Search Results for how-the-laws-of-physics-lie

Science

How the Laws of Physics Lie

In this sequence of philosophical essays about natural science, Nancy Cartwright argues that fundamental explanatory laws, the deepest and most admired successes of modern physics, do not in fact describe the regularities that exist in ...

Author: Nancy Cartwright

Publisher: OUP Oxford

ISBN: 9780191519901

Category: Science

Page: 230

View: 881

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In this sequence of philosophical essays about natural science, Nancy Cartwright argues that fundamental explanatory laws, the deepest and most admired successes of modern physics, do not in fact describe the regularities that exist in nature. Yet she is not `anti-realist'. Rather, she draws a novel distinction, arguing that theoretical entities, and the complex and localized laws that describe them, can be interpreted realistically, but that the simple unifying laws of basic theory cannot.
1983-06-09 By Nancy Cartwright
Mathematics

Topics in the Foundation of Statistics

The title of recent book by Nancy Cartwright is by far better known than its contents; it is, “How The Laws of Physics Lie”. Now Professor Cartwright knows full well that the laws of physics can do nothing except, in a sense, ...

Author: B.C. van Fraassen

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

ISBN: 9789401588164

Category: Mathematics

Page: 163

View: 544

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Foundational research focuses on the theory, but theories are to be related also to other theories, experiments, facts in their domains, data, and to their uses in applications, whether of prediction, control, or explanation. A theory is to be identified through its class of models, but not so narrowly as to disallow these roles. The language of science is to be studied separately, with special reference to the relations listed above, and to the consequent need for resources other than for theoretical description. Peculiar to the foundational level are questions of completeness (specifically in the representation of measurement), and of interpretation (a topic beset with confusions of truth and evidence, and with inappropriate metalinguistic abstraction).
2013-03-09 By B.C. van Fraassen
Philosophy

Symbol and Physical Knowledge

On the Conceptual Structure of Physics Massimo Ferrari M. Ferrari, Ion-Olimpiu Stamatescu ... This is the position Nancy Cartwright advocates in her How the Laws of Physics Lie : " The aim is to cover a wide variety of different ...

Author: Massimo Ferrari

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

ISBN: 3540414673

Category: Philosophy

Page: 229

View: 796

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Introduces the problem of the symbolic structure of physics, surveys the modern history of symbols, proceeds to an epistemological discussion of the role of symbols in our knowledge of nature, and addresses key issues related to the methodology of physics and the character of its symbolic structures.
2002 By Massimo Ferrari
Business & Economics

Models as Mediators

This is close to my position in How the Laws of Physics Lie ( 1983 ) and it is the position that Ronald Giere ( 1988 ) maintains . A look at Giere's account suggests , however , that his views about the way models relate to real systems ...

Author: Mary S. Morgan

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

ISBN: 0521655714

Category: Business & Economics

Page: 401

View: 131

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Edited collection examining the ways in which models are used in modern science.
1999-10-21 By Mary S. Morgan
Science

Laws of Nature

11.2.2 Arguments Contra – “How the Laws of Physics Lie”41 11.2.2.1 Firstly, we mention the argument that the laws of physics do not state facts.42 By a fact we mean the present state of a physical system, its measurable properties and ...

Author: Peter Mittelstaedt

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

ISBN: 9783540283034

Category: Science

Page: 376

View: 714

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Thisbook isnotatextbook tobecomeacquainted with thelaws ofnature. An elementaryknowledgeaboutlawsofnature,inparticularthelawsofphysics,is presupposed. Thebookisratherintendedtoprovideaclari?cationofconcepts and properties of the laws of nature. The authors would like to emphasise that this book has been developed – created – as a real teamwork. Although the chapters (and in some cases parts of the chapters) were originally written by one of the two authors, all of them were discussed thoroughly and in detail and have been revised and complemented afterwards. Even if both authors were in agreement on most of the foundational issues discussed in the book, they did not feel it necessary to balance every viewpoint. Thus some individual and personal di?erence or emphasis will still be recognisable from the chapters written by the di?erent authors. In this sense the authors feel speci?cally responsible for the chapters as follows: Mittelstaedt for Chaps. 4, 9. 3, 10, 11. 2, 12, 13 and Weingartner for Chaps. 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8. 2, 9. 2, 9. 4. The remaining parts are joint sections. Most of the chapters are formulated as questions and they begin with arguments pro and contra. Then a detailed answer is proposed which contains a systematic discussion of the question. This is the respective main part of the chapter. It sometimes begins with a survey of the problem by giving some important answers to it from history (cf. Chaps. 6 and 9).
2005-12-06 By Peter Mittelstaedt
Science

Apocalypse Soon

11 Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie, 14362. 12 Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie, 145. 13 Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie, 12842. 14 Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie, 144 and 158. 15 Giere, Explaining Science ...

