Alberto Cordero

Scientific Realism and the Divide et Impera Strategy: The Ether Saga Revisited

Using the optical ether as a case study, this article advances four lines of consideration to show why synchronic versions of the divide et impera strategy of scientific realism are unlikely to work. The considerations draw from (a) the nineteenth-century theories of light, (b) the rise of surprising implication as an epistemic value from the time of Fresnel on, (c) assessments of the ether in end-of-century reports around 1900, and (d) the roots of ether theorizing in now superseded metaphysical assumptions. The typicality of the case and its impact on diachronic versions of the strategy are briefly discussed.

Realism and Underdetermination: Some Clues from the Practices-Up

Recent attempts to turn Standard Quantum Theory into a coherent representational system have improved markedly over previous offerings. Important questions about the nature of material systems remain open, however, as current theorizing effectively resolves into a multiplicity of incompatible statements about the nature of physical systems. Specifically, the most cogent proposals to date land in effective empirical equivalence, reviving old anti-realist fears about quantum physics. In this paper such fears are discussed and found unsound. It is argued that nothing of global skeptical or agnostic significance follows from the kind of underdetermination presently encountered in fundamental quantum theory. The case is instructive, however, for what it shows about the characteristics and prospects of scientific realism as a perspective in contemporary philosophy of science.

Scientific Culture and Public Education

Current science and science-friendlyphilosophy jointly yield a picture of the world andourselves in it that is more substantial, detailed andcoherent than any other produced before by naturalphilosophy. When carefully formulated this pictureprovides us with: (a) an unprecedentedly reliablerepresentation of vast regions of the natural world;and (b) a non-arbitrary public framework forunderstanding and furthering important areas of publicconcern. This paper comments on the cultural andeducational significance of this picture. Influentialarguments against granting a privileged role toserious science on the basis of differentialcredibility are examined and found wanting. Thisresult is then folded into an analysis of thesignificance of scientific thought and practice for acautious conception of the goals and methods of publiceducation.

Retention, Truth-Content and Selective Realism

Selectivism, the divide et impera approach, is arguably the most promising realist project today, despite lingering issues regarding the selection of truthful parts in successful theories. Second generation approaches address those issues by basing selection on detailed inferential analyses of impressive predictions drawn from the theory at hand. The leading reformed strategies advocate commitment to just theory-parts that are “absolutely indispensable” for advancing the derivations at hand. The minimalist emphasis involved seems reasonable at first, but it weakens the realist project, leaving many thinkers gloomy about the prospects of scientific realism. This paper has two parts. Part 1 examines the reformed strategies and traces their main difficulty jointly to the pledge they make to interpretive minimalism and a neglect of the epistemic (and realist) import of explanatory power. The result is selections of excessively modest content and vulnerable grounding that deliver less than is needed. Part 2 advances a critical revision and naturalist generalization of the basic strategy. The proposed alternative maintains the focus on inferential analyses of predictions and content-reduction, but without commitment to content minimalism. By moving in a naturalist direction, the suggested strategy brings the valuation of theory-parts in line with confirmational criteria that, in scientific practice, give salience to success and freedom from reasonable doubt. The ensuing proposal recognizes both prediction and explanation as necessary conditions for realist commitment to theory-parts.

Rejected Posits, Realism, and the History of Science

Responding to Laudan’s skeptical reading of history, an influential group of realists claim that the seriously wrong claims that past successful theories licensed were not properly implicated in the predictions that once singled them out as successful. For example, in the case of Fresnel’s theory of light, it is said that although he appealed to the ether he didn’t actually need to in order to derive his famous experimental predictions—as far as the latter were concerned the ether concept was “idle,” “dispensable” or worse. This view, developed by Philip Kitcher in the 1980s and subsequently supplemented by Jarrett Leplin and by Stathis Psillos, has received critical attention over the last decade, but more needs to be said on the subject—or so I suggest in this paper. I bring forward four converging argumentative lines to show how and why, from the days of Fresnel to at least two decades after the Michelson-Morley experiments, the ether functioned and was understood as an “indispensable” posit in physics. My first line draws from Fresnel’s actual deployment of the ether concept and the way he and his circle understood his theory’s achievements. The second line draws from the rise of surprising implication as an epistemological value and its impact on leading theorists in the last two-thirds of the century. The third line draws from discussions of the optical ether in end-of-century reports around 1900. The fourth focuses on entrenched metaphysical assumptions that persisted in the practice of physics until the advent of Special Relativity. Pulling these four lines together shows why attempts at synchronic identification of sound theory-parts (as advocated by Kitcher, Leplin and Psillos) are bound to fail, but also how realists might try to meet the challenge this creates.

PROBABILITY AND THE MYSTERY OF QUANTUM MECHANICS

Measurement induced transitions, incompatible properties, radical event indeterminateness, and yet well defined probabilistic behavior at all levels; the quantum world looks at first sight very mysterious indeed. I shall suggest, however, that a good proportion of the quantum mystery is man-made, brought on by a host of discredited expectations about science and the world.

Contemporary Nativism, Scientific Texture, and the Moral Limits of Free Inquiry

Some thinkers distrust Darwinist explorations of complex human behaviors, particularly investigations into possible differences in valued skills between genders, races or classes. Such projects, it is claimed, tend to have adverse effects on people who are already disadvantaged. A recent argument by Philip Kitcher both clarifies and generalizes this charge to cover a wider genre of scientific projects. In this paper I try to spell out and analyze Kitcher’s argument. The argument fails, I suggest, because some of its key premises fail to convince. My analysis focuses on relevant facts about the role of inquiry in fallibilist contexts, the texture of belief in contemporary natural science, and the moral dimension of scientific research.

Science, Objectivity and Moral Values.

Scientific facts are loaded with values, but, it is argued, this does not viciously compromise the objectivity of scientific claims, because the values that permeate scientific discourse (a) are loaded in turn with facts, (b) are not immune from critical revision, and (c) have changed in the past and continue to be subjected to revision. In science, unlike such enterprises as Scientific Creationism, values are discovered, introduced, tested and challenged in the same way that other aspects of scientific discourse are. All of this makes scientific discourse relevant to the contemporary exploration and critique of human values in general, particularly as more aspects of life become illuminated by science.

Evolutionary Ideas and Contemporary Naturalism

As I was thinking about the rise of evolutionary ideas in twentieth century science, I remembered a passage in which the celebrated N.R. Campbell shows his attachment to an old metaphysics of time. It provides a telling measure of how bizarre and unexpected our present ideas must have initially been2.

Reflections on Naturalism

To naturalists, there is no such thing as complete justification for any claim, and so requiring complete warrant for naturalist proposals is an unreasonable request. The proper guideline for naturalist proposals seems thus clear: develop it using the methods of science; if this leads to a fruitful stance, then explicate and reassess. The resulting offer will exhibit virtuous circularity if its explanatory feedback loop involves critical reassessment as the explanations it encompasses play out. So viewed, naturalism is a philosophical perspective that seeks to unite in a virtuous circle the natural sciences and non-foundationalist, broadly-based empiricism.