Skip Navigation

The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 2004 55(4):767-777; doi:10.1093/bjps/55.4.767
© 2004 by British Society for the Philosophy of Science
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in ISI Web of Science
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Hanna, J. F.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
 Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?


Discussion

Contra Ladyman: What Really is Right with Constructive Empiricism

Joseph F. Hanna

Department of Philosophy, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824-1032, USA, hanna{at}msu.edu

James Ladyman ([2000]) argues ‘what's really wrong with constructive empiricism’ is that ‘it requires that there be an objective modal distinction between the observable and the unobservable.’ My intent is to counter Ladyman's claim that the irreducibly modal character of empirical adequacy is something that is ‘really wrong with constructive empiricism’. I argue that disposition concepts refer to non-modal properties of types rather than to modal properties of tokens of those types. Solubility, for example, is an ‘occurrent’, though unobservable, property of a type of substance (involving the structure of associated atoms); and observability is, similarly, an ‘occurrent’, though unobservable, property of a type of event (involving the structure of associated physical systems). Empirical adequacy, like truth, is an objective, semantic notion; the empirical adequacy of a theory depends upon all actual tokens of the relevant observable type, not just upon the tokens that have actually been observed.

  1. Introduction
  2. The typical character of disposition concepts
  3. Confirmational versus semantic empirical adequacy
  4. Conclusion


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.