The Empirical StanceWhat is empiricism and what could it be? Bas C. van Fraassen, one of the world's foremost contributors to philosophical logic and the philosophy of science, here undertakes a fresh consideration of these questions and offers a program for renewal of the empiricist tradition. The empiricist tradition is not and could not be defined by common doctrines, but embodies a certain stance in philosophy, van Fraassen says. This stance is displayed first of all in a searing, recurrent critique of metaphysics, and second in a focus on experience that requires a voluntarist view of belief and opinion. Van Fraassen focuses on the philosophical problems of scientific and conceptual revolutions and on the not unrelated ruptures between religious and secular ways of seeing or conceiving of ourselves. He explores what it is to be or not be secular and points the way toward a new relationship between secularism and science within philosophy. |
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Contents
Against Analytic Metaphysics | 1 |
1 Living with a Dead Metaphysics | 2 |
2 Ontology Reborn | 4 |
3 Does the World Exist? | 5 |
4 A Spectrum of Theories | 6 |
5 Scientific Steps Beyond Science? | 11 |
6 The Form of Success and Its Failure | 18 |
7 A Dilemma for the Conscientious | 25 |
2 Criteria for Royal Succession in Science | 115 |
EMPIRICIST FUNDAMENTALISM AND THE OPEN FUTURE | 117 |
3 Feyerbands Critique of Classical Empiricism | 119 |
4 The Argument Hoist on Its Own Petard? | 124 |
Undermining the Analogy | 129 |
The Problem of Epistemic Frailty and Sin | 135 |
TOLERATING AMBIGUITY THE INEXHAUSTIBLE UNFATHOMABLE HISTORICAL SELF | 137 |
7 The Uses of an Unfollowable Rule | 138 |
8 A World Well Lost | 27 |
What Is Empiricism and What Could It Be? | 31 |
2 History of the Word Empiricism | 32 |
The Defining Criterion | 34 |
4 Immediate Inadequacy of the Criterion | 35 |
The Recurrent Rebellion | 36 |
WHAT EMPIRICISM CANNOT BE | 38 |
Doomed to Vicious Circle or Infinite Regress? | 39 |
Why Stonewalling Cant Work | 40 |
PHILOSOPHICAL STANCES | 46 |
What Separates Empiricists from Metaphysicians? | 47 |
11 The Stance as Will and Idea | 48 |
EXAMPLE OF A STANCE MISUNDERSTOOD MATERIALISM | 49 |
12 Is This a Factual Claim? | 50 |
14 Two Moves for Materialists | 53 |
Whatever It Takes | 55 |
15 Materialism as False Consciousness | 57 |
16 Materialism Without False Consciousness? | 60 |
FIVE WHAT COULD PHILOSOPHY BE THEN? | 61 |
Scientific RevolutionConversion as a Philosophical Problem | 64 |
OUR REJECTEDCELEBRATED PAST | 65 |
1 Epistemic Trauma Revolution Conversion | 67 |
2 The Problem of Radical Conversion as a Criterion of Adequacy | 72 |
TWO FRAMEWORKS FOR SOLUTION | 74 |
4 Objectifying Epistemology | 77 |
5 Voluntarism in Epistemology | 81 |
Wilfrid Sellarss Irenic Axiology | 83 |
William Jamess Epistemic Imperatives | 86 |
Not Yet Solved | 90 |
THE IMPASSE ENTER EMOTION | 92 |
Conditions for Revolution | 93 |
8 Pascals Wager and Its Limits | 94 |
9 Scientific RevolutionConversion as a Decision Problem | 101 |
Breaking the Decision Paradigm | 103 |
11 No Exit? | 108 |
Coda | 109 |
Experience Epistemic Life Without Foundations | 111 |
INTERPRETING THE PAST | 112 |
Our Deconstructible Language | 113 |
Bohm Versus the Copenhagen School | 141 |
Our Redeeming Weaknesses | 143 |
Science as Representation and Interpretation | 144 |
Scientific RevolutionConversion in Perspective | 149 |
What Is Science and What Is It to Be Secular? | 151 |
ONE WHAT IS SCIENCE? | 153 |
2 Objectification as Characteristic of Science | 154 |
Predemarcation | 158 |
Science in the Wildest Sense? | 162 |
Is Genuine Novelty Possible? | 163 |
Crisis | 164 |
Does Science Automatically Involve Completeness Claims? | 165 |
How General Is This Concept of Objectifying Inquiry? | 166 |
Are There Nonobjectifying Forms of Inquiry | 168 |
The Recurring RealistAntirealist Break | 170 |
TWO SO WHAT IS IT TO BE SECULAR | 172 |
6 Secularization of World Picture | 174 |
7 Existential Response | 177 |
Emil Fackenheim Gods Presence in History | 178 |
Martin Buber The Eclipse of God | 181 |
Rudolf Bultmann New Testament and Mythology | 183 |
8 Persons Encounter with the Divine | 187 |
9 Stranger in a Strange Land | 192 |
Scientific Cosmology | 195 |
A History of the Name Empiricism | 199 |
Scientific Methodologies | 200 |
Classifying Philosophical Currents | 201 |
An Alternative Classification of Philosophies | 205 |
5 Emergence of the Textbook Classification | 207 |
Radical Empiricism | 211 |
The Difficulties About Experience Husserl Dewey | 215 |
8 Reichenbachs View of the History of Empiricism | 218 |
Reichenbachs Third Way | 220 |
Drawing on Science the Right Way | 222 |
Bultmanns Theology Is Not a Philosophy | 224 |
Notes | 229 |
Bibliography | 259 |
273 | |
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Common terms and phrases
accepted ambiguity analytic analytic philosophy answer argument assertions attitude belief Bultmann century certainly claim cognitive concept conceptual revolutions Constructive Empiricism cosmology course criterion critical crucial decision Descartes domain domain of discourse emotion empirical sciences empiricism empiricist ence epistemic epistemology example experience explanation fact false false consciousness Feyerabend genuine human hypothesis idea identify induction interpretation Jesuit judgment Kant Kant's knowledge lecture Leibniz logical materialism materialist matter means mereology metaphysician metaphysics modern monism nature Newton's objectifying inquiry objective ontology opinion ourselves paradigm Pascal perhaps person phenomena philosophical philosophical position philosophy of science physics possible postulate precisely principle problem quantum quantum mechanics question radical rational reason Reichenbach religion religious role Rudolf Bultmann rule scientific realism Scripture secular sense simply Sola Sola Scriptura sort stance theoretical theory thing tion tradition true truth understanding world exists world picture