Philosophy of Science

One way of thinking about explanations that are mind-independent in
science is that it answers “what-if-things-had-been-different” questions, supplying information about what changes in some phenomena if some change is made—these sort of statements are counterfactuals. Often in science there is physical phenomena that is not able to be explained in terms other than those of the mathematics, as opposed to explanations where mathematics seems to play the mere role of representing causal or physical facts. This raises a question: could the sort of dependence of physical facts on mathematical facts be counterfactual? In this dissertation I will argue that a counterfactual theory of extramathematical explanation can appeal to a metaphysical necessitation constraint to distinguish between cases where mathematics plays a merely representational role in explaining some physical phenomena, and cases where there is genuine mathematical explanations for the physical phenomena, a challenge raised by Baron (2016b) that I will call the explanatory genuineness problem. Using a new example of the usage of coprimeness facts in computer encryption algorithms, which is analogous to the usage of coprimeness facts in the explanation of cicada life-cycles, I argue that the fact that mathematical explanations can occur in multiple physically distinct systems is evidence in favour of the view that mathematical facts that play a genuine explanatory role represent truths about metaphysical
necessity, thus accounting for metaphysical necessitation. However, appealing to the metaphysical necessitation constraint introduces a further challenge: as evaluating a counterfactual under the metaphysical necessitation constraint will involve evaluating how a physical system is affected by the hypothetical changing of a mathematical fact at an impossible world, I argue that there is competing ways to model the effects of the same mathematical
intervention. This shows us that it is not exactly clear what aspects
of mathematical facts are representing the underlying metaphysical constraints. I conclude that even if a demarcation can be drawn between mathematical facts that play a representational and genuine explanatory role using metaphysical necessitation, a truly counterfactual theory of eme must give some epistemic position for why some evaluation of a mathematical counterfactual is agent independent.

It has been debated whether the wave function of the universe is ontic or nomological in a quantum theory in which the wave function is real, such as Bohm's theory. In this paper, I argue that a natural way to explain the result of a protective measurement is to admit that the wave function is ontic, representing a concrete physical entity. The ontic view of the wave function satisfies the principle of locality for product states, as well as the causal closure principle, while the nomological view of the wave function violates the principle of locality for product states, and it can hardly satisfy the causal closure principle either.

Peer review is often taken to be the main form of quality control on academic writings. Usually this is carried out by journals. Parts of math and physics appear to have now set up a parallel, crowd-sourced model of peer review, where papers are posted on the arXiv to be publicly discussed. In this paper we argue that crowd-sourced peer review is likely to do better than journal-solicited peer review at sorting papers by quality. Our argument rests on two key claims. First, crowd-sourced peer review will lead to there being on average more reviewers per paper than journal-solicited peer review. Second, due to the wisdom of the crowds, more reviewers will tend to make better judgments than fewer. We make the second claim precise by looking at the Condorcet Jury Theorem as well as two related, novel jury theorems developed specifically to apply to the case of peer review.

In 1885, the nineteenth-century Haitian lawyer, statesman, anthropologist, and Egyptologist, Joseph Antenor Firmin (1850-1911), published his work, De l’egalite des races humanines (The Equality of the Human Races) as a rebuttal to Arthur de Gobineau’s, “Essai sur l’ inegalite des races (An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races). In this article I argue that Firmin's critique of western anthropology is not a vindication for afrocentrism as expressed in the works of afrocentric scholars like Molefi Kete Asante and others. Instead, it is a call to highlight the contributions of African people to intellectual thought and development as it has come to be embodied in the universal ontology and epistemology of science. Be that as it may, in this work I want to continue Firmin’s position by demonstrating the African contribution
to social and scientific theories by highlighting the scientism of the African people of Haiti as revealed by the religion of Vodou, its epistemology (Haitian/Vilokan Idealism), and its form of system and social integration, the Vodou Ethic and the spirit of communism. Essentially, like Firmin, I assume, against the noiriste and Afrocentric positions, science as a human universal, which began in Africa, and has now reached maturity in Western society. This work seeks to highlight
the African/Haitian contribution to the scientific process as encapsulated and revealed in Paul C Mocombe’s [1] social theory and method of “phenomenological structuralism” thereby reconstructing the social sciences and humanities to
account for the contribution of black Atlantic thought and culture.

