Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Error, Error-Statistics and Self-Directed Anticipative Learning

  • Published:
Foundations of Science Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Error is protean, ubiquitous and crucial in scientific process. In this paper it is argued that understanding scientific process requires what is currently absent: an adaptable, context-sensitive functional role for error in science that naturally harnesses error identification and avoidance to positive, success-driven, science. This paper develops a new account of scientific process of this sort, error and success driving Self-Directed Anticipative Learning (SDAL) cycling, using a recent re-analysis of ape-language research as test example. The example shows the limitations of other accounts of error, in particular Mayo’s (Error and the growth of experimental knowledge, 1996) error-statistical approach, and SDAL cycling shows how they can be fruitfully contextualised.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Batterman R.W. (2002) The devil in the details: Asymptotic reasoning in explanation, reduction and emergence. MIT, Boston

    Google Scholar 

  • Bickhard M.H. (1993) Representational content in humans and machines. Journal of Experimental and Theoretical Artificial Intelligence 5: 285–333

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bronowski J., Bellugi U. (1970) Language, name, and concept. Science 168: 669–673

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Christensen W.D., Hooker C.A. (1999) The organisation of knowledge: Beyond Campbell’s evolutionary epistemology. Philosophy of Science 66: S237–S249 (Proceedings PSA 1998)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Christensen W.D., Hooker C.A. (2000) An interactivist-constructivist approach to intelligence: Self-Directed Anticipative Learning. Philosophical Psychology 13: 5–45

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Elliott K. (2004) Error as means to discovery. Philosophy of Science 71: 174–197

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Farrell R.P. (2006) Rational versus anti-rational interpretations of science: An ape-language case-study. Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 37: 83–100

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Farrell R.P., Hooker C.A. (2007a) Applying Self-Directed Anticipative Learning to Science I: Agency, error, and the interactive exploration of possibility space in early ape-language research. Perspectives on Science 15: 87–124

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Farrell R.P., Hooker C.A. (2007b) Applying Self-Directed Anticipative Learning to Science II: Learning how to learn across a revolution in early ape-language research. Perspectives on Science 15: 222–255

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fouts R.S. (1983) Chimpanzee language and elephant tails: A theoretical synthesis. In: De Luce J., Wilder H.T. (eds) Language in primates: Perspectives and implications. Springer-Verlag, New York, pp 63–75

    Google Scholar 

  • Gardner R.A., Gardner B.T. (1969) Teaching sign language to a chimpanzee. Science 165: 664–672

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gardner, B. T., & Gardner, R. A. (1974). Comparing the early utterances of child and chimpanzee. In Minnesota Symposia on Child Psychology (Vol. 8, pp. 3–23). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

  • Gardner B.T., Gardner R.A. (1975) Evidence for sentence constituents in the early utterances of child and chimpanzee. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 104: 244–267

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gardner, R. A., & Gardner, B. T. (1980). Comparative psychology and language acquisition. In T. A. Sebeok & J. Umiker-Sebeok (Eds.), Speaking of apes: A critical anthology of two-way communication with man (pp. 287–330). NY: Plenum. (Originally published in Psychology: The state of the art, by K. Salzinger & F. L. Denmark, Eds., 1978, NY: Academy of Sciences).

  • Gardner B.T., Gardner R.A. (1989a) A test of communication. In: Gardner R.A., Gardner B.T., Van Cantfort T.E. (eds) Teaching sign language to chimpanzees. State University of New York Press, Albany, pp 181–197

    Google Scholar 

  • Gardner R.A., Gardner B.T. (1989b) Cross-fostered chimpanzees: 1. In: Testingvocabulary. Heine P.G., Marquardt L.A. (eds) Understanding chimpanzees. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, pp 220–233

    Google Scholar 

  • Guthrie J.P. (2002) Uncatalyzed and amine catalysed decarboxylation of acetoacetic acid: An examination in terms of no barrier theory. Bioorganic Chemistry 30: 32–52

