The Humean pragmatic turn and the case for revisionary best systems accounts

Abstract

Lewis’s original Best Systems Account of laws was not motivated much by pragmatics. But recent commentary on his general approach to laws has taken a ‘pragmatic turn’. This was initiated by Hall’s defence against the charge of ‘ratbag idealism’ which maintained that best systems accounts should be admired rather than criticised for the inherent pragmatism behind their choice of desiderata for what counts as ‘best’. Emboldened by Hall’s pragmatic turn, recent commentators have proposed the addition of pragmatically motivated desiderata to complement or replace the canonical desiderata of strength and simplicity. This, they hope, will allow their revisionary BSAs to respond better to various counterexamples against the original account. While the pragmatic turn itself is well taken, here I problematise these revisionary approaches. First, there are reasonable responses to the counterexamples from within the canonical BSA. Second, while actual laws may satisfy the newly proposed desiderata, there are reasons to think these desiderata cannot be constitutive of laws. By comparison, the canonical desiderata appear to be relevant to explaining why and when the revisionary desiderata will reflect pragmatic features of the laws and better reflect the motives behind practitioners of fundamental physics.

Every view is a view from somewhere: Pragmatist laws and possibility

“…This failure for general Humeanism to be capable of doing justice to the practices of the sciences drives Humean views of laws away from connection to science in a way that some found problematic. This has led to a new wave of what are labeled pragmatist, or pragmatic, Humean views of laws (e.g., Friend, 2022;Hicks et al, 2023). Pragmatist Humean accounts of laws want to add to the criteria of efficiency and accuracy further criteria that can help adjudicate between competing sets of laws for a given world.…”

Does the Best System Need the Past Hypothesis?

“…The ensuing discussion summarizes arguments fromHicks (2018),Dorst (2019a), andJaag and Loew (2020). For critical evaluations of these arguments, see, e.g.,Friend (2022),Sánchez (2022), and the contributions to Loew, Jaag, and Hicks (2023).…”