Underdetermination as an Epistemological Test Tube: Expounding Hidden Values of the Scientific Community

Carrier, Martin (2009) Underdetermination as an Epistemological Test Tube: Expounding Hidden Values of the Scientific Community. In [2008] Theoretical Frameworks and Empirical Underdetermination Workshop (Düsseldorf April 10-12, 2008).

Full text available as:
PDF - Requires a viewer, such as Adobe Acrobat Reader or other PDF viewer.

Abstract

Duhem-Quine underdetermination plays a constructive role in epistemology by pinpointing the impact of non-empirical virtues or cognitive values on theory choice. Underdetermination thus contributes to illuminating the nature of scientific rationality. Scientists prefer and accept one account among empirical equivalent alternatives. The non-empirical virtues operating in science are laid open in such theory choice decisions. The latter act as an epistemological test tube in making explicit commitments to how scientific knowledge should be like.

Keywords:underdetermination, empirical equivalence, rationality, epistemology.
Subjects:General Issues: Theory Change
General Issues: Theory/Observation
General Issues: Values In Science
General Issues: Realism/Anti-realism
Conferences and Volumes:[2008] Theoretical Frameworks and Empirical Underdetermination Workshop (Düsseldorf April 10-12, 2008)
ID Code:4653
Deposited By:Votsis, Ioannis
Deposited On:28 May 2009