Explanation and theory change university of maryland. Share photos and videos, send messages and get updates. Haines brown, bibliography for historical materialism. Consider an example due to wesley salmon salmon, 1971, p. Genera l topic s i n th e philosoph y o f scienc e one scientific explanation. Salmon 19252001 was university professor of philosophy at the university of pittsburgh from 1983 to 1999 and the author of works that include the foundations of scientific inference and statistical explanation and statistical relevance. He is a writer and producer, known for 999 1992, crimewatch uk 1984 and an ocean apart 1988. Short corrects widespread misconceptions of peirces theory of signs and demonstrates its relevance to contemporary analytic philosophy of language, mind and science. In addition, especially helpful for the concept of mediation, are john platt, theorems on boundaries in hierarchical systems, in the book edited by lancelot whyte et al, cited above.
Connect with friends, family and other people you know. Scientific explanation and the causal structure of the world by wesley c. More precisely, an argument is a group of statements standing in relation to each other. Proceedings of the biennial meeting of the philosophy of science association 1984. Westley allan dodd july 3, 1961 january 5, 1993, was an american convicted serial killer and sex offender. Salmon normally uses the words order and structure with reference to the causal thing that is produced, but some clarification is needed. Open library is an open, editable library catalog, building towards a web page for every book ever published.
According to wesley salmon, causal explanations of singular facts must contain descriptions of the causal interactions that caused the fact to be explained, and descriptions of the causal processes that link these interactions to one another and to the explanandum event. Wesley charles salmon 19252001 was a central figure in twentieth. Wesley salmon, scientific explanation and the causal. Scientific explanation stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. Publication date 1984 topics science methodology, science philosophy. Some thoughts on wesley salmons contributions to the. Salmon 1984, 171 sober is mistaken in drawing the same conclusion for ci as he did for mt see above, namely, that salmon intends it to read as a necessary. Salmon describes three fundamental conceptions of scientific explanationthe epistemic, modal, and ontic.
Third, lange presents how explanations by constraint differ from wesley salmon s wellknown notion of noncausal topdown explanations that salmon distinguishes from causal bottomup explanations pp. Having discussed the need to consider statistically relevant factors in assigning frequency values to the single case, he continues. Yet most prominently, salmon was a realist about causality in scientific explanation, although. He has been married to sarah lancashire since august 22, 2001. For much of his career wesley salmon has defended reichenbachs principle of the common cause, and in particular he has endorsed and developed reichenbachs statistical characterization of common causes in terms of conjunctive forks. Lewiss can be stated with fewer technical notions, so let us take a brief look at it. Buy scientific explanation and the causal structure of the world by wesley c salmon online at alibris. They are items that provide hours of enjoyment for the recipient. Logical analysis is concerned with the relationship between a conclusion and the evidence given to support it. Learn vocabulary, terms, and more with flashcards, games, and other study tools.
For instance, boyles law relates temperature, pressure, and volume of an. Scriven, m 1959 truisms as the grounds for historical explanations. The publication of wesley salmons statistical explanation in 1970 heralded a new era. Wesley salmons theory 1984 and david lewiss theory 1986 are two prominent examples. Formats and editions of scientific explanation and the. Why the logic of explanation is inconsistencyadaptive. One of the compelling virtues of salmons book is that not only does it put forward new and. Scientific explanation and the causal structure of the world. Princeton university press, dec 21, 1984 biography. Wesley charles salmon 19252001 was a central figure in twentieth century philosophy of science. Mechanisms, counterfactuals and laws philsciarchive. The philosophical theory of scientific explanation proposed here involves a radically new treatment of causality that accords with the pervasively statistical character of contemporary science.
