For decades, cigarette companies helped to promote the impression that there was no scientific consensus concerning the safety of their product. The appearance of controversy, however, was misleading, designed to confuse the public and to protect industry interests. Created scientific controversies emerge when expert communities are in broad agreement but the public perception is one of profound scientific uncertainty and doubt. In the first book-length analysis of the concept of a created scientific controversy, David Harker explores issues including (...) climate change, Creation science, the anti-vaccine movement and genetically modified crops. Drawing on work in cognitive psychology, social epistemology, critical thinking and philosophy of science, he shows readers how to better understand, evaluate, and respond to the appearance of scientific controversy. His book will be a valuable resource for students of philosophy of science, environmental and health sciences, and social and natural sciences. (shrink)

The most influential arguments for scientific realism remain centrally concerned with an inference from scientific success to the approximate truth of successful theories. Recently, however, and in response to antirealists' objections from radical discontinuity within the history of science, the arguments have been refined. Rather than target entire theories, realists narrow their commitments to only certain parts of theories. Despite an initial plausibility, the selective realist strategy faces significant challenges. In this article, I outline four prerequisites for a successful selective (...) realist defence and argue that adopting a comparative sense of success both satisfies those requirements and partially in consequence provides a more compelling, albeit more modest, realist thesis. (shrink)

Scientific theories are developed in response to a certain set of phenomena and subsequently evaluated, at least partially, in terms of the quality of fit between those same theories and appropriately distinctive phenomena. To differentiate between these two stages it is popular to describe the former as involving the accommodation of data and the latter as involving the prediction of data. Predictivism is the view that, ceteris paribus, correctly predicting data confers greater confirmation than successfully accommodating data. In this paper, (...) I take issue with a variety of predictivist theses, argue that their role for issues of confirmation is extremely limited, and attempt to account for the appeal that predictivism has enjoyed. Introduction Temporal Predictivism Heuristic Predictivism Weak Predictivism 4.1 Inference to better theories 4.2 Inference to better methods Arguments for Strong Heuristic Predictivism 5.1 Best explanations argument 5.2 Conditional support 5.3 Unique explanations Increased Explanatory Unification 6.1 Explaining what other theories can't 6.2 Contrived hypotheses 6.2 Strength and simplicity Conclusions CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

The judgment that a given event is epistemically improbable is necessary but insufficient for us to conclude that the event is surprising. Paul Horwich has argued that surprising events are, in addition, more probable given alternative background assumptions that are not themselves extremely improbable. I argue that Horwich’s definition fails to capture important features of surprises and offer an alternative definition that accords better with intuition. An important application of Horwich’s analysis has arisen in discussions of fine-tuning arguments. In the (...) second part of the paper I consider the implications for this argument of employing my definition of surprise. I argue that advocates of fine-tuning arguments are not justified in attaching significance to the fact that we are surprised by examples of fine-tuning. (shrink)

Several friends of inference to best explanation have claimed in recent work that explanatory virtues, such as consilience, simplicity and increased precision, play an important heuristic role in assigning probabilities to available hypotheses and that it is this role that justifies continued efforts to investigate the scope, nature and epistemic value of the inference rule. In this paper I argue that understanding explanatory virtues as a guide to probability assignments creates a critical dilemma for advocates of IBE that has not (...) previously been made sufficiently explicit and which has significant implications for the prospects of the rule. I conclude that the viability of IBE requires that explanatory virtues be related to a non - probabilistic conception of success. (shrink)

Inference to the best explanation has at times appeared almost indistinguishable from a rule that recommends simply that we should infer the hypothesis which is most plausible given available evidence. In this paper I argue that avoiding this collapse requires the identification of peculiarly explanatory virtues and consider Woodward's concept of invariance as an example of such a virtue. An additional benefit of augmenting IBE with Woodward's model of causal explanation is also suggested.

