Philosophy of Science

Codes:
BMI-FILD-391
BBN-FIL-315.01
BBN-FIL-401.09
BMA-FILD-401.14
BMVD-020.04
BBV-020.24
BMI-LOTD17-205E
BMA-LOTD17-205.1

Those who take this as a joint lecture+seminar course  please take it with code BBN-FIL-315. You also need to take the corresponding seminar course of code BBN-FIL-316 (not necessarily in the same semester). 

The course provides an introduction to modern analytic philosophy of science. I shall focus on the central epistemological problems concerning empirical sciences like physics; and I shall discuss these issues on a formal/logical basis. Finally I sketch a naturalized philosophy of science based on what I call physico-formalist philosophy of mathematics -- an account for scientific knowledge, both a priori and empirical, within a purely physicalist ontology. 

Main topics:

• characterization of scientific knowledge
  
• science in social context
  
• traditional methodology of empirical science
  
• skepticism concerning empirical knowledge
  
• truth of fact vs. truth of reasoning dichotomy
  
• the Kantian tradition
  
• philosophy of logic and mathematics
  
• scientific theory as partially interpreted formal system
  
• semantics of scientific theory
  
• the physicalist approach
  
• meaning and truth
  
• holistic conclusions
  
• operationalism and the constitutive a priori
• fundationalism
  
• empirical underdetermination
• theory-ladenness of empiria
• empirical—theoretical dichotomy
• the problem of realism--antirelalism
  
• scientific knowledge in the context of the natural world
  

Grading criteria, specific requirements:

Oral exam from the material of the lectures. Video records and the slides of the lectures will be available. PhD students, in addition, have to write a 5-10 page critical essay (in English) in connection with the main theses I am proposing in the lecture course.

Required reading:

1. Alexander Bird: Philosophy Of Science (Fundamentals of Philosophy), Routledge, 1998.
   
2. L. E. Szabó: Meaning, Truth, and Physics, In G. Hofer-Szabó, L. Wroński  (eds.),   Making it Formally Explicit, European Studies in Philosophy of Science 6. (Springer International Publishing, 2017) DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-55486-0_9. (Preprint: //philsci-archive.pitt.edu/14769/)
   

Suggested further reading:

3. David A. Truncellito: Epistemology,  Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, https://www.iep.utm.edu/epistemo/
   
4. Thomas Uebel: Vienna Circle, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2013 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.) (//plato.stanford.edu/entries/vienna-circle/)
   
5. John Vickers: The Problem of Induction, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2013 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.) (//plato.stanford.edu/entries/induction-problem/)
   
6. Robert Sinclair: Quine’s Philosophy of Science, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (//www.iep.utm.edu/quine-sc)
   
7. L. E. Szabó: Mathematical facts in a physicalist ontology, Parallel Processing Letters, 22 (2012) 1240009 (12 pages), DOI: 10.1142/S0129626412400099 [preprint]
   
8. L. E. Szabó: Formal Systems as Physical Objects: A Physicalist Account of Mathematical Truth, International Studies in the Philosophy of Science, 17 (2003) pp. 117 – 125 (preprint: PDF)
   
9. L. E. Szabó: Intrinsic, extrinsic, and the constitutive a priori, Foundations of Physics  50, 555–567 (2020).  DOI: 10.1007/s10701-019-00281-z  (Open Access: https://rdcu.be/bKxdO)
   
10. T. Kuhn: Scientific Revolutions, in The Philosophy of Science, R. Boyd et al. (eds.), MIT Press 1991, pp. 139-157.
    
11. L. E. Szabó: Physicalism without the idols of mathematics, Foundations of Science (2023),
    DOI: 10.1007/s10699-023-09920-1   [View and download PDF ]