Deborah Mayo

We argue for a naturalistic account for appraising scientific methods that carries non-trivial normative force. We develop our approach by comparison with Laudan’s (American Philosophical Quarterly 24:19–31, 1987, Philosophy of Science 57:20–33, 1990) “normative naturalism” based on correlating means (various scientific methods) with ends (e.g., reliability). We argue that such a meta-methodology based on means–ends correlations is unreliable and cannot achieve its normative goals. We suggest another approach for meta-methodology based on a conglomeration of tools and strategies (from statistical modeling, experimental design, and related fields) that affords forward looking procedures for learning from error and for controlling error. The resulting “error statistical” appraisal is empirical—methods are appraised by examining their capacities to control error. At the same time, this account is normative, in that the strategies that pass muster are claims about how actually to proceed in given contexts to reach reliable inferences from limited data.

Theories of statistical testing may be seen as attempts to provide systematic means for evaluating scientific conjectures on the basis of incomplete or inaccurate observational data. The Neyman-Pearson Theory of Testing (NPT) has purported to provide an objective means for testing statistical hypotheses corresponding to scientific claims. Despite their widespread use in science, methods of NPT have themselves been accused of failing to be objective; and the purported objectivity of scientific claims based upon NPT has been called into question. The purpose of this paper is first to clarify this question by examining the conceptions of (I) the function served by NPT in science, and (II) the requirements of an objective theory of statistics upon which attacks on NPT's objectivity are based. Our grounds for rejecting these conceptions suggest altered conceptions of (I) and (II) that might avoid such attacks. Second, we propose a reformulation of NPT, denoted by NPT*, based on these altered conceptions, and argue that it provides an objective theory of statistics. The crux of our argument is that by being able to objectively control error frequencies NPT* is able to objectively evaluate what has or has not been learned from the result of a statistical test.