Abstract

This article deals with the methodologies used in philosophy of physics. It begins by considering some methodological inclinations at large in the community of philosophers of physics in order to convey some sense of the plethora of methodologies, self-conscious and otherwise, to be found at the interfaces of philosophy, mathematics, and physics. It then describes and defends a methodological inclination to understand and pursue the project of interpreting physical theories in a way that runs counter to a methodological disposition prevalent among philosophers of physics. This disposition is toward “Naturalism”: the view that the only respectable metaphysics is the metaphysics that makes the best sense of our best physics.