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hentschel K. (1997) The interplay of instrumentation, experiment, and theory: Patterns emerging from case studies on solar redshift, 1890–1960. Philosophy of Science 64: S53–S64

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hogeweg P. (1992) As large as life and twice as natural: Bioinformatics and the artificial life paradigm. In: Green D.G., Bossomaier T.J. (eds) Complex systems. IOS, Singapore, pp 2–10

    Google Scholar 

  • Hooker, C. A. (1975). On global theories. Philosophy of Science, 42, 152–179. (Reprinted from A realistic theory of science, by C. A. Hooker, Ed., 1987, Albany: State University of New York Press).

  • Hooker C.A. (1991) Physical intelligibility, projection, objectivity and completeness: The divergent ideals of Bohr and Einstein. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 42: 491–511

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hooker C.A. (1995) Reason, regulation and realism: Toward a naturalistic, regulatory, systems theory of reason. State University of New York Press, Albany

    Google Scholar 

  • Hooker C.A. (2004) Asymptotics, reduction and emergence. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 55: 435–479

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hooker, C. A. (2008). Interaction and bio-cognitive order. In M. Bickhard (Ed.), Synthese, Special edition on interactivism, to appear. doi:10.1007/s11229-008-9374-y.

  • Lenneberg, E. H. (1980). A word between us. In T. A. Sebeok & J. Umiker-Sebeok (Eds.), Speaking of apes: A critical anthology of two-way communication with man (pp. 71–83). NY: Plenum. (Originally published in Communication, pp. 111–131, by J. D. Roslansky, Ed., 1969, Amsterdam: North-Holland).

  • Mayo D. (1996) Error and the growth of experimental knowledge. University of Chicago Press, Chicago

    Google Scholar 

  • Mayo D. (2000) Experimental practice and an error statistical account of evidence. Philosophy of Science 67: S193–S207

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mayo D. (2005) Peircean induction and the error-correcting thesis. Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 41: 299–319

    Google Scholar 

  • Mayo D., Spanos A. (2006) Severe testing as a basic concept in a Neyman-Pearson philosophy of induction. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 57: 323–357

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Miles H.L. (1983) Apes and language: The search for communicative competence. In: De Luce J., Wilder H.T. (eds) Language in primates: Perspectives and implications. Springer-Verlag, New York, pp 43–61

    Google Scholar 

  • O’Sullivan C., Yeager C. (1989) Communicative context and linguistic competence: The effects of social setting on a chimpanzee’s conversational skill. In: Gardner R.A., Gardner B.T., Van Cantfort T.E. (eds) Teaching sign language to chimpanzees. State University of New York Press, Albany, pp 269–279

    Google Scholar 

  • Savage-Rumbaugh E.S. (1986) Ape language: From conditioned response to symbol. Columbia University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Schickore J. (2005) ‘Through thousands of errors we reach the truth’—but how? On the epistemic roles of error in scientific practice. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 36: 539–556

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Steinle F. (1997) Entering new fields: Exploratory uses of experimentation. Philosophy of Science 64: S65–S74

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Terrace H.S., Petito L.A., Sanders R.J., Bever T G. (1979) Can an ape create a sentence?. Science 206: 891–902

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wallman J. (1992) Aping language. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Wheeler G. (2000) Error statistics and Duhem’s problem. Philosophy of Science 67: 410–420

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Woodward J. (2000) Data, phenomena, and reliability. Philosophy of Science 67: S163–S179

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Humanities & Social Sciences, Discipline of Philosophy, University of Newcastle, McMullin Bld, Callaghan, NSW, 2308, Australia

    R. P. Farrell & C. A. Hooker

Authors
  1. R. P. Farrell
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. C. A. Hooker
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to C. A. Hooker.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Farrell, R.P., Hooker, C.A. Error, Error-Statistics and Self-Directed Anticipative Learning. Found Sci 14, 249–271 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-008-9155-6

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-008-9155-6

Keywords

Search

Navigation