Due to newspaper requirements references were deleted from the printed version
https://dt.ua/SCIENCE/chi-ye-naukoyu-filosofiya-nauki-309070_.html (In Ukrainian)
https://zn.ua/SCIENCE/yavlyaetsya-li-naukoy-filosofiya-nauki-315326_.html (in Russian)
Initially, the paper was sent to the general scientific journal “Visnyk of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine” (http://www.visnyk-nanu.org.ua/en) and rejected without any written explanation.

Contents
Basic question was formulated but has not discussed
Is the philosophy of science a philosophy?
What is a science?
New knowledge is the main scientific product
The philosophy of science as one of metasciences about science
Features of the philosophy of science as science

Abstract
The philosophy of science is understood as a meta-science about science. Its domain includes components, subsystems, structures, functions, and interconnections of systems of scientific knowledge as rational means of generating new knowledge. Some scientific criteria, which are satisfied by the philosophy of science: demarcating and modeling its domain, verifying its statements, identifying and solving original problems, describing dynamics of knowledge systems in terms of their components and subsystems, are formulated.
The structure-nominative direction in the philosophy of science has included into systems of scientific knowledge more forms of its differentiation than informal-conceptual, propositional/standard, logical, instrumentalist/operationalist, erothetic/interrogative, semantic, and structuralist directions. Scientists construct a balanced system of scientific knowledge as the device of producing new knowledge by systemically ordering ties between these forms.
The modification of the structure-nominative direction proposes more detailed («microscopic») consideration of compositions, transformations, interdependencies, and dynamics of subsystems of systems of scientific knowledge.
In any particular system of scientific knowledge, the following agreed subsystems are singled out: ontic (initial ideas about the indisputable attributes of realities from the domain of the knowledge system in question); denominative (names of realities both from the domain and names of components of the system itself); language (system of languages of the knowledge system); logistic (means of ordering subsystems); nomic (laws, axioms, postulates that represent the regularities and regularities of the domain, as well as the principles of the system itself); model (abstract models); representative (models whose prototypes are realities from the domain); problem / interrogative or erothetic (problems, issues, tasks that are being formulated and solved); operational (actions with components and structures of knowledge system in question); procedural (rules for performing actions); evaluative or axiological (assessments of components, structures, subsystems and the system as a whole); hypothetical (assumptions); heuristic (useful, but not rigorous means of reasoning); approximative (approximations) and binding (connections of subsystems and their components) subsystems.
The results of the article are useful in the philosophy of science, sociology of science and history of science, as well as in the teaching of corresponding university courses.
Key words: science as a social institution, philosophy of science, meta-science, production of knowledge, system of scientific knowledge, polysystem, components, subsystems, modified structural-nominative reconstruction, scientific criteria.

Due to newspaper requirements references were deleted from the printed version
https://dt.ua/SCIENCE/chi-ye-naukoyu-filosofiya-nauki-309070_.html (In Ukrainian)
https://zn.ua/SCIENCE/yavlyaetsya-li-naukoy-filosofiya-nauki-315326_.html (in Russian)
Initially, the paper was sent to the general scientific journal “Visnyk of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine” (http://www.visnyk-nanu.org.ua/en) and rejected without any written explanation.
Contents
Basic question was formulated but has not discussed
Is the philosophy of science a philosophy?
What is a science?
New knowledge is the main scientific product
The philosophy of science as one of metasciences about science
Features of the philosophy of science as science

