Spurious Explanations

Abstract

Spurious explanations are those that appear to give greater understanding by suggesting causes (and apparently supplying bases for predictions), and/or by suggesting theories that seem to set the explicandum in a larger conceptual frame. In Chapter 5 (p. 46) it was noted that concepts that are vague may make explanations so loose that they can be regarded as compatible and as incompatible with the same situation. ‘Vandalism is caused by unemployment’ can be interpreted in such a way that advocates of the explanation can always find evidence to support it and objectors may use the same evidence to refute it. These explanations are not being criticised because they are thought to be wrong but because they are thought to be spurious. Critics say that, for example, the Freudian theory that neuroses are caused by an inferiority complex is spurious since it turns out that any observed behaviour, submissive or aggressive, can be ‘explained’ by appeal to this complex. Since the theory can ‘explain’ any behaviour that is observed it cannot be used to predict what will be observed; the ‘explanation’ is always post hoc. An essential feature of a genuine empirical explanation is that it arises from theories (and laws) that exclude certain outcomes¹ and so allow us to predict (within prescribed limits) what will happen.