会议讲座

9月24日:Anjan Chakravartty教授主讲

学术演讲

Case Studies and Scientific Realism

演讲人:Anjan Chakravartty教授(美国圣母大学哲学系)

时  间:2012年9月24日(周一)下午4:00-6:00

地  点:北京大学哲学系(四院)一楼会议室

演讲人简介:
Anjan Chakravartty教授于2001年在剑桥大学获得科学哲学与科学史博士学位,现为美国圣母大学哲学系教授,并担任Studies in History and Philosophy of Science编辑。他曾在多伦多大学哲学系任教并担任科技哲学与科技史研究所主任。研究领域为科学哲学和形而上学中的核心问题,以及物理学哲学和生物学哲学的相关问题。在国际知名哲学类杂志上发表论文30余篇,其专著A Metaphysics for Scientific Realism: Knowing the Unobservable (Cambridge University Press, 2007)获得了加拿大哲学协会2009年颁发的两年一度的图书奖。

演讲摘要:
Case studies from past and present science are often offered as evidence for or against scientific realism: the view that our best theories give approximately true descriptions of unobservable aspects of the world, or that their central terms refer to entities that exist in a mind-independent reality, or that they give approximative representations of the structure of scientific phenomena. But how effective are case studies in arguing for or against scientific realism? I consider this question in light of three arguments. The first concerns the possible immunity of realism to case studies of scientific methodology. The second concerns the possible immunity of realism to considerations of the history of scientific theories that are now rejected. The third concerns a suggested inability of case study evidence to indicate which form of scientific realism is most promising.

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