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426Theological Misinterpretations of Current Physical CosmologyPhilo 1 (1): 15-34. 1998.In earlier writings, I argued that neither of the two major physical cosmologies of the twentieth century support divine creation, so that atheism has nothing to fear from the explanations required by these cosmologies. Yet theists ranging from Augustine, Aquinas, Descartes, and Leibniz to Richard Swinburne and Philip Quinn have maintained that, at every instant anew, the existence of the world requires divine creation ex nihilo as its cause. Indeed, according to some such theists, for any given…Read more
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356A new critique of theological interpretations of physical cosmologyBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 51 (1): 1-43. 2000.This paper is a sequel to my 'Theological Misinterpretations of Current Physical Cosmology' (Foundations of Physics [1996], 26 (4); revised in Philo [1998], 1 (1)). There I argued that the Big Bang models of (classical) general relativity theory, as well as the original 1948 versions of the steady state cosmology, are each logically incompatible with the time-honored theological doctrine that perpetual divine creation ('creatio continuans') is required in each of these two theorized worlds. Furt…Read more
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342Is Freudian Psychoanalytic Theory Pseudo-Scientific by Karl Popper's Criterion of Demarcation?American Philosophical Quarterly 16 (2). 1979.
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338The Pseudo-Problem of Creation in Physical CosmologyPhilosophy of Science 56 (3). 1989.According to some cosmologists, the big bang cosmogony and even the (now largely defunct) steady-state theory pose a scientifically insoluble problem of matter-energy creation. But I argue that the genuine problem of the origin of matter-energy or of the universe has been fallaciously transmuted into the pseudo-problem of creation by an external cause. A fortiori, it emerges that the initial "true" and "false" vacuum states of quantum cosmology do not vindicate biblical divine creation ex nihilo…Read more
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274In fairness to Freud: A critical notice of the foundations of psychoanalysisPhilosophical Review 98 (3): 349-378. 1989.
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269Epistemological liabilities of the clinical appraisal of psychoanalytic theoryNoûs 14 (3): 307-385. 1980.
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256Is preacceleration of particles in dirac's electrodynamics a case of backward causation? The myth of retrocausation in classical electrodynamicsPhilosophy of Science 43 (2): 165-201. 1976.Is it a "conceptual truth" or only a logically contingent fact that, in any given kind of case, an event x which asymmetrically causes ("produces") an event y likewise temporally precedes y or at least does not temporally succeed y? A bona fide physical example in which the cause retroproduces the effect would show that backward causation is no less conceptually possible than forward causation. And it has been claimed ([9], p. 151; [4], p. 41) that in Dirac's classical electrodynamics (relativis…Read more
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229Realism and neo-kantianism in professor Margenau's philosophy of quantum mechanicsPhilosophy of Science 17 (1): 26-34. 1950.Professor Margenau's paper presents an analysis of physical theory which has the great merit of exhibiting classical physics and modern quantum mechanics as different aspects of the same epistemological and methodological framework.By maintaining that “there is not a tree and my construct of it, nor a wave length and my construct of it” he is denying that the constructs of ordinary common sense and, a fortiori, the theoretical constructs of the physical sciences denote entities existing independ…Read more
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204Is the method of bold conjectures and attempted refutations justifiably the method of science?British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 27 (2): 105-136. 1976.
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192Is Psychoanalysis a Pseudo-Science? Karl Popper versus Sigmund FreudZeitschrift für Philosophische Forschung 31 (3). 1977.
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185The Poverty of Theistic CosmologyBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 55 (4): 561-614. 2004.Philosophers have postulated the existence of God to explain (I) why any contingent objects exist at all rather than nothing contingent, and (II) why the fundamental laws of nature and basic facts of the world are exactly what they are. Therefore, we ask: (a) Does (I) pose a well-conceived question which calls for an answer? and (b) Can God's presumed will (or intention) provide a cogent explanation of the basic laws and facts of the world, as claimed by (II)? We shall address both (a) and (b). …Read more
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179I. complementarity in quantum physics and its philosophical generalizationJournal of Philosophy 54 (23): 713-727. 1957.
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170Historical determinism, social activism, and predictions in the social sciencesBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 7 (27): 236-240. 1956.
