scholarly journals The Illusion of Depth of Understanding in Science

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Petri Ylikoski
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Scientific Research ◽  
Scientific Understanding ◽  
Ordinary People ◽  
Scientific Cognition ◽  
Substantial Role ◽  
Main Thesis ◽  
Psychological Experiments

Philosophers of science have a long tradition of making a connection between explanation and understanding, but only lately have they started to give the latter notion a substantial role in their theories. In this chapter I will employ a well-known scientific research heuristic of studying how something works by focusing on circumstances in which it does not work. Rather than trying to describe what scientific understanding would ideally look like, I will try to learn something about it by looking at mundane cases where understanding is partly illusory. The main thesis of this paper will be the following: scientists are prone to the illusion of depth of understanding (IDU), and as a consequence, they sometimes overestimate the detail, coherence, and depth of their understanding. I will start my argument by presenting an analysis of the notion of understanding and its relation to a sense of understanding. In order to make plausible the claim that these are often disconnected, I will describe an interesting series of psychological experiments by Frank Keil and co-authors. These experiments suggest that ordinary people routinely overestimate the depth of their understanding. In Section 3, I will argue that we should take seriously the possibility that scientific cognition is also affected by IDU. Section 4 will spell out some possible causes of explanatory illusions in science. In the final section, I will discuss how scientific explanatory practices could be improved and how the philosophy of science might be able to contribute to this process.

scholarly journals The Truth About Better Understanding?

Erkenntnis ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lewis Ross
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Essential Role ◽  
Scientific Research ◽  
Scientific Understanding ◽  
Ongoing Debate ◽  
Contemporary Epistemology ◽  
Catherine Elgin

AbstractThe notion of understanding occupies an increasingly prominent place in contemporary epistemology, philosophy of science, and moral theory. A central and ongoing debate about the nature of understanding is how it relates to the truth. In a series of influential contributions, Catherine Elgin has used a variety of familiar motivations for antirealism in philosophy of science to defend a non-factive theory of understanding. Key to her position are: (1) the fact that false theories can contribute to the upwards trajectory of scientific understanding, and (2) the essential role of inaccurate idealisations in scientific research. Using Elgin’s arguments as a foil, I show that a strictly factive theory of understanding has resources with which to offer a unified response to both the problem of idealisations and the role of false theories in the upwards trajectory of scientific understanding. Hence, strictly factive theories of understanding are viable notwithstanding these forceful criticisms.

scholarly journals Two Kindred Neo-Kantian Philosophies of Science: Pap’s The A Priori in Physical Theory and Cassirer’s Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Mormann
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Physical Theory ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Logical Empiricism ◽  
Main Thesis ◽  
Modern Physics ◽  
Continental Tradition ◽  
Determinism And Indeterminism ◽  
Kantian Philosophy

Abstract The main thesis of this paper is that Pap’s The Functional A Priori in Physical Theory and Cassirer’s Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics may be conceived as two kindred accounts of a late Neo-Kantian philosophy of science. They elucidate and clarify each other mutually by elaborating conceptual possibilities and pointing out affinities of neo-Kantian ideas with other currents of 20th century’s philosophy of science, namely, pragmatism, conventionalism, and logical empiricism. Taking into account these facts, it seems not too far fetched to conjecture that under more favorable circumstances Pap could have served as a mediator between the “analytic” and “continental” tradition thereby overcoming the dogmatic dualism of these two philosophical currents that has characterized philosophy in the second half the 20th century.

Being

2020 ◽  
pp. 16-74
Author(s):  
José Filipe Silva
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Human Soul

The chapter is divided into three main sections covering Kilwardby’s work on natural philosophy. The chapter starts with the basic issues of composition of corporeal substances and proceeds to consider the question of the nature of composition (versus simplicity) of the human soul. It also attempts to understand Kilwardby’s philosophical commitments underlying his involvement in the Oxford Prohibitions of 1277. Particular attention is paid to the notion of matter and simplicity that offers cues to the identification of the view(s) Kilwardby may be targeting in this event. In this chapter, I also show the nature of the events surrounding the 1277 Oxford Prohibitions in such a way that it makes clear that Kilwardby was not and could not be acting alone or even at his own initiative. Rather, the claim is that he was probably spearheading a philosophical and theological movement of opposition to certain interpretations of Aristotelian ideas, especially in natural philosophy. The final section of the chapter offers Kilwardby’s account of the nature of celestial change and the relation between celestial motion and time.

Communities of Learning

1992 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark R. Schwehn
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Cultural Anthropology ◽  
Academic Life ◽  
Epistemological Question ◽  
Communities Of Learning ◽  
Teaching Learning

Thus far I have tried to show that our present-day conception of the academic vocation is based at least in part upon the transmutation of ideas that were originally religious in origin and implication. In the next two chapters, I shall try to show why a reconception of the academic vocation should involve the reappropriation of certain religious virtues. I do not, however, intend this to be an atavistic undertaking: I have no patience for nostalgic returns to medieval syntheses of one sort or another. I shall accordingly argue in this chapter that what I take to be one of the main currents in contemporary thought—the resurgence of the question of community—both invites and to some extent warrants a religiously informed redescription of academic life and the academic vocation. In the next chapter, I will endeavor to provide just such a redescription as a corrective to the Weberian account I have already analyzed. The resurgent interest in the question of community is an exceptionally broad phenomenon that embraces social and political theory, jurisprudence, theology, literary criticism, cultural anthropology, even the history and philosophy of science. I shall, however, restrict my attention here to the manner in which the community question impinges upon activities and aspirations that are central to the tasks of higher education—teaching, learning, knowledge, and truth. At the risk of drastic oversimplification, I will summarize this more restricted development as follows: over the course of the last twenty or so years, the question of community has replaced the epistemological question as foundational for all other inquiries. The answers to basic human questions, such as, What can we know? or How should we live? or In what or whom shall we place our hope? have come to depend, for a large number of intellectuals, upon the answer to a prior question, Who are we? As a way of both documenting and deepening our sense of this decisive shift in the current climate of opinion, I propose to consider briefly two very influential books that appeared within four years of one another, Richard Rorty’s Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature and Parker Palmer’s To Know As We Are Known.

