Explanation and Its LimitsDudley Knowles This collection of new essays explores the nature of explanation and causality. It provides a stimulating and wide ranging debate on one of the central issues that has concerned philosophers and scientists alike--the epistemological nature of their enquiries. The volume not only sheds light on some of the general questions involved, but also addresses specific problems involved in explanation in different fields--physics, biology, psychology and the social sciences. Explanation and its Limits is an up-to-date, sharply focused and comprehensive review for all philosophers, scientists and social scientists interested in methodology. |
Contents
ExplanationOpening Address | 1 |
Truth and Teleology | 21 |
Functional Support for Anomalous Monism | 45 |
Explanation in Biology | 65 |
Lets Razor Ockhams Razor | 73 |
Singular Explanation and the Social Sciences | 95 |
Explanation and Understanding in Social Science | 119 |
Explanation | 135 |
The Limits of Explanation | 177 |
Limited Explanations | 195 |
Supervenience and Singular Causal Statements | 211 |
Contrastive Explanation | 247 |
How to Put Questions to Nature | 267 |
Explanation and Scientific Realism | 285 |
How Do Scientific Explanations Explain? | 297 |
| 313 | |
Common terms and phrases
action analysis anomalous monism answer argued argument assumptions basic Bayesian behaviour beliefs biological c₁ C₂ causal connections coherence contents contrastive question counterfactual covering law deductive Deductive-Nomological Deductive-Nomological model desires discussion Donald Davidson Elliott Sober entities event event-pair evidence evolution example existence explanandum explanatory factors foil folk-psychology full explanation functional theory given group selection Hempel Hempelian hypothesis idea idiolect inference initial conditions J. J. C. SMART kind laws of nature Lewis logical mathematical matter mechanics mental natural selection nomic non-causal facts notion objective observation occur Oxford paresis parsimony phenomena philosophers Philosophy of Science physical theory plausible prediction principle prior probabilities probabilistic realist realm of discourse reason regularity relation relevant representation requires scientific explanation Scriven semantic sense simply singular causal claims singular explanation sort spatio-temporal specific supervenience suppose teleological thesis things tion true truth conditions understanding University Press van Fraassen why-questions