Currie, Adrian (2019) Simplicity, One-Shot Hypotheses & Paleobiological Explanation. [Preprint]

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Abstract

Paleobiologists (and other historical scientists) often provide simple narratives to explain complex, contingent episodes. These narratives are sometimes ‘one-shot hypotheses’ which are treated as being mutually exclusive with other possible explanations of the target episode, and are thus extended to accommodate as much about the episode as possible. I argue that a provisional preference for such hypotheses provides two kinds of productive scaffolding. First, they generate hypothetical difference-makers’: one-shot hypotheses highlight and isolate empirically tractable dependencies between variables. Second, investigations of hypothetical
difference-makers provision explanatory resources, the ‘raw materials’ for constructing more complex—and likely more adequate—explanations. Provisional preferences for simple, one-shot hypotheses in historical science, then, is defeasibly justified on indirect—strategic—grounds. My
argument is made in reference to recent developments regarding the K-Pg extinction.

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Item Type:	Preprint
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID Currie, Adrian currieadrian@gmail.com
Subjects:	Specific Sciences > Biology Specific Sciences > Earth Sciences General Issues > Explanation General Issues > Values In Science
Depositing User:	Dr Adrian Currie
Date Deposited:	05 Mar 2019 04:32
Last Modified:	05 Mar 2019 04:32
Item ID:	15789
Subjects:	Specific Sciences > Biology Specific Sciences > Earth Sciences General Issues > Explanation General Issues > Values In Science
Date:	2019
URI:	https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/15789

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