Third, lange presents how explanations by constraint differ from wesley salmons wellknown notion of noncausal topdown explanations that salmon distinguishes from causal bottomup explanations pp. Second, lange raises interesting objections to harvey browns proposal of how to explain the lorentz transformations pp. Contents acknowledgements 5 chapter 1 introduction 7 theory of explanation 7 causality and causal explanation 11 interest explanation part i understanding singular causal explanation 17 chapter 2 a contrastive theory of causal explanation 18 1. Press, 1984, 220, and i recommend that our critics study salmons discussion, which should lay to rest the misconception sometimes expressed it has been said, in print, about my own work that such arguments to the best explanation are circular. Discover book depositorys huge selection of wesley salmon books online. The use of explanation aaron benzeev i the explanation of emotions 167. Formats and editions of scientific explanation and the causal. Salmon 1980, providing an overall evaluation of the importance of the logic of chance for the history of the theory of probability, wrote of an epochmaking work. He also worked on confirmation theory, trying to explicate how probability theory via inductive logic might help confirm and choose hypotheses. Author of logic, logical empiricism, zenos paradoxes, the foundations of scientific inference, the foundations of scientific inference, four decades of scientific explanation, a custom edition of logic, logic. J wikipedia citation please see wikipedias template documentation for further citation fields that may be required.
He was arrested later that year after a failed attempt to abduct a sixyearold boy at a movie theater. Covering law model an overview sciencedirect topics. Wesley salmon on explanation, probability and rationality. Salmon describes three fundamental conceptions of scientific.
I have treated mellors book in considerable detail in wesley c. Salmon, wesley 1990, four decades of scientific explanation. Salmon, wesley 1990 four decades of scientific explanation. Wesley salmons process theory of causality and the. Salmon august 9, 1925 april 22, 2001 was an american philosopher of science. The scope of logic 1 when people make statements, they may offer evidence to support them or they may not. A book is also a considerate option when giving to an acquaintance such as a coworker. Dodd wrote detailed accounts of his murders in a diary which was found by police. Salmon phil doweti department of philosophy university of tasmania in a recent paper 1994 wesley salmon has replied to criticisms e.
In 1979, before the ontic approach to causation had reached its later prominence in salmon s thinking, he made the following assessment of the propensity approach. They are a onesizefitsall solution to the problem of what to buy for a loved one. Book depository books with free delivery worldwide. Wright 2012 european journal of philosophy of science 2 3. In response to criticisms from bas van fraassen 1980, 123, salmon clari. The first part of this reply 27 explores fur ther the similarities. There is a second interpretation of hempels argument that, unlike the first interpretation, does not require that we think of the full content of 2. Thus, a perfect fork could be involved in either the production of order and structure, or the production of changes in order and structure of causal processes. Salmon, causalmechanical explanation and the mechanical philosophy. Salmon proposes to overcome the difficulties o determining exactly what.
Working in the tradition of hume, salmon developed a sophisticated version of empiricism combining a genuinely probabilistic approach with realism about theoretical entities. Scientific explanations can be given for such particular occurrences as the appearance of halleys comet in 1759 or the crash of a dc10 jet airliner in chicago in 1979, as well as such general features of the world as the nearly elliptical orbits of planets or the electrical conductivity of copper. Wesley salmons process theory of causality and the conserved. Salmon argues that the inductive solution to the problem of induction is. From his first book logic 1963a, which was translated into spanish, japanese. By contrasting three general conceptions of scientific explanation, this paper seeks to clarify the explanandum and to exhibit the fundamental philosophical issues involved in the project of explicating scientific explanation. Scientific explanation and the causal structure of the. I start by observing that the deductive ideal in itself does not require that the reconstruction of an explanation as a deductive argument includes laws as its premises. Salmon, wesley 1984 scientific explanation and the causal structure of the world. Wesley salmon, scientific explanation and the causal structure of the world princeton, 1984. Peter salmon was born on may 15, 1956 in burnley, lancashire, england. This distinction is especially well appreciated by wesley salmon 1978, notwithstanding that salmon 1984 is the classic statement of the causal theory of explanation. He argues that the prevailing view a version of the epistemic conception is. Aug 18, 2010 open library is an open, editable library catalog, building towards a web page for every book ever published.
In response to a counterexample from nancy cartwright described in salmon 1984, 148, salmon incor. Publication date 1984 topics science methodology, science philosophy publisher. Salmon 1984 in scientific explanation and the causal structure of the world. Title author type language date edition publication. A statement that is supported by evidence is the conclusion of an argument, and logic provides tools for the analysis of arguments.
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