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49Permissible idealizations for the purpose of predictionStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 85 92-100. 2021.Every model leaves out or distorts some factors that are causally connected to its target phenomenon -- the phenomenon that it seeks to predict or explain. If we want to make predictions, and we want to base decisions on those predictions, what is it safe to omit or to simplify, and what ought a causal model to describe fully and correctly? A schematic answer: the factors that matter are those that make a difference to the target phenomenon. There are several ways to understand differencemaking.…Read more
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42Book ReviewRobert W. Batterman, The Devil in the Details: Asymptotic Reasoning in Explanation, Reduction and Emergence. Oxford: Oxford University Press , 160 pp., $35.00 cloth (review)Philosophy of Science 69 (4): 654-657. 2002.
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41Grasp and scientific understanding: a recognition accountPhilosophical Studies 181 (4): 741-762. 2024.To understand why a phenomenon occurs, it is not enough to possess a correct explanation of the phenomenon: you must grasp the explanation. In this formulation, “grasp” is a placeholder, standing for the psychological or epistemic relation that connects a mind to the explanatory facts in such a way as to produce understanding. This paper proposes and defends an account of the “grasping” relation according to which grasp of a property (to take one example of the sort of entity that turns up in ex…Read more
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39Dynamic probability and the problem of initial conditionsSynthese 199 (5-6): 14617-14639. 2021.Dynamic approaches to understanding probability in the non-fundamental sciences turn on certain properties of physical processes that are apt to produce “probabilistically patterned” outcomes. The dynamic properties on their own, however, seem not quite sufficient to explain the patterns; in addition, some sort of assumption about initial conditions must be made, an assumption that itself typically takes a probabilistic form. How should such a posit be understood? That is the problem of initial …Read more
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35M. STREVENSBigger Than Chaos: Understanding Complexity Through Probability (review)British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 61 (4): 875-882. 2010.
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32The knowledge machine: how irrationality created modern scienceLiveright Publishing Corporation. 2020.A paradigm-shifting work that revolutionizes our understanding of the origins and structure of science. Captivatingly written, interwoven with tantalizing illustrations and historical vignettes ranging from Newton's alchemy to quantum mechanics to the storm surge of Hurricane Sandy, Michael Strevens's wholly original investigation of science asks two fundamental questions: Why is science so powerful? And why did it take so long, two thousand years after the invention of philosophy and mathematic…Read more
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31Remarks on Harman and Kulkarni's "Reliable Reasoning"Abstracta 5 (S3): 27-41. 2009.Reliable Reasoning is a simple, accessible, beautifully explained introduction to Vapnik and Chervonenkis’s statistical learning theory. It includes a modest discussion of the application of the theory to the philosophy of induction; the purpose of these remarks is to say something more. 27
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30Review of C. S. Bertuglia and F. Vaio, "Nonlinearity, chaos, and complexity"British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 60 (2): 447-451. 2009.
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9Tychomancy: Inferring Probability from Causal StructureHarvard University Press. 2013.Maxwell's deduction of the probability distribution over the velocity of gas molecules—one of the most important passages in physics (Truesdell)—presents a riddle: a physical discovery of the first importance was made in a single inferential leap without any apparent recourse to empirical evidence. Tychomancy proposes that Maxwell's derivation was not made a priori; rather, he inferred his distribution from non-probabilistic facts about the dynamics of intermolecular collisions. Further, the inf…Read more
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8The causes of characteristic properties: Insides versus categoriesBehavioral and Brain Sciences 37 (5): 502-503. 2014.Cimpian & Salomon propose that the inherence heuristic, a tendency to explain the behavior and other properties of things in terms of their intrinsic characteristics, precedes and explains “essentialist thinking” about natural kinds. This commentary reviews evidence that it is rather essentialism that precedes the assumption of inherence, and suggests that essentialism can do without the inherence heuristic altogether.
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7C. S. BERTUGLIA AND F. VAIO Nonlinearity, Chaos, and Complexity (review)British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 60 (2): 447-451. 2009.
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6The knowledge machine: how an unreasonable idea created modern scienceAllen Lane. 2020.It is only in the last three centuries that the formidable knowledge-making machine we call modern science has transformed our way of life and our vision of the universe - two thousand years after the invention of law, philosophy, drama and mathematics. Why did we take so long to invent science? And how has it proved to be so powerful?The Knowledge Machine gives a radical answer, exploring how science calls on its practitioners to do something apparently irrational- strip away all previous knowl…Read more
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Bigger Than Chaos: The Probabilistic Structure of Complex SystemsDissertation, Rutgers the State University of New Jersey - New Brunswick. 1996.The dissertation concerns the use of physical probability in higher level scientific theories such as statistical mechanics and evolutionary biology. My focus is complex systems--systems containing large numbers of parts that move independently yet interact strongly, such as gases and ecosystems. Although the underlying dynamics of such systems are prohibitively complex, their macrolevel behavior can often be predicted given information about physical probabilities. ;The technique has the follow…Read more
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Dappled Science in a Unified WorldIn Hsiang-Ke Chao & Julian Reiss (eds.), Philosophy of Science in Practice: Nancy Cartwright and the nature of scientific reasoning., Springer International Publishing. 2016.
Areas of Specialization
General Philosophy of Science |
Philosophy of Cognitive Science |
Metaphilosophy |
Interpretation of Probability |