DebateLabKIT/deepa2-corpus · Datasets at Hugging Face

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where even simple general claims based on our experience of things claim
much more than any empirical evidence we could have to justify them. So,
empiricism suffers from incompleteness in an analogous way to logicism in
the philosophy of mathematics, but, importantly, Quine suggests that the
epistemology of empirical knowledge is no worse off than mathematical
knowledge (see Roth, 96). Studies in mathematics lowered its epistemic
standards in fruitful ways, and given this analogy, empiricism can follow
suit. This requires moving from the attempt to reconstruct science logically
from experience, something which Quine accepts would be more epistemologically
adequate, and instead seeking a validation for scientifi c knowledge
from within the methods of science.
Quine ’ s argument is then an invitation for us to reconsider what empiricist
epistemology looks like once we adopt a holistic view of human knowledge
and accept the way this undermines an empiricist reduction of
knowledge to experience, while further viewing science as providing the
best remaining resources for addressing justifi catory issues in epistemology
(see Roth, 96 – 100). Within such constraints, he stresses the importance of
Quine’s Epistemology Naturalized 185
using the methods of science to justify scientifi c truths and to develop
explanatory accounts of the causal mechanisms responsible for the creation
of scientifi c theories.
The infl uence of this argument can be measured in terms of two contrasting
responses, one positive, the other critical. With regard to the fi rst,
Quine ’ s suggested reconstruction of epistemology has spawned numerous
attempts to offer more empirically informed accounts of human knowledge.
Such views appeal to a variety of different sciences such as evolutionary
biology, psychology, and neuroscience, and in the fi eld of philosophy of
science further use has been made of history and sociology. More generally,
Quine ’ s philosophical naturalism, where philosophy is to be conceived as
part of empirical science, has further infl uenced the development of work
in the philosophy of mind, language, ethics, and elsewhere. The second
more critical response has claimed that Quine ’ s suggested naturalization of
epistemology results in a curt dismissal of the central aims of epistemology.
Here, much of the attention has focused on Quine ’ s apparent rejection of
the normative aims of justifi cation leading to what many have viewed as a
radical changing of the subject. The result is the so - called “ replacement
interpretation, ” where Quine is taken as advocating the replacement of
normative epistemology, which seeks to assess critically and rationally the
evidential basis of our beliefs, with a psychological description of the causal
processes of belief acquisition (Gregory, 85 – 121).
Recent scholarship has suggested that this critical reading is mistaken
and has further emphasized that, in general, Quine ’ s proposal does not seek
to eliminate such normative concerns but, rather, explains how epistemology
can still remain normative in light of empiricism ’ s failures and the
ongoing progress of science.
[T]here remains a helpful thought, regarding epistemology generally, in
that duality of structure which was especially conspicuous in the foundations
of mathematics. I refer to the bifurcation into a theory of concepts, or
meaning, and a theory of doctrine, or truth; for this applies to the epistemology
of natural knowledge no less than to the foundations of mathematics.
The parallel is as follows. Just as mathematics is to be reduced to logic, or
logic and set theory, so natural knowledge is to be based somehow on sense
experience. This means explaining the notion of body in sensory terms; here
is the conceptual side. And it means justifying our knowledge of truths of
nature in sensory terms; here is the doctrinal side of the bifurcation. [ . . . ]
Philosophers have rightly despaired of translating everything into observational
and logico - mathematical terms. They have despaired of this even when
they have not recognized, as the reason for this irreducibility, that the statements
largely do not have their private bundles of empirical consequences.
And some philosophers have seen in this irreducibility the bankruptcy of
epistemology [ . . . ] But I think at this point it maybe more useful to say rather
186 Robert Sinclair
that epistemology still goes on, through in a new setting and a clarifi ed status.
Epistemology, or something like it, simply falls into place as a chapter of
psychology and hence of natural science. It studies a natural phenomenon,
viz., a physical human subject. This human subject is accorded a certain
experimentally controlled input – certain patterns of irradiation in assorted
frequencies, for instance – and in the fullness of time the subject delivers as
output a description of the three dimensional external world and its history.
The relation between the meager input and the torrential output is a relation
that we are prompted to study for somewhat the same reasons that always
prompted epistemology; namely, in order to see how evidence related to
theory, and in what ways one ’ s theory of nature transcends any available
evidence. (Quine 71, 82 – 3)
P1. There are important parallels between studies in the foundations of
natural science and studies in the foundations of mathematics that can
help illuminate the epistemology of empirical knowledge.
P2. The logicist project of constructing logical procedures for the codifi cation
of mathematical truths contained two elements: a conceptual one
that defi ned mathematical notions in terms of logic, and a doctrinal
component that derived mathematical truths using logical techniques.
C1. The empiricist attempt to provide an evaluation or derivation of
scientifi c truths on the basis of sensory experience contains the same
general features: a conceptual side concerned with the defi nition of
concepts in sensory terms, and a doctrinal side focusing on the justifi
cation of truths of nature in sensory terms (analogy, P1, P2).
P3. If the empiricist program is to be successful, it then needs to address:
(A) The conceptual requirement of showing how theoretical concepts
(e.g., body) can be defi ned in terms of sensory experience.
(B) The doctrinal requirement of showing how scientifi c laws or generalizations
can be derived from sense experience.
P4. (A) cannot be achieved because concepts and sentences have experiential
consequences only as a collective body, and not in isolation from each
other (holism). (B) cannot be achieved because even the simplest generalizations
based on experience outrun the empirical evidence (Hume ’ s
problem).
C2. No independent philosophical foundation for science is then available
within empiricism ( modus tollens , P3, P4).
P5. There are no better standards of justifi cation available between formal
derivation and the standards of empirical science itself (Quine ’ s scalar

