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425 results in Philosophy of science

Page 1 of 22

Understanding Science

Mental Illness Stigma and the Moral and Social Community
  • Abigail Gosselin
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    February 2026
    Print publication:
    28 February 2026
  • Although mental health is a better understood, more widely discussed topic in our society today, a degree of stigmatization persists, especially in severe cases with links to homelessness, job loss, poverty and human rights. It is also still present in environments such as the workforce, healthcare settings and educational environments, and often internalized by the sufferer themselves. This book provides a philosophical account of what mental illness stigma is, why it persists, what harms it causes to people subject to public stigma or who internalize stigma in themselves, and what can be done about it. It analyzes the process of stigmatization, both public and internalized, in the twenty-first century Western culture, especially in the United States - including the process of stereotyping, the expressive harm of stereotypes, the role of social norms in creating adaptive preferences and shaping behaviour, the moral distancing and status loss involved with social exclusion and dehumanization, and the harm of discrimination.

Darwin's Philosophy of Emotion
  • Trip Glazer
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    January 2026
    Print publication:
    31 January 2026
  • Charles Darwin is known as a biologist, geologist, and naturalist, but he was also a philosopher. This book uncovers Darwin's forgotten philosophical theory of emotion, which combines earlier associationist theories with his theory of evolution. The British associationists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries argued that the mind operates primarily through the association of ideas, and that emotions are strings of thoughts, feelings, and outward expressions, connected by habit and association. Charles Darwin's early notebooks on emotion reveal a keen interest in associationist philosophy. This book shows that one of his final works, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872), is a work of associationist philosophy, and analyses Darwin's revolutionary idea: that if the associations that produce emotions can be inherited, then the theory of evolution can explain how emotions first occurred in simpler organisms and then developed and compounded into the complex experiences humans have today.

Science and Humanism
  • Knowledge, Values, and the Common Good
  • Edited by Anjan Chakravartty
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    December 2025
    Print publication:
    31 December 2025
  • Historically and conceptually, influential traditions of thought and practice associated with humanism and science have been deeply connected. This book explores some of the most pivotal relations of humanistic and scientific engagement with the world to inspire a reconsideration of them in the present. Collectively, its essays illuminate a fundamental but contested feature of a broadly humanist worldview: the hope that science may help to improve the human condition, as well as the myriad relationships of humanity to the natural and social worlds in which we live. Arguably, these relationships are now more profoundly interwoven with our sciences and technologies than ever before. Addressing scientific and other forms of inquiry, approaches to integrating humanism with science, and cases in which science has failed, succeeded, and could do more to promote our collective welfare, this book enjoins us to articulate a compelling, humanist conception of the sciences for our times. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

Cultures of Programming
  • The Development of Programming Concepts and Methodologies
  • Tomas Petricek
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    December 2025
    Print publication:
    31 December 2025
  • What defines a correct program? What education makes a good programmer? The answers to these questions depend on whether programs are seen as mathematical entities, engineered socio-technical systems or media for assisting human thought. Programmers have developed a wide range of concepts and methodologies to construct programs of increasing complexity. This book shows how those concepts and methodologies emerged and developed from the 1940s to the present. It follows several strands in the history of programming and interprets key historical moments as interactions between five different cultures of programming. Rooted in disciplines such as mathematics, electrical engineering, business management or psychology, the different cultures of programming have exchanged ideas and given rise to novel programming concepts and methodologies. They have also clashed about the nature of programming; those clashes remain at the core of many questions about programming today. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

The Arrow of Time
  • From Local Systems to the Whole Universe
  • Edited by Cristian López, Olimpia Lombardi
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    November 2025
    Print publication:
    30 November 2025
  • The 'arrow of time,' a concept first introduced by Sir Arthur Eddington, reflects the one-way flow of time and its association with various physical asymmetries in thermodynamics, cosmology, quantum mechanics, field theories, and beyond. Yet, the foundations of the arrow of time continues to challenge physicists and philosophers, having profound implications across multiple theories and disciplines.This volume compiles insights from the international colloquium 'The Arrow of Time: From Local Systems to the Whole Univers' held in Buenos Aires in 2023. It explores diverse perspectives on the arrow of time in thermodynamics, quantum mechanics and cosmology, its relation to counterfactual reasoning, free will and the growing-block universe, the interplay between consciousness and time, and the implications of time-reversal invariance. Collectively, these contributions provide a rigorous and comprehensive analysis of the enduring enigma of time's unidirectional nature.

