STUDY QUESTIONS FOR M.A. EXAMINATION IN PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE                  
                                                                                
 JANUARY 2005                                                                   
                                                                                
1. One often speaks of the laws of physics, but less often of the laws of
geology or physiology.  What role do laws play in the various sciences?  Are
the so-called laws of economics or psychology the same sort of thing as the
laws of physics?

2. Pierre Duhem provides a classic statement of a widely held thesis of
holism in the philosophy of science: "hypotheses shall be chosen in such a
manner that from them taken as a whole mathematical deduction may draw
consequences representing with a sufficient degree of approximation the
totality of experimental laws." What is to be said in favor of this thesis? 
What is to be said against it?  Why is it important to the philosophy of
science?

3. Quine says that "physical theory is under-determined even by all possible
observations.... Physical theories can be at odds with each other and yet
compatible with all possible data in the broadest sense.  In a word, they
can be logically incompatible and empirically equivalent." What is the
argument for this claim?  Of what significance is it to the philosophy of
science?

4. According to the "unity of science" thesis, the various special sciences
can be reduced to more fundamental sciences, as biology has been reduced to
chemistry and chemistry to physics.  What does it mean to say that one
science has been reduced to another?  Has biology been reduced to chemistry,
or chemistry to physics?  Should reduction to biology be a demand placed on
psychology?

5. "The best kinds of evidence for the reality of a postulated or inferred
entity is that we can begin to measure it or otherwise understand its causal
powers.  The best evidence, in turn, that we have this kind of understanding
is that we can set out, from scratch, to build machines that will work
fairly reliably, taking advantage of this or that causal nexus.  Hence,
engineering, not theorizing, is the best proof of scientific realism about
entities." To what extent does this proposal of Ian Hacking's end the
dispute between realism and instrumentalism?

6. Carl Hempel once remarked, "The establishment of a general theory of
confirmation may well be regarded as one of the most urgent desiderata of
the present methodology of empirical science.  Indeed, it seems that a
precise analysis of the concept of confirmation is a necessary condition for
an adequate solution of various fundamental problems concerning the logical
structure of scientific procedure." What is the task of a theory of
confirmation, and why is it important?  Explain why the general approach
that ought to be taken to this task is still very much a matter of dispute,
in the process sketching at least two of the widely adopted general
approaches and indicating how they fall short.

7. Marx's reaction to Darwin's Origin of Species was: "Not only is a death
blow dealt here for the first time to 'Teleology' in the natural sciences,
but their rational meaning is empirically explained." What is "teleology",
and what place does it have (if any) in science?  Is Marx right about
Darwin's contribution?

8. Thomas Kuhn remarked, "An apparently arbitrary element, compounded of
personal and historical accident, is always a formative ingredient of the
beliefs espoused by a given scientific community at a given time." Must
every scientific theory include elements that are in some sense or other
arbitrary?  Explain your answer and its bearing on the currently widely held
view that scientific truth is a "social construct".

9. The phrase 'experimentum crucis' -- literally, "experiment of the cross"
-- was introduced by Robert Hooke in the 1660s, providing a Latin phrase to
designate Francis Bacon's idea of experiments that act like sign-posts at a
crossroads. It was deployed famously by Isaac Newton in his work in optics
in the 1670s.  This pedigree notwithstanding, some philosophers of science
-- e.g.  Duhem -- argue that there can be no such thing as a crucial
experiment.  Yet scientists continue to talk of crucial experiments.  What
requirements would an experiment have to meet to be "crucial"?  To what
extent are crucial experiments possible?                                                                               

10. Over the last few decades increasing effort has been put into computer
simulations and experiments not only in such fields as "artificial life" and
"artificial intelligence," but also in areas of research in physical science
into which theory has not penetrated very far, such as global warming and
the immediate aftermath of the "Big Bang." Stephen Wolfram has gone so far
in A New Kind of Science to suggest that computer simulations and
experiments will likely end the need for theories, in the classical sense,
in future science.  What exactly are computer simulations and experiments? 
In what respects are they, and are they not, replacements for theoretical
investigations?
                                                                                     
11. In the Preface to his Treatise on Light, published in 1690, Christiaan
Huygens remarks, "One finds in this subject a kind of demonstration which
does not carry with it so high a degree of certainty as that employed in
geometry; and which differs distinctly from the method employed by geometers
in that they prove their propositions by well-established and
incontrovertible principles, while here principles are tested by the
inferences which are derivable from them.  The nature of the subject permits
no other treatment.  It is possible, however, in this way to establish a
probability which is little short of certainty.  This is the case when the
consequences of the assumed principles are in perfect accord with the
observed phenomena, and especially when these verifications are numerous;
but above all when one employs the hypothesis to predict new phenomena and
finds his expectations realized." Assess the adequacy of this description of
the nature of theoretical knowledge in science and of how this knowledge is
achieved.

12. The concept of normal science is part of a four-fold distinction Kuhn
introduced: immature science, normal science, science in crisis, and
scientific revolutions.  David Bloor has argued that, even though
comparatively little attention is given to it in The Structure of Scientific
Revolutions, the concept of normal science is the most important idea put
forward in the book.  By contrast, various followers of Karl Popper have
argued that there is no such thing as normal science -- or at least there
ought not to be.  Is there such a thing as normal science, as Kuhn
demarcates it?  Of what importance, if any, is the distinction between
normal science and extraordinary science to the philosophy of science?  Of
what importance is it to historians of science?