Abstract
To whom, if anyone, are the writings of philosophers of science relevant? There are three potential groups of people: Philosophers, Scientists, and Interested Citizens, within and beyond the academy. I argue that our discipline is potentially relevant to all three, but I particularly press the claims of the Interested Citizens. My essay is in dialogue with a characteristically insightful lecture given thirty years ago by Arthur Fine. Addressing the Philosophy of Science Association as its president, Fine argued that general philosophy of science was dead, and that all the action lay in the philosophy of the special sciences. I try to identify what was correct about Fine’s diagnosis, while supplementing his message by describing fruitful projects that have since emerged. I also hope to share his subversive spirit.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
From the 1970s to the present, philosophers of science associated with Stanford, have argued strongly for the disunity of the sciences. The movement originates with Patrick Suppes, and is continued in the writings of Nancy Cartwright, Ian Hacking, John Dupre, and Peter Galison. Although she was not at Stanford during the period when the main ideas were being developed, Helen Longino should also be counted among the “Stanfordians”.
As an anonymous referee pointed out to me, many philosophers of science now accept the thesis that values play a role in the sciences. That acknowledgment changes the character of some epistemological debates. There are lively discussions of how values enter when theories are underdetermined by the evidence. Consideration of ethical or political philosophical questions around the sciences remains, however, relatively rare.
Here, I want to distinguish the important questions, raised by Heather Douglas and Helen Longino, about the roles particular values play within scientific research, from the social-philosophical question of the proper role of the sciences within the broader society. What are the responsibilities of the institution of science within a democratic society? How should that institution interact with, and co-evolve with, other social institutions?
Here, Helen Longino deserves great credit as an early pioneer, as does Heather Douglas for her critique of the value-free ideal.
And also through collaborations that link scholars at different institutions. A major example is the SRPoise network.
The first question posed during the discussion period in Exeter was so apposite that it deserves a brief answer here. The questioner, a young philosopher, wondered whether the recommendations I had urged could be followed by people near the beginning of their academic careers. I responded by recognizing the wisdom of following the conventions and standards of the profession until one is established – and thus postponing more socially relevant inquiries to a time when one’s position is secure. But, as I added, senior philosophers of science have the responsibility of scrutinizing the prevailing conventions, revising them where they interfere with important work, and thus attempting to relieve the pressure on younger scholars torn between prudence and their sense of where they should focus their efforts. This is only a sketch of an adequate reply to a question deserving more discussion than I have so far offered.
References
Barnes, B. (1977). Interests and the growth of knowledge. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Carnap, R. (1928). Scheinprobleme in der Philosophie. Berlin: Weltkreis-Verlag.
Collins, H. (1985). Changing Order. London: Sage.
Dewey, J. (1916). Democracy and education. Carbondale IL: University of Southern Illinois, (1980 reprinting of the 1916 original, as John Dewey, The Middle Works, Volume 9).
Douglas, H. (2009). Science, policy, and the value-free ideal. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.
Feyerabend, P. (1978). Science in a free society. London: New Left Books.
Feyerabend, P. (1987). Farewell to reason. London: Verso/New Left Books.
Fine, A. (1988). Interpreting science. PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meetings of the Philosophy of Science Association, 1988(2), 3–11.
Hegselmann, R., & Krause, U. (2002). Opinion dynamics and bounded confidence models, analysis, and simulation. Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation, 5(3).
Hempel, C. G. (1950). Problems and changes in the empiricist criterion of meaning. Revue Internationale de Philosophie, 41, 41–63.
Hempel, C. G. (1951). The concept of cognitive significance: A reconsideration. Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 80, 61–77.
Keller, E. F. (1985). Reflections on gender and science. New Haven CT: Yale University Press.
Kitcher, P. (2011). Philosophy inside out. Metaphilosophy, 42, 248–260.
Kuhn, T. S. (1962). The structure of scientific revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lakatos, I. (1970). Falsificationism and the methodology of scientific research programmes. In I. Lakatos & A. Musgrave (Eds.), Criticism and the growth of knowledge (pp. 91–196). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Latour, B. (1987). Science in action. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press.
Laudan, L. (1977). Progress and its problems. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Longino, H. (1990). Science as social knowledge. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Munro, E., Cartwright, N., Hardie, J., & Montuschi, E. (2017). Improving child safety: deliberation in judgement and empirical research. Durham: Centre for Humanities Engaging Science and Society.
Pearl, J. (2000). Causality: Models, reasoning, and inference. Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press.
Popper, K. R. (1934). Logik der Forschung.Wien: Julius Springer.
Scheffler, I. (1967). Science and subjectivity. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill.
Skyrms, B. (1996). Evolution of the social contract. Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press.
Skyrms, B. (2004). The stag hunt. Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press.
Spirtes, P., Glymour, C., & Scheines, R. (2000). Causation, prediction, and search. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Wilholt, T. (2009). Bias and values in scientific research. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 40, 92–101.
Winnie, J. (1970). Special relativity without one-way velocity assumptions. Philosophy of Science, 37, 81–99.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Stephan Hartmann and Michela Massimi for inviting me to address EPSA 2017, and to the audience members who posed excellent questions and made helpful comments, when this talk was delivered. For helpful comments on an earlier draft, I am indebted to two anonymous referees.
In my revisions, I have tried to preserve the relatively informal voice of the original, and have inserted references only in places where it might be hard to track down my allusions.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
This article belongs to the Topical Collection: EPSA17: Selected papers from the biannual conference in Exeter
Guest Editors: Thomas Reydon, David Teira, Adam Toon
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Kitcher, P. “So … who is your audience?”. Euro Jnl Phil Sci 9, 2 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-018-0227-3
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-018-0227-3