Science Denial
  • Post-Truth or Post-Trust?
  • Gabriele Contessa
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    November 2025
    Print publication:
    30 November 2025
  • Over the last couple of decades, there has been increasing concern about the alleged rise of various forms of science denial. But what exactly is science denial? Is it really on the rise? If so, what explains its rise? And what is so concerning about it? This Element argues that the notion of science denial is highly ambiguous and that, once we carefully distinguish among all the different phenomena that are often conflated under this label, it is doubtful that any of them warrants all of the concerns that animate the critics of science denial. This has important consequences for how we understand the complex and delicate relationship between science and the public and, more generally, the collective epistemic malaise afflicting liberal democracies.

Compositional Abduction and Scientific Interpretation
  • A Granular Approach
  • Kenneth Aizawa
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    September 2025
    Print publication:
    30 September 2025
  • Abductive reasoning is a form of inference that infers some hypothesis because of what that hypothesis explains. Unlike deductive reasoning, it yields a plausible conclusion but does not definitively verify it. The theory of compositional abduction developed in this book provides a novel theory of confirmation. Aizawa uses case studies to analyse how scientists interpret the results of experiments to support compositional hypotheses (hypotheses about what things are composed of) and suggests that they use a kind of abduction. His theory is offered as an alternative account of scientific reasoning that the logical empiricists would have interpreted as hypothetico-deductive confirmation. It is also an alternative to the Peircean interpretation of the role of abduction in science. It will be valuable to philosophers of science, those working on hypothetico-deductive confirmation, Peirce's view of abduction, inference to the best explanation, and the New Mechanism. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

Understanding the Tree of Life
  • Kevin Omland
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    September 2025
    Print publication:
    30 September 2025
  • Challenge outdated views of evolution and embrace a clearer understanding of life's incredible diversity with this enlightening exploration of evolutionary trees. Far from being a linear ladder of progress, evolution is a vast, branching tree where all species-humans included-are evolutionary cousins, not ancestors or descendants. Every organism alive today shares the same 3.5 billion years of evolutionary history, uniquely adapted to its own environment. This book takes readers on a journey through the tree of life, beginning with humanity's closest relatives and expanding outward to the most distantly related organisms. By unravelling the misconceptions perpetuated by news articles and traditional depictions of evolution, it offers a fresh perspective on life's interconnectedness. With engaging insights and vivid illustrations, this book fosters a deeper appreciation for the remarkable complexity and diversity of life on Earth, making it an essential read for anyone curious about our evolutionary story.

Conceptualizing Personality Disorder
  • Perspectives from Philosophy, Psychological Science, and Psychiatry
  • Edited by Konrad Banicki, Peter Zachar
  • Published online:
    25 June 2025
    Print publication:
    10 July 2025
  • This book offers an interdisciplinary perspective on personality disorder with chapters by philosophers, psychiatrists, and psychological scientists. Written to be accessible to all three disciplines, it updates traditional conceptualizations and offers new and novel perspectives on personality disorder, with a special emphasis on borderline and narcissistic personalities. Featuring contributions from established senior researchers as well as early career scholars from across four continents, it offers surveys of contemporary research and clinical expertise that together plumb the foundational understandings of personality disorder.

An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science
  • 2nd edition
  • Kent W. Staley
  • Published online:
    29 March 2025
    Print publication:
    27 March 2025
  • This thoroughly updated second edition guides readers through the central concepts and debates in the philosophy of science. Using concrete examples from the history of science, Kent W. Staley addresses questions about what science is, why it is important, and the basis for trust in scientific results. The first part of the book introduces the central concepts of philosophy of science, with updated discussions of the problem of induction, underdetermination, rationality, scientific progress, and important movements such as falsificationism, logical empiricism, and postpositivism, together with a new chapter on social constructionism. The second part offers updated chapters on probability, scientific realism, explanation, and values in science, along with new discussions of the role of models in science, science in policy-making, and feminist philosophy of science. This broad yet detailed overview will give readers a strong grounding in philosophy of science whilst also providing opportunities for further exploration.

