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Index
Cover Author biography Title page Epigragh Contents Preface to the first edition Preface to the second edition Preface to the third edition Preface to the fourth edition Introduction CHAPTER 1: Science as knowledge derived from the facts of experience
A widely held commonsense view of science Seeing is believing Visual experiences not determined solely by the object viewed Observable facts expressed as statements Why should facts precede theory? The fallibility of observation statements Further reading
CHAPTER 2: Observation as practical intervention
Observation: passive and private or active and public? Galileo and the moons of Jupiter Observable facts objective but fallible Further reading
CHAPTER 3: Experiment
Not just facts but relevant facts The production and updating of experimental results Transforming the experimental base of science: historical examples Experiment as an adequate basis for science Further reading
CHAPTER 4: Deriving theories from the facts: induction
Introduction Baby logic Can scientific laws be derived from the facts? What constitutes a good inductive argument? Further problems with inductivism The appeal of inductivism Further reading
CHAPTER 5: Introducing falsificationism
Introduction A logical point in favour of falsificationism Falsifiability as a criterion for theories Degree of falsifiability, clarity and precision Falsificationism and progress Further reading
CHAPTER 6: Sophisticated falsificationism, novel predictions and the growth of science
Relative rather than absolute degrees of falsifiability Increasing falsifiability and ad hoc modifications Confirmation in the falsificationist account of science Boldness, novelty and background knowledge Comparison of the inductivist and falsificationist view of confirmation Advantages of falsificationism over inductivism Further reading
CHAPTER 7: The limitations of falsificationism
Problems stemming from the logical situation Falsificationism inadequate on historical grounds The Copernican Revolution Inadequacies of the falsificationist demarcation criterion and Popper’s response Further reading
CHAPTER 8: Theories as structures I: Kuhn’s paradigms
Theories as structures Introducing Thomas Kuhn Paradigms and normal science Crisis and revolution The function of normal science and revolutions The merits of Kuhn’s account of science Kuhn’s ambivalence on progress through revolutions Objective knowledge Further reading
CHAPTER 9: Theories as structures II: research programs
Introducing Imre Lakatos Lakatos’s research programs Methodology within a program and the comparison of programs Novel predictions Testing the methodology against history Problems with Lakatos’s methodology Further reading
CHAPTER 10: Feyerabend’s anarchistic theory of science
The story so far Feyerabend’s case against method Feyerabend’s advocacy of freedom Critique of Feyerabend’s individualism Further reading
CHAPTER 11: Methodical changes in method
Against universal method Telescopic for naked-eye data: a change in standards Piecemeal change of theory, method and standards A light-hearted interlude Further reading
CHAPTER 12: The Bayesian approach
Introduction Bayes’ theorem Subjective Bayesianism Applications of the Bayesian formula Critique of subjective Bayesianism Further reading
CHAPTER 13: The new experimentalism
Introduction Experiment with life of its own Deborah Mayo on severe experimental testing Learning from error and triggering revolutions The new experimentalism in perspective Appendix: happy meetings of theory and experiment Further reading
CHAPTER 14: Why should the world obey laws?
Introduction Laws as regularities Laws as characterisations of powers or dispositions Thermodynamic and conservation laws Further reading
CHAPTER 15: Realism and anti-realism
Introduction Global anti-realism: language, truth and reality Anti-realism Some standard objections and the anti-realist response Scientific realism and conjectural realism Idealisation Unrepresentative realism or structural realism Further reading
CHAPTER 16: Epilogue to the third edition
Further reading
CHAPTER 17: Postscript
Introduction Confirmation by arguments from coincidence Philosophical versus scientific knowledge of atoms Independent evidence and the ‘theory-dependence of observation’: Perrin’s experiments on Brownian motion Partitioning of theories: atomism in nineteenth-century chemistry Realism versus anti-realism again
Strongly confirmed theories are never completely discarded Approximate truth is all we have Levels of reality
Further reading
Notes Bibliography Index of names Imprint page
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