Perception, Knowledge, and Understanding in Aristotle’s Epistemology

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-46
Author(s):  
Marc Gasser-Wingate
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Understanding ◽  
Alternative Conception ◽  
Epistemic Value ◽  
Cognitive States ◽  
Domain I ◽  
Explanatory Structure ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Epistemic Role

In this chapter I consider how we should approach questions about the relationship between perception and the more advanced cognitive states Aristotle thinks derive from it. I argue that it’s reasonable to talk of perceptual knowledge, and explain how I will be using various knowledge terms to capture the different cognitive states that feature in Aristotle’s epistemology. I then offer an account of scientific understanding (Aristotle’s epistemic ideal) as a form of theoretical expertise requiring a synoptic, reflective appreciation of the explanatory structure of some domain. I argue we should resist views that would make scientific understanding the sole locus of justification, and on which perception would therefore never play any significant epistemic role. I also raise some concerns about invoking talk of justification in this context, and suggest an alternative conception of epistemic value which I think better fits Aristotle’s descriptions of our learning.

Infrastructure

2020 ◽  
pp. 212-240
Author(s):  
Tirthankar Roy
Keyword(s):  
Medical Care ◽  
South Asia ◽  
Private Enterprise ◽  
Scientific Research ◽  
Colonial Rule ◽  
Ordinary People ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Statistical Systems

At independence in 1947, the visible legacy of colonial rule in South Asia was the modern infrastructure that the regime had left behind, the ports, canals, the telegraph, sanitation, medical care, urban waterworks, universities, postal system, courts of law, railways, meteorological office, statistical systems, and scientific research laboratories. All of it involved British knowhow, adapted to the Indian environment with Indian help, and assisted governance directly or indirectly. But once built, such assets did not serve only the empire but also helped private enterprise and ordinary people lead better lives. Chapter 8 shows the motivations that drove these projects and the effects they produced.

scholarly journals From Explanation to Understanding: Normativity Lost?

2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (3) ◽  
pp. 327-343 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henk W. de Regt
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Scientific Practice ◽  
Focus Of Attention ◽  
Scientific Understanding ◽  
Rhetorical Theory ◽  
Chemical Revolution ◽  
Normative Power ◽  
Contextual Theory ◽  
Psychological Dimensions

Abstract In recent years, scientific understanding has become a focus of attention in philosophy of science. Since understanding is typically associated with the pragmatic and psychological dimensions of explanation, shifting the focus from explanation to understanding may induce a shift from accounts that embody normative ideals to accounts that provide accurate descriptions of scientific practice. Not surprisingly, many ‘friends of understanding’ sympathize with a naturalistic approach to the philosophy of science. However, this raises the question of whether the proposed theories of understanding can still have normative power. In this paper I address this question by examining two theories of scientific understanding: Jan Faye’s pragmatic-rhetorical theory and my own contextual theory of scientific understanding. I argue that both theories leave room for normativity, despite their naturalistic tendencies. The normative power of my contextual theory is illustrated with a case study of the chemical revolution.

Digital Connectivity

2018 ◽  
pp. 560-578
Author(s):  
Tania Lewis
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Ordinary People ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
Video Sharing ◽  
Media Space ◽  
Food Cultures ◽  
Food Activism ◽  
Cultural Economies ◽  
Key Participants

Digital connectivity has become central to the daily lives of billions of people throughout the world. This chapter employs the growing digitization of food as a way of grounding and materializing people’s engagements with the digital. The first section discusses the role of digital connectivity in relation to lifestyle and consumption. The next section on cultural economies of participation discusses the growing role of ordinary people as key participants in online food cultures in terms of the rise of “prosumerism” via video-sharing platforms such as YouTube. The third section turns to questions of food politics and the digital and also the constraints and affordances of digital connectivity in relation to food activism. The final section discusses the growing role of transnational corporate food players in social media space and the limits of data sharing and so-called informational transparency in an era of data monitoring and “big data.”

Sailing through the Strait

Black Boxes ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 250-280
Author(s):  
Marco J. Nathan
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Alternative Model ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Black Boxes ◽  
Growth Of Knowledge ◽  
Progressive Growth ◽  
Productive Role

This chapter takes the reader back to where the book started: philosophy of science as metaphorically navigating between Scylla and Charybdis, between reductionism and antireductionism. At the outset, two related questions were raised. First, is it possible to steer clear of both hazards? Is there an alternative model of the nature and advancement of science that avoids the pitfalls of both stances and, in doing so, provides a fresh way of presenting science to an educated readership in a more realistic fashion? Second, how does science bring together the productive role of ignorance and the progressive growth of knowledge? The final chapter cashes out these two promissory notes. These problems have a common answer: black boxes. Specifically, the first four sections argue that the black-boxing strategy outlined throughout the book captures the advantages of both reductionism and antireductionism, while eschewing more troublesome implications. The final section addresses the interplay of ignorance and knowledge.

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