Abstract
Multiple derivability (MD) is an inductive strategy to increase the reliability of a theory (Nederbragt, Studies in the History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 34:539, 2003). It may be considered as the strategy with which a theory is supported by evidence obtained by two or more independent methods that differ in background knowledge and technical principles on which they are based. As such, MD is a member of a family of comparable strategies to which also belong robustness, triangulation and consilience of inductions. Triangulation may be roughly defined as the use of the same or a different method, both in an independent manner, to describe an object. Consilience of induction may be described as occurring under the circumstance that a hypothesis explains two or more known or unknown (classes of) independent facts. It may be argued that robustness is the result of MD, triangulation and consilience; this will be investigated in more detail. Robustness may come in degrees. This can be argued when using the definition of MD in which emphasis is given to theoretical and technical independence of two methods that make it possible to infer the same theory. The degree in which two methods differ in this background and principles determines the degree of robustness. I will confront this with analyses of replication and confirmation. Finally, obtaining robustness by MD may not be possible. I will illustrate this by discussing a case of immunohistochemical staining of microscopical slides. Some robustness on the level of the method itself may be possible but not on the level of the theory. In that case stability of the theory is dependent on social interactions between theory, scientist and the science community.
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Notes
- 1.
I thank Wouter Meijs for discussing this point with me.
- 2.
In the same paper I used the case of establishing the function of mitochondria by the joined efforts of electron microscopists and biochemists as an example of multiple derivability; based on the newer views I have of multiple derivability and triangulation I now prefer to classify the mitochondria case as an example of triangulation.
- 3.
It should be added here that two independent methods may give us more robustness, but sloppy methods, although independent, will not be accepted. Let us, as an example, imagine that an effect of an intervention in an experimental system gives a positive response compared to an untreated control system and that this may lead us to a hypothesis of the system, but the result is not statistically significant; the second, independent, derivation to the same hypothesis is also based on a non-significant experimental result. Although the investigator may feel that she has obtained robustness here she will not be able to get it published in a refereed journal.
- 4.
However, after more critical analysis of the criteria, it may be argued that criterion 8 has more to do with background knowledge and that it is difficult to see it as an independent derivation. Therefore, I shall omit it from further discussion.
- 5.
With regard to the question how many independent derivations are needed, it may be remarked that underdetermination may be infinite but in the practice of laboratory experiments or diagnostic tests two or three are thought to give sufficient arguments, because other alternative hypotheses, which are found too light when weighing on the basis of plausibility are discarded without testing.
- 6.
Epistemological arguments lead to more reliability of a theory, whereas social arguments lead to stability of that theory. Theories may be reliable but not stable because they do not fit in a reigning paradigm (see Gillies (2005) for an analysis of the case of Semmelweis’s childbed fever). Theories may be stable, although they are epistemologically unreliable. Historical anchoring may contribute to both.
- 7.
The possibility to anchor a local theory into the background knowledge of a related field because of analogy may be an important epistemological argument in daily practice of research (see Thagard 1978). In the discussion of causal criteria in the former section the plausibility of criterion 8 seemed to play a comparable role.
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Nederbragt, H. (2012). Multiple Derivability and the Reliability and Stabilization of Theories. In: Soler, L., Trizio, E., Nickles, T., Wimsatt, W. (eds) Characterizing the Robustness of Science. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol 292. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-2759-5_5
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