Kant on Scientific Hypotheses: Historical and Systematic Perspectives. Van den Berg, H. & Demarest, B. October, 2020.
abstract   bibtex   
This paper provides an historical and systematic investigation of the role of hypotheses and explanation based on hypotheses in Kant's philosophy of science. In the first part of the paper, we provide an historical overview of conceptions of hypotheses in 18th century German philosophy of science, considering the works of Wolff, Meier, Crusius, and Kant. We sketch different conceptions of hypotheses and elucidate the different theories of probability informing these conceptions. In the second part of the paper, we adopt a systematic perspective and argue that contemporary accounts of what a good scientific hypothesis is resemble Kant's account of scientific hypotheses. We defend Kant's idea that scientific hypotheses must articulate real possibilities and we consider the role of simplicity and empirical adequacy in explanations based on hypotheses.
@misc{van_den_berg_kant_2020,
	address = {Kaliningrad (online)},
	type = {Invited {Lecture}},
	title = {Kant on {Scientific} {Hypotheses}: {Historical} and {Systematic} {Perspectives}.},
	abstract = {This paper provides an historical and systematic investigation of the role of
hypotheses and explanation based on hypotheses in Kant's philosophy of science. In
the first part of the paper, we provide an historical overview of conceptions of
hypotheses in 18th century German philosophy of science, considering the works of
Wolff, Meier, Crusius, and Kant. We sketch different conceptions of hypotheses and
elucidate the different theories of probability informing these conceptions. In the
second part of the paper, we adopt a systematic perspective and argue that
contemporary accounts of what a good scientific hypothesis is resemble Kant's
account of scientific hypotheses. We defend Kant's idea that scientific hypotheses must articulate real possibilities and we consider the role of simplicity and empirical
adequacy in explanations based on hypotheses.},
	author = {Van den Berg, Hein and Demarest, Boris},
	month = oct,
	year = {2020},
}

Downloads: 0