Abstract
It is sometimes argued that, given its detachment from our current most successful science, analytic metaphysics has no epistemic value because it contributes nothing to our knowledge of reality. Relatedly, it is also argued that metaphysics properly constrained by science can avoid that problem. In this paper we argue, however, that given the current understanding of the relation between science and metaphysics, metaphysics allegedly constrained by science suffers the same fate as its unconstrained sister; that is, what is currently thought of as scientifically respectful metaphysics may end up also being without epistemic value. The core of our claim is that although much emphasis is put on the supposed difference between unconstrained analytic metaphysics, in opposition to scientifically constrained metaphysics, it is largely forgotten that no clear constraining relation of metaphysics by science is yet available.
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Notes
We would like to thank an anonymous referee for pointing that out.
We would also like to thank an anonymous referee for pointing that out.
There is general confusion about how to classify alternatives to understand quantum phenomena, whether they are interpretations or theories. For greater precision, we refer to the passage by Dürr and Lazarovici (2020), who convincingly pose the question in terms of “different quantum theories”, rather than mere “interpretations”:
It is common practice to speak about these as three possible “interpretations” of quantum mechanics. But the term “interpretation” is inappropriate. A poem is interpreted if you want to elicit some deeper meaning from the allegorical language. However, physical theories are not formulated in allegories, but with precise mathematical laws, and these are not interpreted, but analysed. So the goal of physics must be to formulate theories that are so clear and precise that any form of interpretation—what was the author trying to say there?—is superfluous. (Dürr and Lazarovici, 2020, p. vii)
However, this is a considerably new terminology, which is not yet standard (see also Arroyo & da Silva, 2021; Muller, 2015). For this reason, we will keep the term “interpretation” in the rest of the text. Nothing specific in our argument depends on deciding this issue.
We would like to thank an anonymous referee for pointing that out.
Concerning metaphysical underdetermination, the Viking/Toolbox approach may have an apparent way out: we can verify in traditional metaphysics metaphysical contents that are useful for science in both cases, both for individuality and non-individuality (cf. Arenhart, 2017b); in the first case, we can point to a transcendental principle of individuality, e.g. haecceities, and in the latter case absence of the haecceities (cf. Caulton, 2022, pp. 581–582). In all cases, it is appropriate to recall the commitment of those advancing such connections of metaphysics and science to the thesis of scientific realism. In the case of the Viking/Toolbox approach, it is notable that its own proponents (cf. McKenzie, 2016; French, 2014, 2020a) have taken metaphysical underdetermination as a motivation for adopting structural realism—which also suffers from metaphysical underdeterminations about the concept of ‘structure’, (cf. French, 2020b). We would like to thank an anonymous referee for pointing that out.
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Acknowledgements
We thank the participants of the 2\(^o\) Colóquio do GT de Metafísica Analítica, Brazil, for comments made upon an earlier version of this paper. Jonas R. Becker Arenhart would also like to thank the Institute Vienna Circle - University of Vienna, Austria, for a research fellowship that made the research for this paper possible.
Funding
Raoni Wohnrath Arroyo: Support: Grant #2021/11381-1, São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP). Jonas R. Becker Arenhart: Partially funded by CNPq (National Council for Scientific and Technological Development).
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Order of authorship does not represent priority; Raoni Wohnrath Arroyo and Jonas R. Becker Arenhart contributed equally to this work.
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Arroyo, R.W., Arenhart, J.R.B. The epistemic value of metaphysics. Synthese 200, 337 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-022-03833-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-022-03833-5