Study Questions for 2^nd Exam

• Describe several anti-realist arguments, and several standard rebuttals to these arguments by realists, including the "no miracles" argument. What are the weaknesses of these standard rebuttals? What is an abductive inference, and why might it beg the question against an empiricist for the realist to use this kind inference for unobservables? Describe several ways that Boyd tries to overcome these weaknesses. Be sure to explain what "theory dependent" means and why it matters.



• Why is it important that there are theory-dependent technological processes? What does instrumental reliability mean? How might that be different from "success" of science? Explain Boyd's distinction between experimental and empirical evidence.



• Why can't the empiricist adopt the most successful parts of realist theory of science and simply change the philosophical interpretation of that theory?



• Outline and assess Laudan's historical arguments against realism. Include discussion of whether now discarded theories had non-referring terms, the concept of approximate truth, and "success" of theories with non-referring terms



• Outline the deductive-nomological account of scientific explanation. Give examples that show illustrate objections to this view as excluding explanations that should not be excluded, and including "explanations" that really are not.



• Describe the Putnam-Oppenheim view of micro-reduction. What role does deduction play in this theory? What role do now-unpopular logical empiricist views play? Why is it important to have a clearly specified, non-overlapping set of predicates associated with each level in the micro-reduction? Describe some to the difficult points about reduction of thermodynamics of low-density gasses to mechanics? Why are the problems encountered in that case likely to be worse in other cases. What is methodological individualism?



• Describe and evaluate Fodor's critique of micro-reduction, in the context, for example of a reduction of an economic law to physical laws. Include discussion of bridge laws and natural kinds.



• Explain why, according to Garfinkel, explanations in a micro theory are explain less than the explanations of the theory they reduce. What does Garfinkel mean by claiming that qualitative changes intervene in an underlying determinism? Given an example of this. Describe Garfinkel's critique of atomism in thermodynamics. Give an example of a hidden structural presupposition of the reduction of low-density gas thermodynamics to mechanics of molecules or atoms.



• Outline and critically evaluate Gould's critique of Jensen's arguments for the reality of "g". What is the role of Thurston's work in Gould's argument?