Abstract
The philosophy of science is understood as a meta-science about science. Its domain includes components, subsystems, structures, functions, and interconnections of systems of scientific knowledge as rational means of generating new knowledge. Some scientific criteria, which are satisfied by the philosophy of science: demarcating and modeling its domain, verifying its statements, identifying and solving original problems, describing dynamics of knowledge systems in terms of their components and subsystems, are formulated.
The structure-nominative direction in the philosophy of science has included into systems of scientific knowledge more forms of its differentiation than informal-conceptual, propositional/standard, logical, instrumentalist/operationalist, erothetic/interrogative, semantic, and structuralist directions. Scientists construct a balanced system of scientific knowledge as the device of producing new knowledge by systemically ordering ties between these forms.
The modification of the structure-nominative direction proposes more detailed («microscopic») consideration of compositions, transformations, interdependencies, and dynamics of subsystems of systems of scientific knowledge.
In any particular system of scientific knowledge, the following agreed subsystems are singled out: ontic (initial ideas about the indisputable attributes of realities from the domain of the knowledge system in question); denominative (names of realities both from the domain and names of components of the system itself); language (system of languages of the knowledge system); logistic (means of ordering subsystems); nomic (laws, axioms, postulates that represent the regularities and regularities of the domain, as well as the principles of the system itself); model (abstract models); representative (models whose prototypes are realities from the domain); problem / interrogative or erothetic (problems, issues, tasks that are being formulated and solved); operational (actions with components and structures of knowledge system in question); procedural (rules for performing actions); evaluative or axiological (assessments of components, structures, subsystems and the system as a whole); hypothetical (assumptions); heuristic (useful, but not rigorous means of reasoning); approximative (approximations) and binding (connections of subsystems and their components) subsystems.
The results of the article are useful in the philosophy of science, sociology of science and history of science, as well as in the teaching of corresponding university courses.
Key words: science as a social institution, philosophy of science, meta-science, production of knowledge, system of scientific knowledge, polysystem, components, subsystems, modified structural-nominative reconstruction, scientific criteria.

This paper is not how many in the Mormon Transhumanist Association may define Mormon Transhumanism.  This contains my personal reflections on a kind of Transhumanism that I personally am defining, which for me is consistent with the Restorationist movement.  I say "restorationist" because LDS people have been counseled against using the word "Mormon."  Anyhow, in this essay, I describe a theory on spirit matter which is consistent with the scientific theory of dark matter, and I also review other issues of science and religion, and I review statements made by Richard Dawkins in his book The God Delusion, to show how his Transhumanist statements describing the possibility of the existence of Alien civilizations that would be Godlike are consistent with Restorationist Theology, that the human race is actually a colony of an Alien Civilization, so to speak. In other words, what Dawkins calls "Seti Aliens" and what Lincoln Cannon of the Mormon Transhumanist Association describes as Posthuman beings are in fact the "gods" of Restorationist religion.  When in the original Battlestar Galactica, the Ship of Lights carried members of a "posthuman" race from which the human race descends, this is exactly what is described in Restorationist religion.  And therefore, Richard Dawkins is wrong to categorize Restorationist religion as "supernatural" and "magical" and "irrational."  In fact, Restorationist religion comes much closer to Dawkins' Transhumanist and "Seti Alien" philosophies than he realizes.

Tese que reconstitui toda a trajetória do pensamento de Georges Canguilhem, buscando demonstrar a imprevisibilidade das mutações ocorridas em sua obra, bem como a originalidade de cada reformulação pela qual ela passou, sem que nunca se apagasse totalmente a conservação de uma herança dos períodos anteriores. Divide-se em quatro capítulos, para cada um dos quais foi priorizado um acontecimento externo como índice de modificação da filosofia canguilhemiana. O primeiro capítulo (1926-1939) inicia-se reconstituindo a influência exercida sobre ele por Alain e pela Wertphilosophie, tendo como marco de mudança os acontecimentos políticos que conduziram à Segunda Guerra Mundial, o que levará Canguilhem a romper com o pacifismo de seu primeiro mestre e a constituir um pluralismo axiológico que se coloca para além do neo-kantismo. O segundo capítulo (1940-1956) tem como acontecimento sua incursão no domínio médico, já iniciada alguns anos antes, mas que terá suas consequências com a publicação de suas três teses, em que reelabora sua filosofia dos valores inserindo agora a vida como valor a coordenar os demais valores. Entre o segundo e o terceiro períodos analisados, Canguilhem passa a emprestar conceitos à epistemologia bachelardiana na prática da história das ciências, o que permitirá que ele aborde o acontecimento que analisaremos no terceiro capítulo de um modo novo. Assim, o terceiro capítulo (1957-1966) prioriza a ruptura realizada pelo advento da genética no domínio das ciências da vida, o que exigirá uma retificação do conceito de vida por Canguilhem, o que ele fará concebendo essa novidade em biologia como uma “ruptura epistemológica”. O quarto e último capítulo (1966-1995) analisa um acontecimento na esfera das ciências sociais e humanas na França, ocorrida sobretudo com as obras de Althusser e Foucault. Canguilhem formulará um último conceito, o de “ideologia científica”, que permitirá responder a seus jovens colegas e revigorar o empréstimo que já fizera à epistemologia histórica de Bachelard, ensejando também um reexame de toda sua obra pregressa. Desse modo, a filosofia na qual a obra de Canguilhem culmina pode definir-se como: um pluralismo dos valores (cap. 1), coordenado nos termos de um vitalismo racionalista (cap. 2), que se nutre dos resultados colhidos a partir da prática de uma epistemologia histórica das ciências da vida (cap. 3), cujo objetivo é reformular o estatuto filosófico do homem enquanto ser vivente, investigando as condições de possibilidade práticas para uma pedagogia da cura (cap. 4).

