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Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology pp 9–42Cite as

Against Fictionalism

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Part of the book series: Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics ((SAPERE,volume 8))

Abstract

Characteristic of model based science is its attachment to idealizations and abstractions. Idealizations are expressed by statements known to be false. Abstractions are suppressors of what is known to be true. Idealizations over-represent empirical phenomena. Abstractions under-represent them. In a sense, idealization and abstractions are one another’s duals. Either way, they are purposeful distortions of phenomena on the ground. Sometimes phenomena on the ground approximate to what their idealizations say of them. Sometimes nothing in nature approaches them in any finite degree. So wide is this gulf between reality and idealization that Nancy Cartwright was moved to say of them that they are “pure fictions”.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    With a tip of the hat to Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II’s “June is bustin’ out all over”, from the Broadway musical Carousel, 1945.

  2. 2.

    See, for example, Woods [1, 2], Kripke [3], Walton [4] and Howell [5]. The journal Literary Semantics was established in 1972 by Trevor Eaton, and Eaton’s book of the same title appeared in [6].

  3. 3.

    Representative coverage is furnished by Woods, editor, [7]. For the philosophy of science and mathematics, see also Suarez, editor, [8], and for mathematics Bonevac, [9]. See also Magnani’s [10].

  4. 4.

    See the note just above.

  5. 5.

    In mainstream approaches to the semantics of natural language, this order is typically reversed—〈reference, truth, inference〉. Reasons for the switch in fictional contexts are laid out in Woods and an Isenberg [11].

  6. 6.

    As far as I know, the term “logic of fiction”, originates with Cohen in [12].

  7. 7.

    There is not a single equation to be found in, say, Walton’s [13]. On the other hand, Parsons’ [14] displays a liberal sprinkling of them, as does even more so Jacquette’s [15].

  8. 8.

    Concerning which, see again Walton [4], and Woods and Isenberg [11].

  9. 9.

    Cartwright [16], p. 156. Emphasis added. In her text, “[modelling]” is “mathematical.” But Cartwright’s point is not restricted to mathematical modelling.

  10. 10.

    Bernecker and Pritchard, editors, [17], p. 629. Emphases in the original.

  11. 11.

    See Kant [18]. Almost the identical distinction, albeit without mention of Kant, is to be found in Russell’s [19], pp. xv–xvi, 15, 27, 112 and 114; originally published in 1903.

  12. 12.

    In the words of Fine [20], p. 120.

  13. 13.

    A substantial survey can be found in Woods [21].

  14. 14.

    Cartwright [16], p. 153.

  15. 15.

    Also important for scientific models are abstractions, whose principal alethic significance is the suppression of what is true on the ground. For further discussion, see Woods and Rosales [22].

  16. 16.

    Concerning which see also Godfrey-Smith [23]: “Scientists, whose business is understanding the empirical world, often spend their time considering things that are known not to be parts of that world. Standard examples are ideal gases and frictionless planes. Examples also include infinitely large populations in biology, neural networks which learn using biologically unrealistic rules, and the wholly rational and self-interested agents of various social-scientific models …. A natural first description of these things is as fictions, creatures of the imagination.” (p. 101).

  17. 17.

    It might be thought that these infinite gaps could be made subject to variable shrinkage by the devices of probability. A statement having a probability of 0.8 is one with a higher probability than a statement whose value is 0.6. This is so, but not on point. The highest probability is 1.0. Perhaps we could say that statements having this value are ideally probable. At least, if we did say this, people would know what we meant. But 0.6, 0.8 and 1.0 are real numbers. Real numbers are everywhere dense. No real number (save for self) is any closer to 1.0 than any other. The relation of having a higher probability than is not a matter of having a value that lies closer than the alternative to the ideal probability. Of course 8 is a number that lies closer to 10 than 6 does. But these are natural numbers. Other than 1 and 0 numbers on the natural line are not probabilities.

  18. 18.

    Batterman, among others, writes astutely about the philosophical questions raised by the ineliminable presence of unapproachable idealizations in theoretical science, but with no mention of the idea that they are fictions. See, for example, his [24, 25]. Other sceptics of note are Teller [26] and Giere [27], both in Suarez [8].

  19. 19.

    This is starting to change. Two important exceptions are, Suárez [28] and Frigg [29], both in Woods, Fictions and Models. In these approaches, the borrowed treatment of fictions is the so-called pretense theory of Kendall Walton. See again his [13].

  20. 20.

    Fine writes: “Over the last few years the realism-antirealism arguments … and a somewhat larger number of epithets …. When an especially derisive antirealist label is wanted, one can fall back on the term “fictionalist”, coupled with a dismissive reference to Vaihinger and his ridiculous philosophy of ‘As If’”. (“Fictionalism”, Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 18 (1993), 1–18, p. 1.) Fine’s use of “ridiculous” is a matter of mention rather than use. Fine is no Vaihingerian, but he is far from thinking that The Philosophy of ‘As If” is ridiculous.

  21. 21.

