Hostname: page-component-5c6d5d7d68-wp2c8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-08-21T09:13:31.442Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Explanation = Unification? A New Criticism of Friedman’s Theory and a Reply to an Old One

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

William Roche  and
Elliott Sober
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

According to Michael Friedman’s theory of explanation, a law X explains laws Y1, Y2, …, Yn precisely when X unifies the Y’s, where unification is understood in terms of reducing the number of independently acceptable laws. Philip Kitcher criticized Friedman’s theory but did not analyze the concept of independent acceptability. Here we show that Kitcher’s objection can be met by modifying an element in Friedman’s account. In addition, we argue that there are serious objections to the use that Friedman makes of the concept of independent acceptability.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 84 , Issue 3 , July 2017 , pp. 391 - 413
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barnes, Eric. 1992a. “Explanatory Unification and the Problem of Asymmetry.” Philosophy of Science 59:558–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barnes, Eric 1992b. “Explanatory Unification and Scientific Understanding.” In PSA 1992: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, 1:3–12. East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association.Google Scholar
Barnes, Eric 1994. “Explaining Brute Facts.” In PSA 1994: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, 1:61–68. East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association.Google Scholar
Bartelborth, Thomas. 1996. “Scientific Explanation.” In Structuralist Theory of Science: Focal Issues, New Results, ed. Balzer, Wolgang and Moulines, Carlos, 23–43. Berlin: de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Moulines, Carlos 2002. “Explanatory Unification.” Synthese 130:91–107.Google Scholar
de Regt, Henk, and Dieks, Dennis. 2005. “A Contextual Approach to Scientific Understanding.” Synthese 144:137–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Douglas, Heather. 2009. “Reintroducing Prediction to Explanation.” Philosophy of Science 76:444–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Friedman, Michael. 1974. “Explanation and Scientific Understanding.” Journal of Philosophy 71:5–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Friedman, Michael 1981. “Theoretical Explanation.” In Reduction, Time and Reality: Studies in the Philosophy of the Natural Sciences, ed. Healey, Richard, 1–16. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Healey, Richard 1983. Foundations of Space-Time Theories: Relativistic Physics and Philosophy of Science. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Fry, Richard. 2016. “Backwards Explanation and Unification.” European Journal for Philosophy of Science 6:55–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gemes, Ken. 1994. “Explanation, Unification, and Content.” Noûs 28:225–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gijsbers, Victor. 2007. “Why Unification Is Neither Necessary Nor Sufficient for Explanation.” Philosophy of Science 74:481–500.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gijsbers, Victor 2013. “Understanding, Explanation, and Unification.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 44:516–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Griesmaier, Franz-Peter. 2005. “Kitcher-Style Unificationism and Explanatory Relevance.” Dialectica 59:37–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halonen, Ilpo, and Hintikka, Jaakko. 1999. “Unification: It’s Magnificent but Is It Explanation?” Synthese 120:27–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hempel, Carl. 1965. “Aspects of Scientific Explanation.” In Aspects of Scientific Explanation and Other Essays in the Philosophy of Science, 331–496. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Humphreys, Paul. 1993. “Greater Unification Equals Greater Understanding?” Analysis 53:183–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jenkins, C. S., and Nolan, Daniel. 2008. “Backwards Explanation.” Philosophical Studies 140:103–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, Todd. 1995a. “How the Unification Theory of Explanation Escapes Asymmetry Problems.” Erkenntnis 43:229–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, Todd 1995b. “Reductionism and the Unification Theory of Explanation.” Philosophy of Science 62:21–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, Todd 1997. “Unification, Reduction, and Non-ideal Explanations.” Synthese 112:75–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, Todd 1998. “Unification, Deduction, and History: A Reply to Steel.” Philosophy of Science 65:672–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, Todd 2008. “Unification.” In The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Science, ed. Psillos, Stathis and Curd, Martin, 489–97. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Kitcher, Philip. 1976. “Explanation, Conjunction, and Unification.” Journal of Philosophy 73:207–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, Philip 1981. “Explanatory Unification.” Philosophy of Science 48:507–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, Philip 1989. “Explanatory Unification and the Causal Structure of the World.” In Scientific Explanation, ed. Kitcher, Philip and Salmon, Wesley, 410–505. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Kyburg, Henry. 1961. Probability and the Logic of Rational Belief. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.Google Scholar
Kyburg, Henry 1965. “Salmon’s Paper.” Philosophy of Science 32:147–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mares, Edwin. 2014. “Relevance Logic.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Zalta, Edward. Stanford, CA: Stanford University. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-relevance/.Google Scholar
Petkov, Stefan. 2015. “Explanatory Unification and Conceptualization.” Synthese 192:3695–3717.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Psillos, Stathis. 2002. Causation and Explanation. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Putnam, Hilary. 1975. “Philosophy and Our Mental Life.” In Mind, Language, and Reality, 291–303. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Salmon, Wesley. 1971. “Statistical Explanation.” In Statistical Explanation and Statistical Relevance, ed. Salmon, Wesley, 29–87. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Salmon, Wesley 1984. Scientific Explanation and the Causal Structure of the World. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Salmon, Wesley 1989. “Four Decades of Scientific Explanation.” In Scientific Explanation, ed. Kitcher, Philip and Salmon, Wesley, 3–219. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Schurz, Gerhard. 1999. “Explanation as Unification.” Synthese 120:95–114.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schurz, Gerhard 2014. “Unification and Explanation: Explanation as a Prototype Concept; A Reply to Weber and van Dyck, Gijsbers, and de Regt.” Theoria 29:57–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schurz, Gerhard, and Lambert, Karel. 1994. “Outline of a Theory of Scientific Understanding.” Synthese 101:65–120.Google Scholar
Skipper, Robert. 1999. “Selection and the Extent of Explanatory Unification.” Philosophy of Science 66 (Proceedings): S196–S209.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sober, Elliott. 2003. “Two Uses of Unification.” In The Vienna Circle and Logical Empiricism: Re-evaluation and Future Perspectives, ed. Stadler, Friedrich, 205–16. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Stadler, Friedrich 2012. “Coincidences and How to Reason about Them.” In EPSA Philosophy of Science Association: Amsterdam, 2009, ed. de regt, Henk, Hartmann, Stephan, and Okasha, Samir, 355–74. Amsterdam: Springer.Google Scholar
de regt, Henk, Hartmann, Stephan, and Okasha, Samir 2015. Ockham’s Razors: A User’s Manual. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Strevens, Michael. 2004. “The Causal and Unification Approaches to Explanation Unified—Causally.” Noûs 38:154–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weber, Erik, and van Bouwel, Jeroen. 2009. “Causation, Unification, and the Adequacy of Explanations of Facts.” Theoria 24:301–20.Google Scholar
Woodward, James. 2003. Making Things Happen: A Theory of Causal Explanation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Woodward, James 2014. “Scientific Explanation.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Zalta, Edward. Stanford, CA: Stanford University. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/scientific-explanation/.Google Scholar