We characterize access to empirical objects in biology from a theoretical perspective. Unlike objects in current physical theories, biological objects are the result of a history and their variations continue to generate a history. This property is the starting point of our concept of measurement. We argue that biological measurement is relative to a natural history which is shared by the different objects subjected to the measurement and is more or less constrained by biologists. We call symmetrization the theoretical and often concrete operation which leads to considering biological objects as equivalent in a measurement.  Last, we use our notion of measurement to analyze research strategies. Some strategies aim to bring biology closer to the epistemology of physical theories, by studying objects as similar as possible, while others build on biological diversity.

Fuchs and Peres (2000) claimed that standard Quantum Mechanics needs no interpretation. In this essay, I show the flaws of the arguments presented in support to this thesis. Specifically, it will be claimed that the authors conflate QM with Quantum Bayesianism (QBism) - the most prominent subjective formulation of quantum theory; thus, they endorse a specific interpretation of the quantum formalism. Secondly, I will explain the main reasons for which QBism should not be considered a physical theory, being it concerned exclusively with agents’ beliefs and silent about the physics of the quantum regime. Consequently, the solutions to the quantum puzzles provided by this approach cannot be satisfactory from a physical perspective. In the third place, I evaluate Fuchs and Peres arguments contra the non-standard interpretations of QM, showing again the fragility of their claims. Finally, it will be stressed the importance of the interpretational work in the context of quantum theory.

In his life as in his work Ugo Spirito embodies the deepest meaning of the twentieth century European intellectual history. More precisely: the entire West, marked by the parable of revolutionary ideologies. In fact, that century and that civilization have moved from imperialism to globalization in international politics. From irrationalism to postmodernism, in philosophy. The philosophy of Ugo Spirito has made a similar path, as if his thought was mimetic (or prescient?) with respect to the century in which he lived. In this sense both the great fortune received during life and the relative forgetfulness suffered by his work after death are meaningful. As if another century had begun in 1979, another story. Parole chiave: Novecento, filosofia, politica internazionale, postmodernismo.

David Miller argues that there are no good reasons, either sufficient or insufficient. I show that most of his arguments are invalid or unsound. Several of his arguments depend upon the false claim that every deductively valid argument is circular. I accept one of Miller's arguments for the conclusion that there are no good reasons which are less-than-sufficient. I accept one of his arguments to the conclusion that there are no probative sufficient reasons. But I explain how there are epistemic sufficient reasons which are relative to the game of science and how their existence is consistent with Miller's main contentions while avoiding Miller's apparently anarchic account of our knowledge.

Psychiatric classification is highly controversial, as could be witnessed again with the latest revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). These controversies comprise multiple kinds of critiques by a variety of actors. It is unlikely that all these issues will be overcome by one perfect solution in the future. Rather, it is precisely the DSM's "one-size-fits-all-approach" that lies at the root of many of the current problems. To restore the scientific and public credibility of psychiatric classification, a multi-dimensional pluralist response is thus needed: theoretical pluralism, meaning a promotion of different research projects and heuristic strategies (1), taxonomic pluralism, which allows for different classifications used in research versus clinical practice (2), and participatory pluralism, which concerns the diversity of perspectives and stakeholders in DSM-revisions (3).

The first sensational image of a black hole poses a reflection on the nature of things.

A hundred years have now passed since, with a similar photo, to the one that is going around the world today, Albert Einstein understood that he was right on the point expressed in his theory of gravitational relativity: gravity is the exhibition of the curvature of space - time. The photo that confirms the validity of his idea was that of an eclipse of the Sun, in which the stars could be seen in a different position than expected: their light had been bent by the gravitational field of the Sun.

A century later, even the astrophysicists who for the first time finally saw the image of an agreement (created from radio emissions) of a black hole have understood and confirmed Einstein's theory.