    This is not to say that façon de parler fictionalism is inherently antirealist. Fictional realists hold that Holmes is a real thing, albeit not in the way that we ourselves are. Realistically inclined idealizers claim that infinite populations are real, albeit not in the way that the population of London is. If the attribution of fictionality to those idealizations is just another way of saying that they are real, but not in the way that the population of London is, the attributor is a façon de parler fictionalist.

  22. 22.

    Bokulich [30], The emphasis, in the first instance, is hers, and in the second mine.

  23. 23.

    See again Suárez and Frigg. An exception is Vaihinger’s [31], the book arises from Vaihinger’s doctoral dissertation of 1877. Meinongean theories, in turn, are adaptations of an antecedently developed metaphysical theory. See again Parsons’ Nonexistent Objects and Jacquette’s Meinongean Logic. Also important is Bonevac’s home-made mathematical fictionalism, in “Fictionalism”, Sects. 7.2–7.8, made especially interesting by the fact that Bonevac is not himself a fictionalist.

  24. 24.

    Virtually all the going fictionalist accounts of mathematics are façon de parler accounts or similarity accounts. See again Bonevac’s [9]. See also Cartwright’s discussion of representation in [16], p. 156.

  25. 25.

    Quine [32].

  26. 26.

    See here Woods and Rosales [33].

  27. 27.

    See Suppes [34, 35].

  28. 28.

    I borrow the term from McMullin [36]. See also Suarez [28].

  29. 29.

    Wigner [37].

  30. 30.

    Cartwright [38]. Emphasis added.

  31. 31.

    The distinction between consequence and ground is a crucial in all case-making contexts, yet the logic of grounding is not as technically well-advanced as one might expect it to be. For recent work, see Fine [39].

  32. 32.

    See again my “Fictions and their logics”, in Jacquette’s Philosophy of Logic.

  33. 33.

    Van Fraassen [40].

  34. 34.

    For telling objections, even so, see Rosen [41].

  35. 35.

    Besides, Whitehead and Russell didn’t think that classes had anything like a decisive ontological advantage over numbers. (Why else would they advance the no-class theory?).

  36. 36.

    Russell [42], p. 71. Reprinted 1993.

  37. 37.

    That is, the original project failed. Attempts to rescue significant parts of logicism have been attempted over the years, some making notable progress. See here Burgess [43].

  38. 38.

    Bentham [44], It is a matter of note that Ogden is Vaihinger’s English translator. Bentham, by the way, should not be confused with his nephew the logician George Bentham. See Bentham [45].

  39. 39.

    See Quine [46], pp. 67–72. Quine writes at p. 69: “It was the recognition of this semantic primacy of sentences that gave us contextual definition. I attribute […] this to Bentham.”

  40. 40.

    Bentham [47].

  41. 41.

    Ramsey [48]. Craig [49–51]. See also his [52].

  42. 42.

    Apart from their potential as indispensable-falsehood solutions, Ramsey and Craig eliminations are faced with internal difficulties. If, for example, we Ramseyized an entire theory, except for its logical particles, then Löwenheim-Skolem considerations would now apply and with them, some would say, the loss of the theory’s scientific content. As for Craig’s claim that the o-consequences are invariant under the transition from S to So, there is no effective way of producing these o-consequences in the first place without the aid of t-terms. So, there is an important sense in which the transformation doesn’t cancel t-term dependencies.

  43. 43.

    Reservations are advanced in my “Fictions and their logics”.

  44. 44.

    This is especially true of criminal cases at common law. Acquittals constitute the legal fact of innocence. But legal innocence significantly outpaces actual innocence. This is deliberate. It arises from a social policy designed to minimize wrongful convictions. Better a false acquittal than a false conviction.

  45. 45.

    Unless, of course, Doyle provides otherwise. Either way, these are fictional facts, not real ones.

  46. 46.

    See again Fine’s “Fictionalism” and Bonevac’s “Fictionalism”, Sect. 3.4.

  47. 47.

    See here Gabbay and Woods [53], See also Woods [54], Chap. 8.

  48. 48.

    I owe the attribution to Quine in [55].

  49. 49.

    Peirce [56], 5.189.

  50. 50.

    For a recent analysis of Peircean abduction, see Woods [57]. This is a refinement and correction of an earlier treatment in Gabbay and Woods [58]. Also important are Aliseda [59], and Magnani [60]. An earlier treatment is Lipton’s [61].

  51. 51.

    Peirce [62].

  52. 52.

    Collected Papers, 5.99; 6.49-6, 473; 7.202–219.

  53. 53.

    Collected Papers, 5.189.

  54. 54.

    Collected Papers, 5.189.

  55. 55.

    A real-world example: Freud made a psychoanalytic investigation of the character of Gradiva: A Pompean Fantasy, a novella by Wilhelm Jensen.

  56. 56.

    Next to Dickens, no important writer reveals London’s social complexities and physical textures better than Doyle.

  57. 57.

    Recall August Kekulé’s vision of the chemical structure of benzene, occasioned in the hallucinatory grip of delirium tremens.

  58. 58.

    Perhaps the most rigorous opponent of fictionally true inconsistencies is Lewis, in [66].

  59. 59.

