Studies in History and Philosophy of Science

A prevailing view holds that the main goal of mental health promotion is to maintain and improve positive mental health, which is not merely defined by the absence of mental disorders, but by the presence of certain abilities. There are, however, challenges associated with this view that this paper aims to identify and explore. We start by highlighting three requirements for an ethically and politically justified mental health promotion scheme: (i) using a positive concept of mental health that (ii) respects the neutrality principle while (iii) not being overly permissive...

This paper examines how a certain threshing machine was developed and improved by Jobst Heinrich Voigt and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz between 1699 and 1700. While this machine was based on various mechanical principles and instruments, including the pinned drum mechanism first noted by Georg Philipp Harsdörffer, it was later reconceptualized as a 'mathematical' machine. I claim that such a positioning was not unique to this machine, but part of a wider movement during the 18th century that considered various artisanal instruments as mathematical, as well as agricultural and artisanal knowledge as scientific...

I propose a technique for identifying fundamental properties using structures already present in physical theories. I argue that, in conjunction with a particular naturalistic commitment, that I dub 'algebraic naturalism', these structures can be used to generate a standard of metaphysical determinacy. This standard can be used to rule out the possibility of a virulent strain of 'deep' metaphysical indeterminacy that has been imputed to quantum mechanics.

I argue that the question of animal consciousness is an extrapolation problem and, as such, is best tackled by deploying currently accepted methodology for validating experimental models of a phenomenon of interest. This methodology relies on an assessment of similarities and dissimilarities between experimental models, the partial replication of findings across complementary models, and evidence from the successes and failures of explanations, technologies and medical applications developed by extrapolating and aggregating findings from multiple models...

The early history of string theory is marked by a shift from strong interaction physics to quantum gravity. The first string models and associated theoretical framework were formulated in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the context of the S-matrix program for the strong interactions. In the mid-1970s, the models were reinterpreted as a potential theory unifying the four fundamental forces. This paper provides a historical analysis of how string theory was developed out of S-matrix physics, aiming to clarify how modern string theory, as a theory detached from experimental data, grew out of an S-matrix program that was strongly dependent upon observable quantities...

In this paper I discuss the first "multi-messenger" observations of a binary neutron star merger and kilonova. These observations, touted as "revolutionary," included both gravitational-wave and electromagnetic observations of a single source. I draw on analogies between astrophysics and historical sciences (e.g., paleontology) to explain the significance of this for (gravitational-wave) astrophysics. In particular, I argue that having independent lines of evidence about a target system enables the use of argumentative strategies-the "Sherlock Holmes" method and consilience-that help overcome the key challenges astrophysics faces as an observational and historical science...

Algebraic quantum field theory (AQFT) puts forward three "causal axioms" that aim to characterize the theory as one that implements relativistic causation: the spectrum condition, microcausality, and primitive causality. In this paper, I aim to show, in a minimally technical way, that none of them fully explains the notion of causation appropriate for AQFT because they only capture some of the desiderata for relativistic causation I state or because it is often unclear how each axiom implements its respective desideratum...

The idea that the dynamical properties of quantum systems are invariably relative to other systems has recently regained currency. Using Relational Quantum Mechanics (RQM) for a case study, this paper calls attention to a question that has been underappreciated in the debate about quantum relativism: the question of whether relativity iterates. Are there absolute facts about the properties one system possesses relative to a specified reference, or is this again a relative matter, and so on? It is argued that RQM (in its best-known form) is committed to what I call the Unrestricted Iteration Principle (UIP), and thus to an infinite regress of relativisations...

I identify and resolve an internal tension in Critical Contextual Empiricism (CCE) - the normative account of science developed by Helen Longino. CCE includes two seemingly conflicting principles: on one hand, the cognitive goals of epistemic communities should be open to critical discussion (the openness of goals to criticism principle, OGC); on the other hand, criticism must be aligned with the cognitive goals of that community to count as "relevant" and thus require a response (the goal-relativity of response-requiring criticism principle, GRC)...

This paper addresses the issue of the import of convergence arguments in theory assessment. A first part is devoted to making the point of the different types of strategies based on convergence, providing new distinctions with respect to the existing literature. Specific attention is devoted to robustness vs consilience arguments and one representative example for each category is then discussed in some detail. These are: (a) Perrin's famous robustness argument on behalf of the atomic hypothesis on the grounds of the concordance of thirteen different procedures to the same result for the Avogadro number; (b) the consilience argument motivating the trust in the viability of the extra-dimension conjecture in the context of early string theory...

