• Question: Can you explain why 'philosophy of science' is fundamental to the improvement of scientific knowledge?

    Asked by daleh001 to Joseph on 15 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Joseph Finlayson

      Joseph Finlayson answered on 15 Jun 2011:

      I don’t think it necessarily is but it depends what the project of science is. Is it about discovering fundamental truth? Or is it only about predicting the outcome of experiments?

      When a scientist says ‘Quarks exist’ are they asserting that quarks really truly and definitely are part of reality? Or are they saying ‘I need to posit something that has a spin of 1/2 and a mass of MeV/c2’ in order to make my prediction hold?

      If it’s the latter then philosophy probably has little role to play in science. It it’s the former then philosophy can help regiment science by giving scientist the criteria to which their experiments have to achieve before they can correctly assert that ‘x exists’

      Hope that helps, any more questions, just shoot.
      Joseph

Comments