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Philosophy 214 - Philosophy of Science Summary
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- Philosophy 214
- Institution
- Stellenbosch University (SUN)
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These notes were compiled by Jenah McKenzie and Pablo Rees.Do not redistribute.
All copyrights are owned by the authors of the work compiled.
Philosophy 214 Semester Test Notes: Philosophy of Science
The test will consist of 2 parts, a short question section and a long question section.
The content of the test will be The Nature of Science (van Niekerk reading and Feyerabend) and The Nature of Social
Science (Taylor reading).
Note: The Van Niekerk reading covers the Standard Image, Popper and Kuhn.
No tutorial work will be explicitly tested, although you may use work discussed in tutorials to bolster your answers.
These notes will be compiled according to these two sections and will include the necessary information for each.
The work used to compile these notes come from class notes, lecture slides from Stellenbosch University, and the necessary
readings.
WHAT IS SCIENCE? (Section 1)
Science has a transformative impact on the world and it is thus important to study it: think of its
impact on technology, economies, medicine and agriculture just to name a few. It is the most
transformative thing in human history and our best method of expanding our field of knowledge.
The Standard Image of Science: The Inductive View
There are 5 assumptions that make up the standard image of science. These are:
1. Science is completely objective and rational.
2. Scientific knowledge is acquired in precisely the same way, everywhere and always (it is
therefore formalistic1 and ahistorical)
3. Science is completely value free. (Note: ethical standards in the modern era have changed
this)
4. Science rests on the generalisation of knowledge gained from our experience of the world
(INDUCTION).
5. Such generalisations are the theories that formulate the so called laws of nature.
Scientific knowledge is the product of the natural sciences and these natural sciences are regarded
as the model of all knowledge processes in scientific activity. Natural sciences have a special status
because they regard objectivity and rationality as important. Science describes exactly what reality is
and has a logical method of acquiring scientific knowledge through universally accepted and valid
restrictions/constraints. The standard image demands logical consistency and acceptance of the
authority of sensory perceptions.
Objectivity: scientific knowledge represents reality as reality is represented to the senses (eyes, ears,
etc.) Science should exclude any subjective/emotive reactions and evaluations of reality because
they will result in deceptive and untrustworthy knowledge. Furthermore, the context (social and
historical) that scientific theories originated in do not affect the contents/reliability of the relevant
1
Formalism - the practice or the doctrine of strict adherence to prescribed or external forms.
1
, These notes were compiled by Jenah McKenzie and Pablo Rees.
Do not redistribute.
All copyrights are owned by the authors of the work compiled.
theories. Scientific claims are thus impersonal, objective, and universally valid in nature due to
human subjectivity being deliberately excluded from the knowledge process.
Rationality: this refers to having a stabilised procedure wherein anybody who has the necessary
background knowledge can master the procedure and will get the same research results.
There are two areas of scientific knowledge:
1) The context of discovery – observations that lead to theories about where the observations
come from.
2) The context of validation – where the theories are tested and verified.
According to the Standard Image, knowledge acquisition in science begins with observation in order
to obtain facts from which we form the unproblematic and unambiguous basis of knowledge.
Rationality focuses on inductive logic – Observations are made and then inferences are drawn. It is
based on regularities in the behaviour of observed (empirical) phenomena which are then
formulated in terms of hypothetic statements.
For example, every time you drink robots at Delapa you wake up with a hangover therefore robots
give you hangovers.
Following this initial hypothesis, further experimental research is done to confirm the hypothesis’
claim – i.e.: the scientific claim is verified. Only after it’s been verified by sensory perceptions can it
attain scientific status.
Inductive logic follows the pattern:
Observation form hypothesis test hypothesis enough evidence to rationally accept the
generalisation as a general law
As observations are gathered up, theories are formed and thus this is how scientific knowledge
grows. The truth value of scientific knowledge in the form of verifiability is attained through the
reconstructability of the observations on which the theories rest. If science is based on inductive
logic, it can never give you certainty – because new general laws can be found that could alter the
current law. But most are happy to embrace probability as rationality.
But, how far can we trust induction and the general laws they provide? It was once believed that a
14% VAT rate would be sufficient to keep South Africa out of debt. What if our current general laws
are wrong like that too?
Here is a dialogue expressing problems with Inductive Knowledge:
Hume: (asking for a friend) is it logical to accept induction’s universal claims despite the fact that we
have limited experiences? I’m not saying that induction is false, just that it’s not rationally justified.
Mill: Induction is actually logical indeed. If we assume that the universe is uniform in behaviour and
that events are not random.
2
, These notes were compiled by Jenah McKenzie and Pablo Rees.
Do not redistribute.
All copyrights are owned by the authors of the work compiled.
Hume: You having only ever seen white swans does not imply that no black swans exist. Fuck you.
Induction is a lie.
Mill: Ummm, no. This is not a refutation of induction. It’s merely just an indication of a limited field
of experience upon which the theory was based.
Hume: But, induction makes the claim that “the universe if uniform”. This claim is only based on past
experience and is therefore an inductive claim. Thus induction is both circular and round. Much like
your mother.
End scene
Mill’s argument is not reliable. At what point can we begin to generalise and form universal laws?
Where is the line that tells us we’ve had enough experience? Is it after 1 robot? 2 robots? 3 robots?
(Personally this is where I draw the line and if any of you make it further I think you have a problem
and need to start seeing someone)
Also, not all scientific theories arise from experience – The double helix structure of DNA for
example was mathematically formulated to comprise all the elements that DNA displays.
Thus inductive logic does indeed seem to be very flawed.
Karl Popper: Falsifiability and Demarcation
Conjecture refutation conjecture refutation.
Good science is: Highly falsifiable, improbable and has low empirical evidence.
No amount of evidence can prove a theory true but a single piece can prove it false.
Popper brings about a shift in the standard image of science. He tries to distinguish between science
and pseudoscience. Popper believed that knowledge does not begin with observations, but rather
from frustrated expectations (problems). We solve practical problems by thinking up a hypothesis
based on insufficient knowledge. We then test our solution until it fails and repeat. That is why his
work is called “Conjectures2 and Refutations” i.e. thoughts and then critique of these thoughts.
Following these refutations, new problems can then arise which call for more conjectures. Thus the
growth of knowledge is due to conjectures failing and being reformulated to be better.
Popper’s theory can hence be described as evolutionary. New theories are only possible because we
are aware of where old ones failed. Popper’s Frustrated Expectations are essentially expectations
that failed within a knowledge framework. These then prove that the framework is flawed and must
be reviewed. It would be like having expectations for an awesome presidency after Obama and the
winding up with Trump - one might call this a “frustrated expectation”. The knowledge process
begins as soon as we start to search for a solution to this problem (Kanye 2020).
2
Conjecture – a conclusion based on insufficient evidence.
3
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