Fall 2020

Michael Faraday's diagram of magnetic lines of force, from his “Experimental Researches in Electricity”, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Vol. 142, 1 January 1852, pp. 25–56.

Details

Instructor

Overview

This course will cover three central topics in general philosophy of science: explanation, laws and causation. The focus will be on how general issues intersect with some more applied topics in the particular sciences, with some candidates being: causal and non-causal explanation in evolutionary theory; explainability in artificial intelligence; the relationship between the idea that the dynamical laws of physics govern and the idea that they explain; and the relationship between the cognitive science of causal judgment and the metaphysics of causation. We will focus on the topics that those attending become most interested in.

Assessment

Requirements:

• Contribute to online annotation of the readings.
• Write one research paper.

Due dates:

Schedule

Meeting One: Introductory Discussion (Wednesday 9 September)

Section I: Explanation

Meeting Two: Nomological Theories of Explanation (Monday 14 September)

• Hempel, Carl Gustav. 1965. “Aspects of Scientific Explanation”, in Aspects of Scientific Explanation and Other Essays in the Philosophy of Science, Free Press, New York, pp. 331–496. [PDF] (Read §§1–2)
• Woodward, James. 2003. “Causal Explanation: Background and Criticism”, in Making Things Happen: A Theory of Causal Explanation, Oxford University Press, New York, pp. 152–186. URI: https://doi.org/10.1093/0195155270.003.0004. [PDF]

Meeting Three: Causal Theories of Explanation (Monday 21 September)

• Lewis, David. 1986. “Causal Explanation”, in Philosophical Papers, Oxford University Press, Oxford, Vol. II, pp. 214–240. URI: http://doi.org/10.1093/0195036468.003.0007. [PDF]
• Sober, Elliott. 1983. “Equilibrium Explanation”, in Philosophical Studies, Vol. 43, No. 2, March, pp. 201–210. URI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/BF00372383. [PDF]

Meeting Four: Counterfactual Theories of Explanation (Monday 28 September)

• Woodward, James and Hitchcock, Christopher. 2003. “Explanatory Generalizations, Part I: A Counterfactual Account”, in Noûs, Vol. 37, No. 1, March, pp. 1–24. URI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1468-0068.00426. [PDF]
• Woodward, James and Hitchcock, Christopher. 2003. “Explanatory Generalizations, Part II: Plumbing Explanatory Depth”, in Noûs, Vol. 37, No. 2, June, pp. 181–199. URI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1468-0068.00435. [PDF]

Meeting Five: Case Study: Drift (Monday 5 October)

• Futuyma, Douglas J. and Kirkpatrick, Mark. 2017. “Genetic Drift: Evolution at Random”, in Evolution, Sinauer Associates, Sunderland MA, pp. 165–189. [PDF]
• Plutynski, Anya. 2007. “Drift: A Historical and Conceptual Overview”, in Biological Theory, Vol. 2, No. 2, May, pp. 156–167. URI: http://doi.org/10.1162/biot.2007.2.2.156. [PDF]
• Lange, Marc. 2013. “Really Statistical Explanations and Genetic Drift”, in Philosophy of Science, Vol. 80, No. 2, April, pp. 169–188. URI: http://doi.org/10.1086/670323. [PDF]

Meeting Six: Case Study: Neural Networks (Monday 12 October)

• Lipton, Zachary C. 2018. “The Mythos of Model Interpretability”, in Queue, Vol. 16, No. 3, June, pp. 1–27. URI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3236386.3241340. [PDF]
• Sullivan, Emily. forthcoming. “Understanding from Machine Learning Models”, in British Journal for the Philosophy of Science. URI: https://doi.org/10.1093/bjps/axz035. [PDF]

Meeting Seven: Case Study: Chance and Explanation (Monday 19 October)

• Elliott, Katrina. 2020. “Two Explanatory Questions”. Unpublished manuscript. [PDF]
• Skow, Bradford. 2014. “The Role of Chance in Explanation”, in Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 92, No. 1, pp. 103–123. URI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00048402.2013.790913. [PDF]

Section II: Laws

Meeting Eight: Nomic Fundamentalism (Monday 26 October)

• Cartwright, Nancy. 1994. “Fundamentalism vs. the Patchwork of Laws”, in Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Vol. 94, No. 1, June, pp. 279–292. URI: https://doi.org/10.1093/aristotelian/94.1.279. [PDF]
• Sklar, Lawrence. 2003. “Dappled Theories in a Uniform World”, in Philosophy of Science, Vol. 70, No. 2, April, pp. 424–441. URI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/375476. [PDF]

Meeting Nine: Humeanism (Monday 2 November)

• Hall, Ned. 2009. “Humean Reductionism About Laws of Nature”. Unpublished manuscript. [PDF]

Meeting Ten: Humeanism and Explanation (Monday 9 November)

• Shumener, Erica. 2019. “Laws of Nature, Explanation, and Semantic Circularity”, in The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, Vol. 70, No. 3, November, pp. 787–815. URI: https://doi.org/10.1093/bjps/axx020. [PDF]
• Emery, Nina. 2019. “Laws and Their Instances”, in Philosophical Studies, Vol. 176, No. 6, June, pp. 1535–1561. URI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-018-1077-8. [PDF]

Section III: Causation

Meeting Eleven: Actual Causation: Philosophical Background (Monday 16 November)

• Fenton-Glynn, Luke. forthcoming. Causation, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. [PDF]

Meeting Twelve: Actual Causation: Functional Theories (Monday 23 November)

• Danks, David. 2013. “Functions and Cognitive Bases for the Concept of Actual Causation”, in Erkenntnis, Vol. 78, December, pp. 111–128. URI: http://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-013-9439-2. [PDF]
• Hitchcock, Christopher. 2017. “Actual Causation What’s the Use?”, in Beebee, Hitchcock and Price (Ed), Making a Difference: Essays on the Philosophy of Causation, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 116–131. URI: http://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198746911.003.0007. [PDF]

Meeting Thirteen: Actual Causation and Normative Judgement (Monday 30 November)

• Hitchcock, Christopher and Knobe, Joshua. 2009. “Cause and Norm”, in Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 106, No. 11, November, pp. 587–612. URI: https://doi.org/10.5840/jphil20091061128. [PDF]
• Willemsen, Pascale and Kirfel, Lara. 2018. “Recent Empirical Work on the Relationship Between Causal Judgements and Norms”, in Philosophy Compass, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 1–12. URI: http://doi.org/10.1111/phc3.12562. [PDF]
• Strevens, Michael. 2013. “Causality Reunified”, in Erkenntnis, Vol. 78, December, pp. 299–320. URI: http://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-013-9514-8. [PDF]

Meeting Fourteen: Actual Causation and Explanatory Judgement (Monday 7 December)

• Hall, Ned. 2004. “Two Concepts of Causation”, in Collins, Hall and Paul (Ed), Counterfactuals and Causation, MIT Press, Cambridge MA, pp. 225–276. [PDF]
• Lombrozo, Tania. 2010. “Causal-Explanatory Pluralism: How Intentions, Functions, and Mechanisms Influence Causal Ascriptions”, in Cognitive Psychology, Vol. 61, No. 4, December, pp. 303–332. URI: http://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogpsych.2010.05.002. [PDF]

Updated: 24 November 2020