[ Paul Teller (2008), Ch 5 “The Finewright Theory”, in S. Hartmann et al. (eds.)(2008), Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science (Routledge), pp. 91-116. ]
1. Introduction
2. Fine’s Natural Ontological Attitude (NOA)
3. Lies and the Homely Line
4. Reconciliation with NOA
5. Fundamentalism
6. Generalizing the Issues
7. Ceteris Paribus Generalizations, Open Ended Capacities,
and the Dual Nature of Idealization and Inexact Representation
8. Exact Capacities?
9. Straight-out Truths?
10. Requirement of an Exact Standard?
11. A New Theory of Truth After All?
12. Concluding Thoughts
1. Introduction
2. Fine’s Natural Ontological Attitude (NOA)
3. Lies and the Homely Line
4. Reconciliation with NOA
5. Fundamentalism
p.96 #4
6. Generalizing the Issues
7. Ceteris Paribus Generalizations, Open Ended Capacities,
and the Dual Nature of Idealization and Inexact Representation
8. Exact Capacities?
- Cartwright has argued that capacities are real;
- that they are perfectly determinate characteristics of things;
- and so that attribution of capacities are true or false and not subject to either the failing of imprecision/inexactness/vagueness or of the kind of idealization.
9. Straight-out Truths?
10. Requirement of an Exact Standard?
11. A New Theory of Truth After All?
12. Concluding Thoughts
Reply to Paul Teller
p.117 #5
- Cartwright treats central claims of science that are radically false or are so abstract and removed from the empirical world.
- Teller treats different claims, those that are not true but are nevertheless “approximately true”.
- “Aristotelian” abstraction
- Following Aristotle’s thought, Carl Menger argues that economics could be an exact science but that be true of “full empirical reality”.
- Pierre Duhem argued that science itself is exact even though the facts we confront cannot dictate an exact scientific description.
- Otto Neurath urge a Positivist view that we can only compare scientific representations with other representations, not the world itself.
(2021.11.28.)