The Constitution of Science
  • C. Mantzavinos
  • Published online:
    05 December 2024
    Print publication:
    12 December 2024
  • How can science be protected, by whom and at what level? If science is valued positively as the incubator of the most successful solutions to representational problems of reality as well as the basis of the most effective interventions in the natural and social world, then its constitutional foundations must be protected. This book develops a specific normative outlook on science by introducing the idea of a 'Constitution of Science'. Scientific activities are special kinds of epistemic problem-solving activities unfolding in an institutional context. The scientific enterprise is a social process unfolding within an intricate institutional framework that structures the daily activities of scientists and shapes their outcomes. Those institutions of science which are of the highest generality make up the 'Constitution of Science' and are of fundamental importance for channelling the scientific process effectively.

Understanding the Nature‒Nurture Debate
  • Eric Turkheimer
  • Published online:
    07 November 2024
    Print publication:
    21 November 2024
  • There are arguably few areas of science more fiercely contested than the question of what makes us who we are. Are we products of our environments or our genes? Is nature the governing force behind our behaviour or is it nurture? While it is now widely agreed that it is a mixture of both, discussions continue as to which is the dominant influence. This unique volume presents a clear explanation of heritability, the ongoing nature versus nurture debate and the evidence that is currently available. Starting at the beginning of the modern nature-nurture debate, with Darwin and Galton, this book describes how evolution posed a challenge to humanity by demonstrating that humans are animals, and how modern social science was necessitated when humans became an object of natural science. It clearly sets out the most common misconceptions such as the idea that heritability means that a trait is 'genetic' or that it is a justification for eugenics.

Jesus and the Genome
  • The Intersection of Christology and Biology
  • Michael L. Peterson, Timothy J. Pawl, Ben F. Brammell
  • Published online:
    07 November 2024
    Print publication:
    28 November 2024
  • Is a coherent worldview that embraces both classical Christology and modern evolutionary biology possible? This volume explores this fundamental question through an engaged inquiry into key topics, including the Incarnation, the process of evolution, modes of divine action, the nature of rationality, morality, chance and love, and even the meaning of life.  Grounded alike in the history and philosophy of science, Christian theology, and the scientific basis for evolutionary biology and genetics, the volume discusses diverse thinkers, both medieval and modern, ranging from Augustine and Aquinas to contemporary voices like Richard Dawkins and Michael Ruse. Aiming to show how a biologically informed Christian worldview is scientifically, theologically, and philosophically viable, it offers important perspectives on the worldview of evolutionary naturalism, a prominent perspective in current science–religion discussions. The authors argue for the intellectual plausibility of a comprehensive worldview perspective that embraces both Christology and evolution biology in intimate relationship.

Understanding Visuals in the Life Sciences
  • Han Yu
  • Published online:
    31 October 2024
    Print publication:
    21 November 2024
  • From photographs to micrographs, from the various types of graphs to fun, interactive visuals and games, there are many different forms in which science can be visualised. However, all of these forms of visualisation in the Life Sciences are susceptible to misunderstandings and misinformation. This accessible and concise book demonstrates the misconceptions surrounding the visuals used in popular life science communication. Richly illustrated in colour, this guide is packed with examples of commonly used visual types: photographs, micrographs, illustrations, graphs, interactive visuals, and infographics allowing visual creators to produce more effective visuals that aspire to being both attractive and informative for their target audience. It also encourages non-specialist readers to be more empowered and critical, to ask difficult questions, and to cultivate true engagement with science. This book is an invaluable resource for life scientists and science communicators, and anyone who creates visuals for public or non-specialist readers.