Predictivism is the thesis that evidence successfully predicted by a scientific theory counts more (or ought to count more) in the confirmation of that theory than already known evidence would. One rationale that has been proposed for predictivism is that predictive success guards against ad hoc hypotheses. Despite the intuitive attraction of predictivism, there is historical evidence that speaks against it. As valuable as the historical evidence may be, however, it is largely indirect evidence for the epistemic attitudes of individual - albeit prominent - scientists...

There seems to be an emerging consensus among many philosophers of science that non-epistemic values ought to play a role in the process of scientific reasoning itself. Recently, a number of philosophers have focused on the role of values in scientific classification or taxonomy. Their claim is that a choice of ontology or taxonomic scheme can only be made, or should only be made, by appealing to non-epistemic or social values. In this paper, I take on this "argument from ontological choice," claiming that it equivocates on the notion of choice...

Hermann Weyl's philosophical reflections remain a topic of considerable interest in the history and philosophy of science. In particular, Weyl's commitment to a form of idealism, as it pertains to his reading of Husserl and Fichte, has garnered much discussion. However, much less attention has been given to Weyl's later, and at that only partial, turn towards a form of empiricism (i.e. from the late 1920s onward). This lack of focus on Weyl's later philosophy has tended to obscure some of the most significant lessons that Weyl sought to draw from his decades of research in the foundations of mathematics and physics...

"Excited Delirium Syndrome" (ExDS) is a controversial diagnosis. The supposed syndrome is sometimes considered to be a potential cause of death. However, it has been argued that its sole purpose is to cover up excessive police violence because it is mainly used to explain deaths of individuals in custody. In this paper, we examine the epistemic conditions giving rise to the controversial diagnosis by discussing the relation between causal hypotheses, evidence, and data in forensic medicine. We argue that the practitioners' social context affects causal inquiry through background assumptions that enter inquiry at multiple stages...

The understanding of artifacts and biological phenomena has often influenced each other. This work argues that at the core of these epistemic bridges there are shared teleological notions and explanations manifested in analogies between artifacts and biological phenomena. To this end, I first propose a focus on the logical structure of minimal teleological explanations, which renders said epistemic bridges more evident than an ontological or metaphysical approach to teleology, and which can be used to describe scientific practices in different areas by virtue of formal generality and minimalism (section 2)...

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A growing literature in philosophy of science focuses on the role of aesthetics in scientific practice, with the experiment recently recognized for its aesthetic value. However, the literature on aesthetics in experimentation grows out of case studies from the history of science, leaving open the question as to how contemporary scientists experience aesthetics in their experimental work. In this paper we offer the first qualitative, empirical analysis of aesthetic experiences regarding experimental practice, drawing from in-depth interviews with 215 scientists in four countries...

In a series of articles, Mauricio Suárez defends the neutrality of fictionalism with respect to the scientific realism-anti-realism debate. Suárez understands fictionalism from a strictly methodological point of view, linked to the practice of model building in the context of the philosophy of science. He moves away from the type of fictionalism analysed in other areas of philosophy such as metaphysics, the philosophy of language, aesthetics or the philosophy of mathematics. Following Vaihinger's position, he emphasizes the inferential role of fiction in scientific modelling and argues that scientific fictionalism is not incompatible with scientific realism, as is often believed...

The interpretability of ML models is important, but it is not clear what it amounts to. So far, most philosophers have discussed the lack of interpretability of black-box models such as neural networks, and methods such as explainable AI that aim to make these models more transparent. The goal of this paper is to clarify the nature of interpretability by focussing on the other end of the "interpretability spectrum". The reasons why some models, linear models and decision trees, are highly interpretable will be examined, and also how more general models, MARS and GAM, retain some degree of interpretability...

I apply Dawid's Meta-Empirical Assessment (MEA) methodology to the theory of cosmological inflation. I argue that applying this methodology does not currently offer a compelling case for ascribing non-empirical confirmation to cosmological inflation. In particular, I argue that despite displaying strong instances of Unexpected Explanatory Coherence (UEA), it is premature to evaluate the theory on the basis of the No Alternatives Argument (NAA). More significantly though, I argue that the theory of cosmological inflation fails to sustain a convincing Meta-Inductive Argument (MIA) because the empirical evidence and theoretical successes that it seeks to draw meta-empirical support from do not warrant a meta-inductive inference to inflation...