Prof Miklos Redei

This course is compulsory on the BSc in Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method. This course is available on the BSc in Philosophy and Economics, BSc in Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, BSc in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, BSc in Philosophy, Politics and Economics (with a Year Abroad) and BSc in Politics and Philosophy. This course is available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit and to General Course students.

Science is chock full of miraculous predictions, shocking revolutions, and unexpected results that few science fiction writers could have ever dreamed of. What makes science so special? This course is a tour of the philosophical underpinnings of modern science. No background in any science is needed for this course; everything you need to know will be covered.

Indicative topics include: The logical positivist demarcation of science from non-science, Popper’s falsificationism, Lakatos' Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes, Kuhn's concept of science.  Explanation: the deductive nomological explanation, statistical explanation. The positive instance account of confirmation. Foundations of probability and Bayesian confirmation.  Laws of Nature: the regularity view of laws, the best systems account. Intertheory relations: reductionism and pluralism. Realism versus Antirealism: Scientific realism and antirealism, the no miracles argument, inference to the best explanation, the pessimistic meta-induction, constructive empiricism, the natural ontological attitude, entity realism, structural realism. Models: scientific modelling and scientific representation. Science and social context: values, constructivism, feminism, operating modes of science.

10 hours of lectures and 10 hours of classes in the AT. 10 hours of lectures and 10 hours of classes in the WT.

Students will be expected to write two essays (one in MT and one in LT), and participate in class discussion.

P Godfrey-Smith: Theory and Reality: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science. C Hitchcock (editor): Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Science.

Essay (50%, 1500 words) in the AT.
Essay (50%, 1500 words) in the WT.

Students are expected to produce 1 summative essay in MT and 1 summative essay in LT.