Abstract
How does theoretical science implement the search for the best explanation of complex phenomena? Is it possible for these explanations to be causal? These are the two main questions that I intend to analyze in this paper.
In the absence of theories capable of offering an explanation of novel or surprising phenomena, science resorts to abduction in order to find the hypothesis that best accounts for the observations. Now, abduction is not the only way that makes explanation possible or supports scientific creativity. Theoretical physicists usually combine mathematically, in a form compatible with dimensional analysis, already accepted results proceeding from different branches of physics, in order to anticipate/explain new ideas. I propose the name of theoretical preduction, for this kind of reasoning.
Usually the theoretical models designed by physicists in order to offer an explanation of the observations are built by applying preductive reasoning. The explanation they provide is inter-theoretical. In these cases preduction comes in support of abduction, and since it is not standard abduction which is taking place here, I name this procedure sophisticated abduction. Thus, if the desired explanation should be causal, this procedure would require going back to other causes or mixing causes with each other. Causation would be disseminated in a network of nomological chains.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
The Latin quotations come from Hammer (1963: 121).
- 2.
Gilbert (1544–1603) had published in London in 1600 De Magnete, where he states that the Earth is a magnet.
- 3.
- 4.
On the observed properties of white dwarfs see Hansen et al. (2004: 467–469).
- 5.
The American physicist Ralf Howard Fowler (1888–1944) made in 1926 “the fundamental discovery that the electron assembly in the white dwarfs must be degenerate in the sense of the Fermi-Dirac statistics.” (Chandrasehkar 1939: 451, Bibliographical Notes 1). And Shapiro and Teukolsky (2004: 56) claim: “In December 1926, R. H. Fowler, in a pioneering paper on compact stars, applied Fermi-Dirac statistics to explain the puzzling nature of white dwarfs: he identified the pressure holding up the stars from gravitational collapse with electron degeneracy pressure.”
On the history of the theory of white dwarfs see also Shapiro and Teukolsky (2004: 55–56).
References
Aristotle (1975) Posterior analytics. Barnes J (eds). Clarendon Press, Oxford
Berzelius JJ (1812/1813) Essay on the cause of chemical proportions, and on some circumstances relating to them: together with a short and easy way of expressing them. Ann. Philos 2, 3
Bessel FW (1844) On the variations of the proper motions of Procyon and Sirius. Mon Not R Astron Soc 6:136–141
Chandrasehkar S (1939) An introduction to the study of stellar structure. Dover Publications, New York
Ferrel W (1856) An essay on the winds and the currents of the oceans. Nashville J Med Surg
Galilei G (1954) Dialogues concerning two new sciences. Dover Publications, New York (trans: Crew H, de Salvio A)
Hadley G (1683) Concerning the cause of the general trade-winds. Philos Trans (1683–1775) 39:58–62 (1735–1736)
Halley E (1686) An historical account of the trade winds, and monsoons, observable in the seas between and near the tropicks, with an attempt to assign the phisical cause of the said winds. Philos Trans (1683–1775) 16:153–168 (1686–1692)
Hammer F (ed) (1963) Johannes Kepler gesammelte werke. Band VIII: Mysterium Cosmographicum, De Cometis, Hyperaspistes. C. H. Bleck’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, München
Hansen CJ, Kawaler SD, Trimble V (2004) Stellar interiors. Physical principles, structure and evolution, 2nd edn. Springer, New York
Harman G (1965) The inference to the best explanation. Philos Rev 74(1):88–95
Kepler J (1992) New astronomy. University Press, Cambridge (trans: Donahue WH)
Koyré A (1961) La révolution astronomique. Copernic, Kepler, Borelli. Hermann, Paris
Lewis D (1986) Causal explanation. In: Lewis D (ed) Philosophical Papers, vol II. University Press, Oxford
Lipton P (2001) What Good is an Explanation? In: Hon G, Rakover S (eds) Explanation, theoretical approaches and applications. Kluwer, Drodrecht
Magnani L (2001) Abduction, reason and science. Processes of discovery and explanation. Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, New York
Magnani L, Belli E (2007) Abduction, fallacies and rationality in agent-based reasoning. In: Pombo O, Gerner A (eds) Abduction and the Process of Scientific Discovery. Colecçao Documenta, Centro de Filosofía das Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa, Lisboa, 283–302
Newton I (1782) Opera quae exstant omnia. Tom IV. London. Samuel Horsley, ed. Facsimile edition. Friedrich Frommann Verlag, Stuttgart
Ostlie DA, Bradley WC (1996) Modern stellar astrophysics. Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., Inc., Reading
Peirce ChS (1965) Collected papers, CP. Harvard University Press, Cambridge
Rivadulla A (2008) Discovery Practices in Natural Sciences: From Analogy to Preduction. Revista de Filosofía Núm. 33(1):117–137
Rivadulla A (2015) Abduction in observational and in theoretical sciences. Some examples of IBE in palaeontology and in cosmology. Revista de Filosofía 40(2):143–152
Rivadulla A (2016) Complementing standard abduction. Anticipative approaches to creativity and explanation in the methodology of natural sciences. In: Magnani L, Casadio C (eds) Model-based reasoning in science and technology. Logical, epistemological and cognitive isues. SAPERE, vol 27, Springer, Cham, 319–328
Rivadulla A (2018) Abduction, Bayesianism and best explanation in physics. Culturas Científicas 1(1):63–75
Rivadulla A (2019) Causal explanations: are they possible in physics? In: Matthews MR (ed) Mario Bunge Centenary Festschrift. Springer
Rosen E (1959) Three copernican treatises. 2nd (edn), revised. Dover Publications, New York
Shapiro SL, Teukolsky SA (2004). Black holes, white dwarfs, and neutron stars. The physics of compact objects. Wiley-Vch Verlag GmbH, Weinheim
Whewell W (1847) The philosophy of the inductive sciences. Part one and part two, 2nd edn. Frank Cass and Co. Ltd, London
Acknowledgment
I am very grateful to two anonymous referees for their valuable comments on this article.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Rivadulla, A. (2019). Disseminated Causation: A Model-Theoretical Approach to Sophisticated Abduction. In: Nepomuceno-Fernández, Á., Magnani, L., Salguero-Lamillar, F., Barés-Gómez, C., Fontaine, M. (eds) Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. MBR 2018. Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics, vol 49. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32722-4_17
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32722-4_17
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-32721-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-32722-4
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyPhilosophy and Religion (R0)