Author: Stephen F. Haller

Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP

ISBN: 9780773570597

Category: Science

Page: 160

View: 670

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Using arguments that parallel those of Blaise Pascal and William James, Haller offers prudential reasons for caution that should convince those not already persuaded by ethical arguments. While models of global systems can reveal only possible, not probable, futures, the catastrophic threats posed by such things as global warming, ozone depletion, or population increase represent what James would call "live options": that is, they present us with a plausible possibility that forces us to make momentous decisions. Haller concludes that we cannot afford to risk catastrophe, despite the high costs this decision involves.
2002-10-01 By Stephen F. Haller
Science

Thinking about Biology

As it happens , some philosophers question the absoluteness even of the fundamental laws of physics , doubting that ... 5 See for example Nancy Cartwright's book How the Laws of Physics Lie ( Oxford : Oxford University Press , 1983 ) .

Author: Stephen Webster

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

ISBN: 0521599547

Category: Science

Page: 235

View: 985

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A short, readable 2003 textbook that is about the philosophical, social and political aspects of biology.
2003-04-03 By Stephen Webster
Philosophy

Laws Mind and Free Will

Laws,. and. Fundamentalism. The Davidsonian Problematic for philosophy of psychology is set up in terms of a contrast between two, purportedly different, types of laws: those that are “strict and ... 4.1 How the Laws of Physics Lie ...

Author: Steven W. Horst

Publisher: MIT Press

ISBN: 9780262015257

Category: Philosophy

Page: 277

View: 427

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An account of scientific laws that vindicates the status of psychological laws and shows natural laws to be compatible with free will. In Laws, Mind, and Free Will, Steven Horst addresses the apparent dissonance between the picture of the natural world that arises from the sciences and our understanding of ourselves as agents who think and act. If the mind and the world are entirely governed by natural laws, there seems to be no room left for free will to operate. Moreover, although the laws of physical science are clear and verifiable, the sciences of the mind seem to yield only rough generalizations rather than universal laws of nature. Horst argues that these two familiar problems in philosophy--the apparent tension between free will and natural law and the absence of "strict" laws in the sciences of the mind--are artifacts of a particular philosophical thesis about the nature of laws: that laws make claims about how objects actually behave. Horst argues against this Empiricist orthodoxy and proposes an alternative account of laws--an account rooted in a cognitivist approach to philosophy of science. Horst argues that once we abandon the Empiricist misunderstandings of the nature of laws there is no contrast between "strict" laws and generalizations about the mind ("ceteris paribus" laws, laws hedged by the caveat "other things being equal"), and that a commitment to laws is compatible with a commitment to the existence of free will. Horst's alternative account, which he calls "cognitive Pluralism," vindicates the truth of psychological laws and resolves the tension between human freedom and the sciences.
2011 By Steven W. Horst
Philosophy

Nancy Cartwright

This book focuses mainly on Cartwright's recent work on laws and capacities. It is the outcome of the second series of the Munster lectures in philosophy which took place on May 5-6, 1998.

Author: Matthias Paul

Publisher:

ISBN: STANFORD:36105028476096

Category: Philosophy

Page: 119

View: 407

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Nancy Cartwright has been a dominant figure in the philosophy of science for more than twenty years. In the early eighties she wrote her influential book "How the Laws of Physics Lie" which was generally perceived to be a challenge to a realistic conception of scientific theories. Over the last decade her focus has shifted to issues concerning what she calls "fundamentalism". This is the position that laws of nature are basic and that other things come from them. Cartwright rejects this story and replaces it by the view that capacities are basic and that laws obtain "on account of the repeated Operation of a system of components with stable capacities in particularly fortunate circumstances". This book focuses mainly on Cartwright's recent work on laws and capacities. It is the outcome of the second series of the Munster lectures in philosophy which took place on May 5-6, 1998. This volume comprises a revised version of Cartwright's evening talk, 12 colloquium papers which Cartwright considered to be "extremely thought provoking", followed by replies Cartwright makes to each of them.
1999 By Matthias Paul
Philosophy

Tainted

3 (July 2010): 317–340; I. Votsis, “Data Meet Theory: Up Close and Inferentially Personal,” Synthese 182, no. 1 (2011): 89–100. Scheffier, Science and Subjectivity, 8–9. Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie, Essay 6; B. van Fraassen, ...

Author: Kristin Sharon Shrader-Frechette

Publisher: Environmental Ethics and Scien

ISBN: 9780199396412

Category: Philosophy

Page: 295

View: 358

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Three-fourths of scientific research in the United States is funded by special interests. Many of these groups have specific practical goals, such as developing pharmaceuticals or establishing that a pollutant causes only minimal harm. Kristin Shrader-Frechette uses the analytical tools of classic philosophy of science to evaluate the conclusions of science tainted by the influence of special interests. She challenges accepted scientific findings regarding risks such as chemical toxins and carcinogens, ionizing radiation, pesticides, hazardous-waste disposal, development of environmentally sensitive lands, threats to endangered species, and inadequate standards for workplace-pollution exposure.
2014 By Kristin Sharon Shrader-Frechette

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