A not unpopular thesis, when it comes to the confirmation of scientific theories, is that data which were used in the construction of a theory afford poorer support for that theory than data that played no role. Some compelling thought experiments have been offered in favour of this view, not as proof but rather to add some intuitive plausibility. In this paper I consider such thought experiments and argue that they do not support the thesis; the perceived importance of prediction (...) over accommodation, at least in these cases, is illusory. Introduction Background assumptions Strong thesis Weak thesis Conclusions. (shrink)

In a recent paper McCain (2012) argues that weak predictivism creates an important challenge for external world scepticism. McCain regards weak predictivism as uncontroversial and assumes the thesis within his argument. There is a sense in which the predictivist literature supports his conviction that weak predictivism is uncontroversial. This absence of controversy, however, is a product of significant plasticity within the thesis, which renders McCain’s argument worryingly vague. For McCain’s argument to work he either needs a stronger version of weak (...) predictivism than has been defended within the literature, or must commit to a more precise formulation of the thesis and argue that weak predictivism, so understood, creates the challenge to scepticism that he hopes to achieve. The difficulty with the former is that weak predictivism is not uncontroversial in the respect that McCain’s argument would require. I consider the prospects of saving McCain’s argument by committing to a particular version of weak predictivism, but find them unpromising for several reasons. (shrink)

The problem of demarcation continues to attract attention, in part because solutions are perceived to have enormous social significance. The civic motivation, however, I argue is in tension with the heterogeneity of the sciences. Philosophers of science would be better employed reflecting on the features, causes, and consequences, of created, scientific controversies. These arise when relevant experts are in broad agreement about what conclusions can sensibly be drawn from available evidence, but the public perceives an expert community deeply divided and (...) conclusions that are plagued by profound and systemic uncertainty. In the second part of the paper I explore this concept further. (shrink)

This document collects discussion and commentary on issues raised in the workshop by its participants. Contributors are: Greg Frost-Arnold, David Harker, P. D. Magnus, John Manchak, John D. Norton, J. Brian Pitts, Kyle Stanford, Dana Tulodziecki.

In this open peer commentary, we categorize the possible “neuroscience in national security” definitions of misuse of science and identify which, if any, are uniquely presented by advances in neuroscience. To define misuse, we first define what we would consider appropriate use: the application of reasonably safe and effective technology, based on valid and reliable scientific research, to serve a legitimate end. This definition presents distinct opportunities for assessing misuse: misuse is the application of invalid or unreliable science, or is (...) the use of reliable scientific methods to serve illegitimate ends. Ultimately, we conclude that while national security is often a politicized issue, assessing the state of scientific progress should not be. (shrink)

SummaryAn account is given of one of the most heated controversies in nineteenth-century British geology—the battle between Archibald Geikie and John Judd concerning the interpretation of the Palaeogene igneous rocks of the Inner Hebrides, particularly those of the Cuillins and the Red Hills of Skye. The controversy erupted in the first instance over the question of the respective ‘territories’ of the two geologists, then developed into disagreement as to the origin of the plateau lavas of Skye: were they formed from (...) fissure eruptions (Geikie's view) or from the outpourings of great volcanoes (Judd's view)? Debate then focused on the question of the relative age of the gabbro of the Cuillins and the granite (granophyre) of the Red Hills. A certain locality at Druim Hain (Druim an Eihdne) at the junction between the two rock-types became crucial for the dispute. Following earlier observers, Judd held that the granite was older and had been intruded by the gabbro. Geikie took the opposite view. Geikie's work relied particularly on field observations, for which he was assisted by several other geologists. Judd, who worked by himself, rested his argument more on the evidence furnished by petrology, using thin sections. Both geologists were influenced by Ferdinand von Richthofen. Geikie's work appeared to be vindicated in his own lifetime by the map work of Alfred Harker, which effectively closed the controversy. But later commentators such as Walker hold that in a sense both were correct. There were indeed great volcanoes active in the Inner Hebrides in the Palaeogene, as well as fissure eruptions. Moreover, recent mapping does not support all the observations of Geikie and Harker. The controversy illustrates different styles in nineteenth-century geology, with petrological arguments, based on the examination of thin sections, pitted against field observations. It may also be seen as being linked with the ongoing rivalry in the nineteenth century between the members of the Geological Survey (particularly the Directors General) and the ‘amateur’ university geologists. Geikie prevailed in the debate in part because he was able to draw on more resources for its prosecution, being helped by various friends and members of the Geological Survey. The study draws on the newly discovered Geikie archive at Haslemere, which contains his complete outgoing official correspondence, and 27 of his field notebooks, previously missing. With the help of this material, it is possible to gain a clearer insight into the methods deployed by Geikie in his fieldwork, and his ways of working and thinking. (shrink)

