Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of Contributors
- Explanation—Opening Address
- Explanation in Psychology
- Explanation in Biology
- Explanation in Social Sciences
- 1 Singular Explanation and the Social Sciences
- 2 Explanation and Understanding in Social Science
- Explanation in Physics
- The Limits of Explanation
- Supervenience and Singular Causal Claims
- Contrastive Explanations
- How to Put Questions to Nature
- Explanation and Scientific Realism
- How Do Scientific Explanations Explain?
- Index
2 - Explanation and Understanding in Social Science
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 August 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of Contributors
- Explanation—Opening Address
- Explanation in Psychology
- Explanation in Biology
- Explanation in Social Sciences
- 1 Singular Explanation and the Social Sciences
- 2 Explanation and Understanding in Social Science
- Explanation in Physics
- The Limits of Explanation
- Supervenience and Singular Causal Claims
- Contrastive Explanations
- How to Put Questions to Nature
- Explanation and Scientific Realism
- How Do Scientific Explanations Explain?
- Index
Summary
Hempelian orthodoxy on the nature of explanation in general, and on explanation in the social sciences in particular, holds that
(a) full explanations are arguments
(b) full explanations must include at least one law
(c) reason explanations are causal
David Ruben disputes (a) and (b) but he does not dispute (c). Nor does he dispute that ‘explanations in both natural and social science need laws in other ways, even when not as part of the explanation itself (p. 97 above). The distance between his view and the covering law theory, he points out, ‘is not as great as it may first appear to be’ (p. 97 above).
Ruben quotes the following example from Michael Scriven. William the Conqueror never invaded Scotland because ‘he had no desire for the lands of the Scottish nobles, and he secured his northern borders by defeating Malcolm, King of Scotland, in battle and exacting homage’ (quoted Ruben, p. 103 above). Scriven holds this to be a complete, or at least not incomplete, explanation. I agree that on a normal use of the word explanation it could be complete. Equally, on that same use, it might not be complete. It would not be reckoned a complete explanation, for example, if William was known to be a quarrelsome megalomaniac ever itching for further opportunities to lay countries to waste and demonstrate his superiority in battle. In that case the fact that he refrained from invading Scotland just because he did not want Scottish lands and had secured his northern borders might come as a surprise. We would want to know why he had acted in so unexpectedly sensible a way.
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- Information
- Explanation and its Limits , pp. 119 - 134Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1991