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7VorwortIn Gregor Betz, Dirk Koppelberg, David Lüwenstein & Anna Wehofsits (eds.), Weiter Denken - Über Philosophie, Wissenschaft Und Religion, De Gruyter. 2015.
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29Making Reflective Equlibrium Precise: A Formal ModelErgo: An Open Access Journal of Philosophy 8. 2021.Reflective equilibrium (RE) is often regarded as a powerful method in ethics, logic, and even philosophy in general. Despite this popularity, characterizations of the method have been fairly vague and unspecific so far. It thus may be doubted whether RE is more than a jumble of appealing but ultimately sketchy ideas that cannot be spelled out consistently. In this paper, we dispel such doubts by devising a formal model of RE. The model contains as components the agent’s commitments and a theory …Read more
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8Chaos, Plurality, and Model Metrics in Climate ScienceIn Ulrich Gähde, Stephan Hartmann & Jörn Henning Wolf (eds.), Models, Simulations, and the Reduction of Complexity, De Gruyter. pp. 255-264. 2013.
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14There are different varieties of conservatism concerning belief formation and revision. We assesses the veritistic effects of a particular kind of conservatism commonly attributed to Quine: the so-called maxim of minimum mutiliation, which states that agents should give up as few beliefs as possible when facing recalcitrant evidence. Based on a formal bounded rationality model of belief revision, which parametrizes degree of conservatism, and corresponding multi-agent simulations, we eventually …Read more
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11“Führer befiehl, wir folgen dir!” Charismatic Leaders in Extremist GroupsIn Thomas Christiano, Ingrid Creppell & Jack Knight (eds.), Morality, Governance, and Social Institutions: Reflections on Russell Hardin, Springer Verlag. pp. 259-287. 2017.If we want to understand how extremist group ideologies are established, we have to comprehend the social processes which form the basis of the emergence and distribution of such beliefs. In our chapter, we present an innovative approach to examining these processes and explaining how they function: with the method of computer-based simulation of opinion formation, we develop heuristic explanatory models which help to generate new and interesting hypotheses. The focus is thereby not on individua…Read more
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83Philosophy of science for science communication in twenty-two questionsIn Annette Leßmöllmann, Marcelo Dascal & Thomas Gloning (eds.), Science Communication. pp. 3-28. 2020.Philosophy of science attempts to reconstruct science as a rational cognitive enterprise. In doing so, it depicts a normative ideal of knowledge acquisition and does not primarily seek to describe actual scientific practice in an empirically adequate way. A comprehensive picture of what good science consists in may serve as a standard against which we evaluate and criticize actual scientific practices. Such a normative picture may also explain why it is reasonable for us to trust scientists – to…Read more
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Accounting for Possibilities in Decision MakingIn Gertrude Hirsch Hadorn & Sven Hansson (eds.), The Argumentative Turn in Policy Analysis: Reasoning About Uncertainty, Springer Verlag. 2016.
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27Applying argumentation to structure and visualize multi-dimensional opinion spacesArgument and Computation 10 (1): 23-40. 2018.
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3Ethical Aspects of Climate EngineeringKIT Scientific Publishing,. 2012.This study investigates the ethical aspects of deploying and researching into so-called climate engineering methods, i.e. large-scale technical interventions in the climate system with the objective of offsetting anthropogenic climate change. The moral reasons in favour of and against R&D into and deployment of CE methods are analysed by means of argument maps. These argument maps provide an overview of the CE controversy and help to structure the complex debate.
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14Climate EngineeringIn Armin Grunwald (ed.), Handbuch Technikethik, Metzler. pp. 254-257. 2013.Als ›Climate Engineering‹ bezeichnet man großtechnische Eingriffe in das Klimasystem, die darauf abzielen, den anthropogenen Klimawandel zu kompensieren. Neben Mitigation- und Adaptation-Maßnahmen bilden Climate-Engineering-Verfahren damit eine dritte Kategorie möglicher Reaktionen auf den anthropogenen Klimawandel.