This paper argues against a particular version of the inference from the success of a scientific theory to the claim that the theory must be approximately true to some extent. The kind of success at issue is comparative, where one theory is more empirically successful than its rival if that theory predicts phenomena that are inexplicable or anomalous according to its rival. A theory that exhibits this kind of comparative success can be seen as thereby achieving empirical progress over its (...) rival. David Harker has developed a form of selective scientific realism based on the idea that this kind of success is evidence for the approximate truth of the parts of theories responsible for such success. Counterexamples to Harker’s position are cases in which a theory is more successful than its rival in virtue of containing parts that are not even approximately true. In order to identify some counterexamples to Harker’s position, this paper considers four historical cases that Greg Frost-Arnold has recently used to motivate a novel historical challenge to realism called the Problem of Misleading Evidence. This paper argues that these four cases are counterexamples to Harker’s position, and that they provide a strong reason to doubt his position and the kind of success-to-truth inference that he defends. (shrink)

David Young invites his readers on a journey of adventure and discovery; a journey for the mind, and an adventure in the realm of ideas. By retracing the steps of men who developed the theory of biological evolution, we see how scientists came to recognize the nature and importance of natural selection. The journey begins in the seventeenth century, when even the most accomplished naturalists knew next to nothing of biology as we understand it today. Steadily increasing knowledge and (...) the quickening pace of research began to uncover much new evidence, and in the middle of the century Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace incorporated this evidence in a comprehensive theory of evolution. In the twentieth century biology has become steadily more specialized, so the book picks out some of the main developments that bring us to studies of evolution being carried out today. (shrink)

In The Paradox of Predictivism I tried to demonstrate that there is an intimate relationship between predictivism and epistemic pluralism. Here I respond to various published criticisms of some of the key points from Paradox from David Harker, Jarret Leplin, and Clark Glymour. Foci include my account of predictive novelty, the claim that predictivism has two roots, the prediction per se and predictive success, and my account of why Mendeleev’s predictions carried special weight in confirming the Periodic Law (...) of the Elements. (shrink)

An encounter with a large object may induce feelings of fear, awe, attraction, and more. But it is not simply the physical dimensions of an object that account for our sense that something is "big." Big Culture is a study of large objects and images that works to identify the qualities and effects of bigness. In doing so, David Wittenberg offers a philosophical proposal for reconceptualizing the problem of magnitude. The book explores examples of bigness that are simultaneously familiar (...) and singular in the cultural landscape, such as skyscrapers, atomic bomb explosions, and cinematic special effects. From these examples, Wittenberg postulates a new aesthetics of magnitude that is better able to account for the special role that bigness plays in our everyday perception of objects and images. Big Culture argues that bigness is a more primal, a more absolute, and even a more violent or erotic encounter with the objective world than the scalar relativism that tends to characterize our lives. Ultimately, Wittenberg insists that bigness comes before scale, even before size itself. (shrink)