    “On Sinn and Bedeutung” translated by Max Black, in Michael Beaney editor The Frege Reader, pages 151-171, Oxford: Blackwell, 1997; p. 157. In “On denoting”, Russell too gives fictional sentences the brush-off. They are, he says, sometimes true in a “secondary sense”, without pausing to say what this sense might be. Strawson displays a similar casualness. In [67], he allows that sentences in Pickwick Papers are about Mr. Pickwick only in some (wholly unexplained) sense of “about”.

  60. 60.

    An excellent survey is Howell’s “Literary fictions, real and unreal”, in Fictions and Models, pages 27-107.

  61. 61.

    The Logic of Fiction, and “Fictions and their Logics”.

  62. 62.

    Richard Routley, Exploring Meinong’s Jungle and Beyond, Canberra: Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1980, Parsons, Nonexistent Objects, 1980, and Jacquette, A Meinongean Logic, 1996, and Nicholas Griffin, “Through the Woods to Meinong’s jungle”, in Kent A peacock and Andrew D. Irvine, editors, Mistakes of Reason: Essays in Honour of John Woods, pages 15-32, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005.

  63. 63.

    Walton, Mimesis as Make-Believe, and David Lewis, “Truth in fiction”.

  64. 64.

    Routley [68] and Woods, The Logic of Fiction.

  65. 65.

    Frege, “On Sinn and Bedeutung”, Russell, “On denoting” and An Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy.London: Allen and Unwin, 1967. First published in 1919.

  66. 66.

    Thomasson [69], and “Fiction, existence and indeterminacy”, in Woods, Fictions and Models, and Juan Redmond, Logique Dynamique de la Fiction: Pour un Approche Dialogique, London: College Press, 2012.

  67. 67.

    Lambert [70–72]. van Fraassen [73, 74], Burge [75], and Sainsbury [76].

  68. 68.

    Woltersdorf [77], and Pavel [78].

  69. 69.

    The Logic of Fiction.

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Acknowledgments

For criticisms and suggestions I thank a friendly audience in Sestri, including Atocha Aliseda, Daniel Arista, Howard Callaway, Michel Ghins, Michael Hoffman, Michael Lissak, Lorenzo Magnani, Woosuk Park, and Paul Thagard. I regret that I lack names for the other helpful intervenors. An earlier version of parts of this essay was delivered in Paris at the kind invitation of l’Institut Jean Nicod in December 2011. For challenging comments I am grateful to Jérôme Pelletier and Anouk Barberousse, and others whose names now escape me. Apologies. For conversation or correspondence before or after the conference, I also thank Nancy Cartwright, Nicholas Griffin, Dale Jacquette, Dominic McIvor Lopes, Shahid Rahman, and especially Alirio Rosales. For technical support I am deeply indebted—indeed tethered—to Carol Woods.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

    John Woods

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  1. Department of Humanities Philosophy Section, University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy

    Lorenzo Magnani

Appendix

Appendix

Present-day theories of literary fictions reflect sharply different ways of cutting the cake. Here are two of them, made possible by subscription to or rejection of the following pair of assumptions:

Parmenides’ Law. Quantification and reference are existentially loaded. There is nothing that doesn’t exist. It is not possible to refer to what isn’t.

The Non-existence Postulate. The purported objects and events of fiction do not exist. No object is a fictional object. No event is a fictional event.

It is doubtful that any philosophical claim could divide considered judgement more deeply than these two. Certainly they are, in their intractability, no improvement on the divisiveness occasioned by realism-antirealism wrangles in science or anywhere else. Why, then, for our philosophical anxieties about science, would we seek succor in the realist-antirealist war zones occasioned by the Law and the Postulate? Desperate times call for desperate measures, but isn’t this going too far?

A further point on which literary semanticists are divided is

Frege’s Dismissal. Since literature doesn’t matter for science, a literary semantics would be of only marginal interest.Footnote 59

In a rough and ready way, the first two of these clashing standpoints motivate the (incomplete) sample below, with the third somewhat orthogonal to them as in a second grouping, also just a sample.Footnote 60

List One

Pro the law and the postulate

Contra the law and the postulate

Sayso semantics.Footnote 62

Meinongean theoriesFootnote 63

Pretense theoriesFootnote 64

Existence-neutral logicsFootnote 65

Frege-Russell theoriesFootnote 66

Artifactual theoriesFootnote 67

Free logicsFootnote 68

Fictional worlds theoriesFootnote 69

Theories of substitutional quantificationFootnote 70

 

List Two

Pro Frege’s dismissal

Con Frege’s dismissal

Free logics

Sayso semantics

Frege-Russell theories

Meinongean theories

Strawson’s “On Referring”

Pretense theories

 

Artifactual theories

 

Fictional worlds theories

There is in these multiplicities fair warning. As we have it now, the state of play in the logics of literary fictions give uncertain guidance to the realist-antirealist debate in science, or elsewhere. It is a conflicted matter in the philosophy of science. It is a conflicted matter in the philosophy of literature. So where in the philosophy of literature is the payoff for the philosophy of science?

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Woods, J. (2014). Against Fictionalism. In: Magnani, L. (eds) Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics, vol 8. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-37428-9_2

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