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48Theorie dialektischer StrukturenKlostermann. 2010.Wo Meinungen aufeinanderprallen, um Verständnis geworben und Überzeugungsarbeit geleistet wird, sind Begründungen nicht weit. Für jede Überzeugung gibt es immer ein, zwei Gründe, die mit Gegengründen konfrontiert und, im Gegenzug, mit weiteren Überlegungen verteidigt werden usw. usf. Schnell sind wir verwirrt und drohen, ohne uns der "Grammatikregeln" vernünftigen Argumentierens zu besinnen, nicht mehr durchzublicken. Die Theorie dialektischer Strukturen leistet einen Beitrag zur Grammatik vernü…Read more
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45Lebende BücherIn Georg Bertram (ed.), Philosophische Gedankenexperimente – ein Lese- und Studienbuch, Reclam. 2012.
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58Debate Dynamics: How Controversy Improves Our BeliefsSpringer. 2012.By means of multi-agent simulations, it investigates the truth and consensus-conduciveness of controversial debates. The book brings together research in formal epistemology and argumentation theory.
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147Revamping Hypothetico-Deductivism: A Dialectic Account of Confirmation (review)Erkenntnis 78 (5): 991-1009. 2013.We use recently developed approaches in argumentation theory in order to revamp the hypothetico-deductive model of confirmation, thus alleviating the well-known paradoxes the H-D account faces. More specifically, we introduce the concept of dialectic confirmation on the background of the so-called theory of dialectical structures (Betz 2010, 2012b). Dialectic confirmation generalises hypothetico-deductive confirmation and mitigates the raven paradox, the grue paradox, the tacking paradox, the pa…Read more
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44Ist der LHC eine Weltuntergangsmaschine?In Gregor Betz, Dirk Koppelberg, David Lüwenstein & Anna Wehofsits (eds.), Weiter Denken - Über Philosophie, Wissenschaft Und Religion, De Gruyter. pp. 23-40. 2015.Im Herbst des Jahres 20– breiten sich Gerüchte aus, dass am Genfer Kernforschungszentrum CERN, den gegenteiligen Versicherungen führender Teilchenphysiker zum Trotz, stabile schwarze Löcher erzeugt wurden. Daraufhin kommt es vielerorts zu Plünderungen. Auch vermelden zahlreiche Firmen und öffentliche Arbeitgeber, dass ein erheblicher Anteil der Belegschaft nicht am Arbeitsplatz erschienen ist. Rund um den Globus fragen sich Menschen ob der Hiobsbotschaften aus Genf: Steht nun der Weltunterg…Read more
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86What range of future scenarios should climate policy be based on? Modal falsificationism and its limitationsPhilosophia Naturalis 46 (1): 133-158. 2009.Climate policy decisions are decisions under uncertainty and are, therefore, based on a range of future climate scenarios, describing possible consequences of alternative policies. Accordingly, the methodology for setting up such a scenario range becomes pivotal in climate policy advice. The preferred methodology of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will be characterised as ,,modal verificationism"; it suffers from severe shortcomings which disqualify it for scientific policy advice.…Read more
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53Gregor Betz explores the following questions: Where are the limits of economics, in particular the limits of economic foreknowledge? Are macroeconomic forecasts credible predictions or mere prophecies and what would this imply for the way economic policy decisions are taken? Is rational economic decision making possible without forecasting at all?
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50Der Umgang mit Zukunftswissen in der Klimapolitikberatung. Eine Fallstudie zum Stern ReviewPhilosophia Naturalis 45 (1): 95-129. 2008.The Stern Review on The Economics of Climate Change is a highly influential welfare analysis of climate policy measures which has been published in 2006. This paper identifies and systematically assesses the long-term socioeconomic and climatic predictions the Stern Review relies on, and reflects them philosophically. Being a cost-benefit analysis, the Stern Review has to predict the benefits of climate mitigation policies, i.e.the damaging consequences of climate change which might be avoided, …Read more
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138Weiter Denken - Über Philosophie, Wissenschaft Und Religion (edited book)De Gruyter. 2015.Wer philosophiert, argumentiert. Der Band vereint Beiträge zur Argumentationstheorie, Erkenntnistheorie, Wissenschaftstheorie, Existenzphilosophie, Religionsphilosophie und Metaphilosophie. Er zeigt auf, dass auch theoretische Fragen von lebenspraktischer Bedeutung sind.
