An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science

Introduction

The last few chapters have presented a series of challenges to the idea that disputes over the status of scientific theories can be resolved unambiguously by appealing to the evidence. We have encountered arguments that purport to tell us that evidence in some way or another underdetermines the choice of theories, that the very meanings of the words used to describe the evidence may incommensurably depend on the theory one chooses when interpreting the evidence, that different scientists will disagree about the value of various features of the evidence, that even when the evidence seems to point strongly against a theory, one may rationally hang on to that theory, and even that for any given body of evidence, opposing conclusions based on incompatible methodological rules can equally advance scientific knowledge.

Taken together, such arguments appear to throw a rather large quantity of cold water on whatever embers of hope may remain for the logical empiricists' project of providing a neutral framework that scientists could use to evaluate the degree to which any given body of data supports or confirms any given hypothesis.

Many contemporary philosophers of science, however, have sought an alternate route by which they might pursue something like this project. Moreover, they have sought to do this in a way that might accommodate some of the post-positivist insights discussed in earlier chapters.