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156Psychoanalysis and TheismThe Monist 70 (2): 152-192. 1987.The topic of “Psychoanalysis and Theism” suggests two distinct questions. First, what is the import, if any, of psychoanalytic theory for the truth or falsity of theism? And furthermore, what was the attitude of Freud, the man, toward belief in God? It must be borne in mind that psychological explanations of any sort as to why people believe in God are subject to an important caveat. Even if they are true, such explanations are not entitled to beg the following different question: Is religious b…Read more
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156Is Simplicity Evidence of Truth?Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement 61 261-275. 2007.In a short 1997 book entitled Simplicity as Evidence of Truth, the Oxford philosopher Richard Swinburne has put forward the following thesis summarily: ‘… for theories (of equal scope) rendering equally probable our observational data (which, for brevity I shall call equally good at “predicting”), fitting equally well with background knowledge, the simplest is most probably true’.
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149Professor Dingle on falsifiability: A second rejoinderBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 12 (46): 153-156. 1961.
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133Whitehead's method of extensive abstractionBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 4 (15): 215-226. 1953.
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122David Malament and the Conventionality of Simultaneity: A Reply (review)Foundations of Physics 40 (9-10): 1285-1297. 2001.In 1977, David Malament proved the valuable technical result that the simultaneity relation of standard synchrony $\epsilon=\frac{1}{2}$ with respect to an inertial observer O is uniquely definable in terms of the relation κ of causal connectibility. And he claimed that this definability undermines my own version of the conventionality of metrical simultaneity within an inertial frame.But Malament’s proof depends on the imposition of several supposedly “innocuous” constraints on any candidate fo…Read more
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117Can an infinitude of operations be performed in a finite time?British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 20 (3): 203-218. 1969.
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116Relativity and the Atomicity of BecomingReview of Metaphysics 4 (2). 1950.The scientific conception of change and motion raises two fundamental questions: Is there any evidence that the temporal order of events cannot legitimately be postulated to be continuous in Cantor's sense? Is it possible to account for such distinguishing properties of time as its possession of an "arrow" on the basis of assuming that events constitute a continuous type of order in Cantor's sense, and providing a coordinating definition for the ordering relation "later than"? We must raise thes…Read more
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114Comments on Professor Roger Buck's Paper "Reflexive Predictions."Philosophy of Science 30 (4). 1963.Professor Buck has given an illuminating account of the logical status of reflexive predictions in the social sciences. He tells us that the classification of a prediction as reflexive is predicated on a tacit distinction between the “normal” and the “abnormal” or perturbed conditions under which it is made. This seems to me to be a perceptive and sound circumscription of the class of reflexive predictions as encountered in the social sciences. He goes on to show helpfully how the social scienti…Read more
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113Discussions: Thb falsifiability op the lorentz-Fitzgerald contraction hypothesisBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 10 (37): 48-50. 1959.
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107Simultaneity by Slow Clock Transport in the Special Theory of RelativityPhilosophy of Science 36 (1). 1969.Ellis and Bowman's account of nonstandard signal synchronizations is examined as a prolegomenon to this paper. Attention is called to some consequences of an important ambiguity in their account of the transitivity of nonstandard synchrony. Then an analysis is given of the principle of relativity to assess E & B's claim that this principle either restricts nonstandard signal synchronisms or rules them out altogether. It is argued that the latitude for choices of nonstandard synchronisms is not c…Read more
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104Can a theory answer more questions than one of its rivals?British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 37 (1): 1-23. 1986.
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104Does Freudian theory resolve "the paradoxes of irrationality"?Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 62 (1): 129-143. 2001.In this paper, I criticize the claim made by Donald Davidson, among others, that Freud’s psychoanalytic theory provides “a conceptual framework within which to describe and understand irrationality.” Further, I defend my epistemological strictures on the explanatory and therapeutic foundations of the psychoanalytic enterprise against the efforts of Davidson, Marcia Cavell, Thomas Nagel, et al., to undermine them
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102Are physical events themselves transiently past, present and future? A reply to H. A. C. DobbsBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 20 (2): 145-153. 1969.
Adolf Grunbaum
(1923 - 2018)
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
19th Century Philosophy |
20th Century Philosophy |
Philosophy of Physical Science |