Scientific Realism, the Semantic View and Evolutionary Biology

Sterpetti, Fabio

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-28163-6_4

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 46 publications

(27 reference statements)

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“…Cambiando a otra línea de problemas, el realismo estructural tiene que resolver otras dificultades como las que menciona Sterpetti (2016). El autor señala que aún si el realismo estructural puede resolver problemas realistas en biología evolutiva, hay problemas más generales que resolver.…”

Section: Posibles Desarrollosunclassified

Realismo estructural en biología

Álvarez

2023

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Este artículo se centra en dar un recuento del realismo estructural, especialmente en presentar el debate que hay en torno a esta postura en biología evolutiva. Comenzamos repasando las motivaciones originales del realismo estructural. Debido al énfasis original en ecuaciones y que no encontramos comúnmente ecuaciones en biología, presentamos una propuesta sobre cómo adaptar al realismo estructural para esta ciencia especial. Presentamos argumentos en contra del realismo estructural en biología y defendemos a la postura de dichas complicaciones. Por último presentamos problemas que atañen al realismo estructural en general y que habría que resolver para hacer de esta una propuesta viable.

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Section: Posibles Desarrollosunclassified

Realismo estructural en biología

Álvarez

2023

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“…My view rests on a distinction between the information that constitutes lay knowledge and the information that constitutes virologists' expertise. I am committed to the claim that scientific theories in certain disciplines, such as virology, offer a closer approximation of the truth than the folk theories or experiential knowledge of laypersons (Collins 2014;Rowbottom 2019;Sterpetti 2016). I'll motivate the claim by showing that the information constituting virologists' expertise gives them a greater predictive power than laypersons when it comes to resolving safety and efficacy concerns.…”

Section: The Limitations Of the First-order Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Rationality of COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy

Kelsall

2023

Episteme

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Some vaccine-hesitant people lack epistemic trust in the COVID-19 vaccine recommendation that because vaccines have been shown to be medically safe and effective, one ought to get vaccinated. Citing what I call exception information, they claim that whatever the general safety and efficacy of vaccines, the vaccines may not be safe and effective for them. Examples include parents citing information about their children's health, pregnant women's concerns about the potential adverse effects of treatment on pregnant women, young people citing their relative invulnerability to extreme COVID-19 symptoms, or members of vulnerable racial groups citing epistemic injustice, such as a lack of representation in COVID-19 vaccine trials. This paper examines the extent to which a lack of epistemic trust in vaccine recommendations, based on such exemption information, is rational.

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“…the topic focuses on microphysics, and especially areas such as quantum field theory. This has already prompted some more work on structural realism and biology, such asSterpetti (2016), which focuses on population genetics.…”

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Scientific realism: what it is, the contemporary debate, and new directions

Rowbottom¹

2017

Synthese

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This special issue was produced in connection with a conference, 'Science: The Real Thing?' The idea behind the conference was to assess the state of the debate on scientific realism, broadly construed, and to investigate or propose new directionsnew positions, and new arguments about old positions -in said debate.In this contribution, I do three things. First, I provide a characterization of scientific realism, with a special focus on the question: 'What's at stake in the realism debate?' This is a surprisingly controversial and tricky matter, which was discussed at length in the closing round table discussion of the conference. Second, I provide an overview of the key developments in this debate over the past decade. 1 Third, I provide a brief overview of the other contributions to this special issue, and explain how they relate to the aforementioned developments.1 It is much easier to reach agreement about what counts as a contribution to the debate than it is to reach agreement about how to characterize the debate. This should be unsurprising; similarly, it is much easier to reach agreement about what counts as a science -or, for that matter, a chair or a tablethan it is to reach agreement about a definition, or a significant partial definition, thereof.Preprint -F/coming in Synthese 2 What Is Scientific Realism?Given the extent to which scientific realism has been discussed -for a flavour of this, consider that The Scientific Image has been cited 6000 times since 1980 and that Scientific Realism: How Science Tracks Truth has been cited 1000 times since 1999, by Google scholar's estimations -one might expect there to be considerable agreement on what, precisely, scientific realism involves. But even a perfunctory survey of the literature purporting to be on the topic dashes that hope, for as Chakravartty ( 2011) pithily notes:It is perhaps only a slight exaggeration to say that scientific realism is characterized differently by every author who discusses it … 2The two influential monographs mentioned above, for instance, diverge considerably on the meaning of 'scientific realism'. On the one hand, van Fraassen (1980: 8) asserts:Science aims to give us, in its theories, a literally true story of what the world is like; and acceptance of a scientific theory involves the belief that it is true. This is the correct statement of scientific realism.2 Similar sentiments are expressed elsewhere. For example, Hacking (1983: 26) writes 'Definitions of 'scientific realism' merely point the way. It is more an attitude than a clearly stated doctrine… Scientific realism and anti-realism are … movements. ' and Leplin (1984: 1) notes that 'Like the Equal Rights Movement, scientific realism is a majority position whose advocates are so divided as to appear a minority.'

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Scientific Realism, the Semantic View and Evolutionary Biology

Cited by 3 publications

References 46 publications

Realismo estructural en biología

Realismo estructural en biología

The Rationality of COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy

Scientific realism: what it is, the contemporary debate, and new directions

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