Is the world really 'dappled'? A response to Cartwright's charge against "cross-wise" reduction" - HAL Accéder directement au contenu
Article dans une revue Philosophy of Science Année : 2003

Is the world really 'dappled'? A response to Cartwright's charge against "cross-wise" reduction"

Résumé

Nancy Cartwright's charge against horizontal reductionism leads to a claim about how the world is, namely “dappled.” By proposing a simple thought-experiment, I show that Cartwright's division of the world into “nomological” machines and “messy” systems for which no law applies is meaningless. The thought-experiment shows that for a system, having the property of being a nomological machine depends on what kind of questions you ask about it. No metaphysical conclusion about the world being unruly or not can be drawn from a division that is question-dependent. Moreover, I argue that this predicament undermines Cartwright's attempt to provide an illustration of how bad metaphysics of science translates into bad scientific methodologies and policies.
Loading...
Fichier non déposé

Dates et versions

halshs-00353978, version 1 (17-01-2009)

Identifiants

  • HAL Id : halshs-00353978 , version 1

Citer

Stéphanie Ruphy. Is the world really 'dappled'? A response to Cartwright's charge against "cross-wise" reduction". Philosophy of Science, 2003, 70, pp.57-67. ⟨halshs-00353978⟩
41 Consultations
0 Téléchargements
Dernière date de mise à jour le 28/04/2024
comment ces indicateurs sont-ils produits

Partager

Gmail Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Plus