everything can be known or discovered by advocating this view of science,but vF rejcts this but by doing so he has created an entity that will remain forever unknowable to the mind,an unobsevable entity technically if nothing else he creates their existence and this is contrary to his position. paul neilan an NUIG student.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Wonderfully important book,
By
This review is from: The Scientific Image (Paperback)
This is a must read for anyone wishing to sincerely engage in philosophy of science. It should change the way you think about science, but it does not deny anything essential to science. Just so you know, Van Fraassen is a Catholic, so he does seem to believe in unobservable entities, though he denies that empirical science as it is commonly understood can tell us anything about them directly.
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