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233Justifying inference to the best explanation as a practical meta-syllogism on dialectical structuresSynthese 190 (16): 3553-3578. 2013.This article discusses how inference to the best explanation can be justified as a practical meta - argument. It is, firstly, justified as a practical argument insofar as accepting the best explanation as true can be shown to further a specific aim. And because this aim is a discursive one which proponents can rationally pursue in — and relative to — a complex controversy, namely maximising the robustness of one’s position, IBE can be conceived, secondly, as a meta - argument. My analysis thus b…Read more
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41Chaos, plurality and model metrics in climate scienceIn Ulrich Gähde, Stephan Hartmann & Jörn Henning Wolf (eds.), Models, Simulations, and the Reduction of Complexity, De Gruyter. pp. 255-264. 2013.
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38The vicious circle theorem – a graph-theoretical analysis of dialectical structuresArgumentation 19 (1): 53-64. 2005.This article sets up a graph-theoretical framework for argumentation-analysis (dialectical analysis) which expands classical argument-analysis. Within this framework, a main theorem on the existence of inconsistencies in debates is stated and proved: the vicious circle theorem. Subsequently, two corollaries which generalize the main theorem are derived. Finally, a brief outlook is given on further expansions and possible applications of the developed framework.
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47Mehr Besonnenheit, bitte! Über Prognosegrenzen und PolitikberatungÖkologisches Wirtschaften 2011 (2): 35-38. 2011.In einer Welt, in der der Umgang mit Komplexität und Unsicherheit an Bedeutung gewinnt, sind politische Entscheidungsträger immer stärker auf eine wissenschaftliche Beratung angewiesen. Trotz des Bedarfs der politischen Akteure nach konkreten Handlungsempfehlungen sollte seriöse Politikberatung die grundlegenden Werte wissenschaftlichen Arbeitens nicht aus den Augen verlieren.
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129Descartes' "Meditationen" sind vielleicht 'der' Klassiker der Philosophie. Sie behandeln grundlegende Fragen: Welche Arten von Gegenständen kommen in der Welt vor? Was für eine Art von Ding bin ich? Bin ich frei? Was ist Wahrheit? Welchen Status haben logische Wahrheiten oder mathematische Theoreme? Was kann ich wissen? Gregor Betz' systematischer Kommentar rekonstruiert die entsprechenden Gedankengänge und Begründungen und versucht Antworten auf Descartes' Fragen zu geben. Auch andere Philosoph…Read more
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13Spohns Theorie des induktiven Schließens und ihre erkenntnistheoretischen, wissenschaftsphilosophischen und metaphysischen AnwendungenDeutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 63 (2). 2015.
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772In defence of the value free idealEuropean Journal for Philosophy of Science 3 (2): 207-220. 2013.The ideal of value free science states that the justification of scientific findings should not be based on non-epistemic (e.g. moral or political) values. It has been criticized on the grounds that scientists have to employ moral judgements in managing inductive risks. The paper seeks to defuse this methodological critique. Allegedly value-laden decisions can be systematically avoided, it argues, by making uncertainties explicit and articulating findings carefully. Such careful uncertainty arti…Read more
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112What’s the worst case? The Methodology of Possibilistic PredictionAnalyse & Kritik 32 (1): 87-106. 2010.Frank Knight (1921) famously distinguished the epistemic modes of certainty, risk, and uncertainty in order to characterize situations where deterministic, probabilistic or possibilistic foreknowledge is available. Because our probabilistic knowledge is limited, i.e. because many systems, e.g. the global climate, cannot be described and predicted probabilistically in a reliable way, Knight's third category, possibilistic foreknowledge, is not simply swept by the probabilistic mode. This raises t…Read more
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38Pascals WetteIn Georg Bertram (ed.), Philosophische Gedankenexperimente – ein Lese- und Studienbuch, Reclam. 2012.
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51Ethical Aspects of Climate Engineering. KarlsruheKIT Scientific Publishing. 2012.This study investigates the ethical aspects of deploying and researching into so-called climate engineering methods, i.e. large-scale technical interventions in the climate system with the objective of offsetting anthropogenic climate change. The moral reasons in favour of and against R&D into and deployment of CE methods are analysed by means of argument maps. These argument maps provide an overview of the CE controversy and help to structure the complex debate.
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25Warum erfolgreiche Prognosen neuartiger Phänomene methodologisch wertvoll sindDeutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 58 (2): 329-332. 2010.
Gregor Betz
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
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Karlsruhe Institute of TechnologyProfessor
Areas of Specialization
2 more
Formal Epistemology |
Social Epistemology |
General Philosophy of Science |
Philosophy of Social Science |
Philosophy of Earth Sciences |
Reasoning |
Inference |