John Locke's _Second Treatise of Government_ is perhaps the key founding liberal text. _A Letter Concerning Toleration_, written in 1685, is a classic defense of religious freedom. Yet many of Locke's other writings--not least the Constitutions of Carolina, which he helped draft--are almost defiantly anti-liberal in outlook. This comprehensive collection brings together the main published works with the most important surviving evidence from among Locke’s papers relating to his political philosophy. David Wootton's wide-ranging and scholarly Introduction sets the writings (...) in the context of their time, examines Locke's developing ideas and unorthodox Christianity, and analyzes his main arguments. The result is the first fully rounded picture of Locke’s political thought in his own words. (shrink)

In this article, David Shemin, who is now in retirement, describes how in 1944 he ingested 66 g of 15N‐labeled glycine in order to determine the half‐life of hemoglobin and other blood proteins. The ramifications of the experiment led to the unravelling of the biosynthesis of porphyrins and the role of glycine and α‐aminolevulinic acid in heme, vitamin B12 and chlorophyll synthesis.

In this book, Professor David Starrett organizes within a single framework the major theoretical foundations of modern public sector economics. He presents a unified treatment of market failure that encompasses externalities, pure public goods, local public goods and natural monopolies. Professor Starrett then develops and assesses the efficacy of the various planning procedures - including representative voting, benefit cost analysis, incentive compatible design mechanisms and the free market. He devotes attention to both national and local issues, with the aim (...) of identifying those methods that are best suited to each arena separately. Special attention is paid to financial arrangements, techniques for eliciting necessary information that is not readily available, and identification of biases that will result from incorrect procedures. This study will be useful to graduate students and economists who are interested in public finance or welfare economics. (shrink)

Zone Morality describes systems families and businesses created by the causal reciprocities of their members. These relations embody the duties and permissions of a system s moral code. We move easily among core systems, though interests and moral demands may vary. Procedural democracy promises equity to people or systems having diverse interests when society fails to create a public that governs for the common interest.".

This updated and revised second edition of Donald A. Wells's popular 'War Crimes and Laws of War', originally published in 1984, traces the rules of war since ancient times. The major sources of the rules or 'laws' of war are explored: the congresses of the Hague, Geneva, and the United Nations. But an abyss exists between what military manuals allow and what the congresses prohibit; this book attempts to resolve this dilemma. An important text for military college courses and international (...) relations, as well as social philosophy courses. Co-published with the North American Society for Social Philosophy. Here is what reviewers had to say about the first edition. (shrink)

Rachlin's substantive points about the relationship between altruism and self-control are obscured by simplistic and outdated portrayals of evolutionary psychology in relation to learning theory.

The discovery of homeobox genes in vertebrates may allow analysis of a basic problem in developmental neurobiology: how regional differences in CNS organization are specified during development. This view is based on the roles defined for homologous genes in Drosophila development, and is supported by studies of the patterns of homeobox gene expression in vertebrate embryos. Homeobox genes comprise a multigene family, members of which are expressed in different spatially restricted domains along the anterior‐posterior axis of the CNS. These observations (...) are consistent with homeobox genes having roles in the positional specification of CNS organization, and experimental tests of this should be forthcoming shortly. (shrink)

If sociopathy is a biological adaptation, it probably evolved in small social groups in which individuals lacked the social mobility required for a con-man strategy to work. On the other hand, conflicts between groups may have provided a large niche for sociopathy throughout human history.

Introduction: Time travel and the mechanics of narrative -- Macrological fictions: evolutionary utopia and time travel (1887-1905) -- Historical interval I: the first time travel story -- Relativity, psychology, paradox: Wertenbaker to Heinlein (1923-1941) -- Historical interval II: three phases of time travel--the time machine -- The big time: multiple worlds, narrative viewpoint, and superspace -- Paradox and paratext: picturing narrative theory -- Theoretical interval: the primacy of the visual in time travel narrative -- Viewpoint-over-histories: narrative conservation in Star Trek (...) -- Oedipus multiplex, or, the subject as a time travel film: Back to the future -- Conclusion: The last time travel story. (shrink)