Understanding Human Diversity
  • Jonathan Marks
  • Published online:
    31 August 2024
    Print publication:
    04 July 2024
  • No two people are the same, and no two groups of people are the same. But what kinds of differences are there, and what do they mean? What does our DNA say about race, gender, equality, or ancestry? Drawing on the latest discoveries in anthropology and human genetics, Understanding Human Diversity looks at scientific realities and pseudoscientific myths about the patterns of diversity in our species, challenging common misconceptions about genetics, race, and evolution and their role in shaping human life today. By examining nine counterexamples drawn from popular scientific ideas, that is to say, examinations of what we are not, this book leads the reader to an appreciation of what we are. We are hybrids with often inseparable natural and cultural aspects, formed of natural and cultural histories, and evolved from remote ape and recent human ancestors. This book is a must for anyone curious about human genetics, human evolution, and human diversity.

Science, Medicine, and the Aims of Inquiry
  • A Philosophical Analysis
  • Somogy Varga
  • Published online:
    16 May 2024
    Print publication:
    23 May 2024
  • After its unparalleled rise and expansion over the past century, medicine is increasingly criticized both as a science and clinical practice for lacking scientific rigor, for contributing to overmedicalization, and for failing to offer patient-centered care. This criticism highlights serious challenges which indicate that the scope and societal role of medicine are likely to be altered in the 21st century. Somogy Varga's ground-breaking book offers a new perspective on the challenges, showing that they converge on fundamental philosophical questions about the nature and aim of medicine. Addressing these questions, Varga presents a philosophical examination of the norms and values constitutive of medicine and offers new perspectives on how to address the challenges that the criticism raises. His book will offer valuable input for rethinking the agenda of medical research, health care delivery, and the education of health care personnel.

Interpreting Quantum Mechanics
  • Modern Foundations
  • David W. Snoke
  • Published online:
    09 May 2024
    Print publication:
    16 May 2024
  • This novel text directly addresses common claims and misconceptions around quantum mechanics and presents a fresh and modern understanding of this fundamental and essential physical theory. It begins with a non-mathematical introduction to some of the more controversial topics in the foundations of quantum mechanics. For those more familiar with the theoretical framework of quantum mechanics, the text moves on to a general introduction to quantum field theory, followed by a detailed discussion of cutting-edge topics in this area such as decoherence and spontaneous coherence. Several important philosophical problems in quantum mechanics are considered, and their interpretations are compared, notably the Copenhagen and many-worlds interpretations. The inclusion of frequent real-world examples, such as superconductors and superfluids, ensures the book remains grounded in modern research. This book will be a valuable resource for students and researchers in both physics and the philosophy of science interested in the foundations of quantum mechanics.

Montesquieu's 'The Spirit of the Laws'
  • A Critical Edition
  • Edited and translated by William Barclay Allen
  • Published by:
    Anthem Press
    Published online:
    13 April 2024
    Print publication:
    06 February 2024
  • The Spirit of the Laws not only systematizes the foundational ideas of separation of powers and balances and checks, it provides the decisive response to the question of whether power in the nation-state can be limited in the aftermath of the Westphalian settlement of 1648. It describes a civilizational change through which power becomes domesticated, with built-in resistance to attempts to absolutize (or make total) political power. As such, it is the Bible of modern politics, now made more accessible to English readers than it ever has been.

Numerical Cognition and the Epistemology of Arithmetic
  • Markus Pantsar
  • Published online:
    15 March 2024
    Print publication:
    28 March 2024
  • Arithmetic is one of the foundations of our educational systems, but what exactly is it? Numbers are everywhere in our modern societies, but what is our knowledge of numbers really about? This book provides a philosophical account of arithmetical knowledge that is based on the state-of-the-art empirical studies of numerical cognition. It explains how humans have developed arithmetic from humble origins to its modern status as an almost universally possessed knowledge and skill. Central to the account is the realisation that, while arithmetic is a human creation, the development of arithmetic is constrained by our evolutionarily developed cognitive architecture. Arithmetic is a sophisticated cultural development, but it is ultimately based on abilities with numerosities that we already possess as infants and share with many non-human animals. Therefore, arithmetic is not purely conventional, an arbitrary game akin to chess. Instead, arithmetic is deeply connected to our basic cognitive capacities.

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