Abstract
In his book The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory, Duhem denied the feasibility of crucial experiments in physics. Said he:
… the physicist can never subject an isolated hypothesis to experimental test but only a whole group of hypotheses; when the experiment is in disagreement with his predictions, what he learns is that at least one of the hypotheses constituting this group is unacceptable and ought to be modified; but the experiment does not designate which one should be changed (my italics)1.
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Notes
Pierre Duhem, The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1954, p. 187.
Ibid.
Ibid., p. 186.
Laurens Laudan, ‘On the Impossibility of Crucial Falsifying Experiments: Grünbaum on “The Duhemian Argument”‘, Philosophy of Science 32 (1965), 295–99.
For a discussion of the epistemic requirement that explanatory premises must not be known to be false, see Ernest Nagel, The Structure of Science, Harcourt, Brace and World, New York, 1961, pp. 42–43.
A. Grünbaum, ‘The Falsifiability of a Component of a Theoretical System’, in Mind, Matter, and Method: Essays in Philosophy and Science in Honor of Herbert Feigl, P. K. Feyerabend and G. Maxwell, eds., University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1966, pp. 276–80. Ibid., pp. 280–81. Ibid., pp. 283–95; and A. Grünbaum, Geometry and Chronometry in Philosophical Perspective, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1968, Chap. III, pp. 341–51. In Chap. III, Section 9.2, pp. 351–69 of the latter book, I present a counterexample to H. Putnam’s particular geometrical version of D2. For a brief summary of Putnam’s version, see Note 55.
A. Grünbaum, ‘The Falsifiability of a Component of a Theoretical System’, in Mind, Matter, and Method: Essays in Philosophy and Science in Honor of Herbert Feigl, P. K. Feyerabend and G. Maxwell, eds., University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1966, pp. 276–80. Ibid., pp. 280–81. Ibid., pp. 283–95; and A. Grünbaum, Geometry and Chronometry in Philosophical Perspective, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1968, Chap. III, pp. 341–51. In Chap. III, Section 9.2, pp. 351–69 of the latter book, I present a counterexample to H. Putnam’s particular geometrical version of D2. For a brief summary of Putnam’s version, see Note 55.
A. Grünbaum, ‘The Falsifiability of a Component of a Theoretical System’, in Mind, Matter, and Method: Essays in Philosophy and Science in Honor of Herbert Feigl, P. K. Feyerabend and G. Maxwell, eds., University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1966, pp. 276–80. Ibid., pp. 280–81. Ibid., pp. 283–95; and A. Grünbaum, Geometry and Chronometry in Philosophical Perspective, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1968, Chap. III, pp. 341–51. In Chap. III, Section 9.2, pp. 351–69 of the latter book, I present a counterexample to H. Putnam’s particular geometrical version of D2. For a brief summary of Putnam’s version, see Note 55.
A. Grünbaum, ‘The Falsifiability of a Component of a Theoretical System’, in Mind, Matter, and Method: Essays in Philosophy and Science in Honor of Herbert Feigl, P. K. Feyerabend and G. Maxwell, eds., University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1966, pp. 276–80. Ibid., pp. 280–81. Ibid., pp. 283–95; and A. Grünbaum, Geometry and Chronometry in Philosophical Perspective, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1968, Chap. III, pp. 341–51. In Chap. III, Section 9.2, pp. 351–69 of the latter book, I present a counterexample to H. Putnam’s particular geometrical version of D2. For a brief summary of Putnam’s version, see Note 55.
A. Grünbaum, ‘The Falsifiability of a Component of a Theoretical System’, in Mind, Matter, and Method: Essays in Philosophy and Science in Honor of Herbert Feigl, P. K. Feyerabend and G. Maxwell, eds., University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1966, pp. 276–80. Ibid., pp. 280–81. Ibid., pp. 283–95; and A. Grünbaum, Geometry and Chronometry in Philosophical Perspective, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1968, Chap. III, pp. 341–51. In Chap. III, Section 9.2, pp. 351–69 of the latter book, I present a counterexample to H. Putnam’s particular geometrical version of D2. For a brief summary of Putnam’s version, see Note 55.
Grünbaum, ‘The Falsifiability of a Component of a Theoretical System’, pp. 277–78.
W. V. O. Quine, From a Logical Point of View (revised ed.), Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1961, pp. 43 and 41 n.
Grünbaum, ‘The Falsifiability of a Component of a Theoretical System’, pp. 279–80.
Ibid., p. 279.
Ibid., p. 278.
Mary Hesse, The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 18 (1968), 334.
Peter Achinstein, Concepts of Science, Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1968, pp. 3ff.
Ibid., p. 6.
Ibid., pp. 7–8.
Ibid., pp. 8–9.
Ibid., p. 9.
Ibid., p. 35.
Ibid., p. 101.
Ibid., p. 2.
See pp. 143–44 of A. Grünbaum, Philosophical Problems of Space and Time, second, enlarged ed., D. Reidel Publ. Co., Boston and Dordrecht, 1974; and
A. Grünbaum, Geometry and Chronometry, pp. 314–17. 1974
See P. G. Bergmann, Introduction to the Theory of Relativity, Prentice-Hall, New York, 1946, pp. 86–88.
C. Giannoni, ‘Quine, Grünbaum, and The Duhemian Thesis’, Nous 1 (1967), 288.
Ibid., pp. 286–87.
Ibid., p. 288. The example which Giannoni then goes on to cite from Duhem is one in which a very weak electric current was running through a battery and where, therefore, one or more indicators may fail to register its presence. In that case, the current will still be said to flow if one or another indicator yields a positive response. This particular case may well be a borderline one as between semantic and nonsemantic relevance.
See, for example, C. Moller, Theory of Relativity, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1952, Ch. VIII, Section 84.
For a rebuttal to John Earman’s objections to ascribing a spatial geometry to the rotating disk, see the detailed account of the status of metrics in A. Grünbaum, ‘Space, Time and Falsifiability’, Part 1, Philosophy of Science 37 (1970). 562–65 (Chapter 16 of Grünbaum, Philosophical Problems of Space and Time, pp. 542–545).
This formulation is given in E. T. Whittaker, From Euclid to Eddington, Cambridge University Press, London, 1949, p. 63.
Philip Quinn, ‘The Status of the D-Thesis’, Section III, Philosophy of Science 36, (1969), No. 4.
J. W. Swanson, ‘On the D-Thesis’, Philosophy of Science 34 (1967), 59–68.
A. Einstein, ‘Geometry and Experience’, in Readings in the Philosophy of Science, in H. Feigl and M. Brodbeck (eds.), Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1953, p. 192.
H. Reichenbach, The Theory of Probability, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1949.
W. C. Salmon, The Foundations of Scientific Inference, University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, 1967, p. 58.
For a lucid explanation of the razz-transitivity (as distinct from intransitivity) of the relation of inductive support and of its ramifications, see W. C. Salmon, ‘Consistency, Transitivity, and Inductive Support’, Ratio 7 (1965), 164–68.
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Grünbaum, A. (1976). Is it Never Possible to Falsify A Hypothesis Irrevocably?. In: Harding, S.G. (eds) Can Theories be Refuted?. Synthese Library, vol 81. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-1863-0_15
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