where even simple general claims based on our experience of things claim

much more than any empirical evidence we could have to justify them. So,

empiricism suffers from incompleteness in an analogous way to logicism in

the philosophy of mathematics, but, importantly, Quine suggests that the

epistemology of empirical knowledge is no worse off than mathematical

knowledge (see Roth, 96). Studies in mathematics lowered its epistemic

standards in fruitful ways, and given this analogy, empiricism can follow

suit. This requires moving from the attempt to reconstruct science logically

from experience, something which Quine accepts would be more epistemologically

adequate, and instead seeking a validation for scientifi c knowledge

from within the methods of science.

Quine ’ s argument is then an invitation for us to reconsider what empiricist

epistemology looks like once we adopt a holistic view of human knowledge

and accept the way this undermines an empiricist reduction of

knowledge to experience, while further viewing science as providing the

best remaining resources for addressing justifi catory issues in epistemology

(see Roth, 96 – 100). Within such constraints, he stresses the importance of

Quine’s Epistemology Naturalized 185

using the methods of science to justify scientifi c truths and to develop

explanatory accounts of the causal mechanisms responsible for the creation

of scientifi c theories.

The infl uence of this argument can be measured in terms of two contrasting

responses, one positive, the other critical. With regard to the fi rst,

Quine ’ s suggested reconstruction of epistemology has spawned numerous

attempts to offer more empirically informed accounts of human knowledge.

Such views appeal to a variety of different sciences such as evolutionary

biology, psychology, and neuroscience, and in the fi eld of philosophy of

science further use has been made of history and sociology. More generally,

Quine ’ s philosophical naturalism, where philosophy is to be conceived as

part of empirical science, has further infl uenced the development of work

in the philosophy of mind, language, ethics, and elsewhere. The second

more critical response has claimed that Quine ’ s suggested naturalization of

epistemology results in a curt dismissal of the central aims of epistemology.

Here, much of the attention has focused on Quine ’ s apparent rejection of

the normative aims of justifi cation leading to what many have viewed as a

radical changing of the subject. The result is the so - called “ replacement

interpretation, ” where Quine is taken as advocating the replacement of

normative epistemology, which seeks to assess critically and rationally the

evidential basis of our beliefs, with a psychological description of the causal

processes of belief acquisition (Gregory, 85 – 121).

Recent scholarship has suggested that this critical reading is mistaken

and has further emphasized that, in general, Quine ’ s proposal does not seek

to eliminate such normative concerns but, rather, explains how epistemology

can still remain normative in light of empiricism ’ s failures and the

ongoing progress of science.

[T]here remains a helpful thought, regarding epistemology generally, in

that duality of structure which was especially conspicuous in the foundations

of mathematics. I refer to the bifurcation into a theory of concepts, or

meaning, and a theory of doctrine, or truth; for this applies to the epistemology

of natural knowledge no less than to the foundations of mathematics.

The parallel is as follows. Just as mathematics is to be reduced to logic, or

logic and set theory, so natural knowledge is to be based somehow on sense

experience. This means explaining the notion of body in sensory terms; here

is the conceptual side. And it means justifying our knowledge of truths of

nature in sensory terms; here is the doctrinal side of the bifurcation. [ . . . ]

Philosophers have rightly despaired of translating everything into observational

and logico - mathematical terms. They have despaired of this even when

they have not recognized, as the reason for this irreducibility, that the statements

largely do not have their private bundles of empirical consequences.

And some philosophers have seen in this irreducibility the bankruptcy of

epistemology [ . . . ] But I think at this point it maybe more useful to say rather

186 Robert Sinclair

that epistemology still goes on, through in a new setting and a clarifi ed status.

Epistemology, or something like it, simply falls into place as a chapter of

psychology and hence of natural science. It studies a natural phenomenon,

viz., a physical human subject. This human subject is accorded a certain

experimentally controlled input – certain patterns of irradiation in assorted

frequencies, for instance – and in the fullness of time the subject delivers as

output a description of the three dimensional external world and its history.

The relation between the meager input and the torrential output is a relation

that we are prompted to study for somewhat the same reasons that always

prompted epistemology; namely, in order to see how evidence related to

theory, and in what ways one ’ s theory of nature transcends any available

evidence. (Quine 71, 82 – 3)

P1. There are important parallels between studies in the foundations of

natural science and studies in the foundations of mathematics that can

help illuminate the epistemology of empirical knowledge.

P2. The logicist project of constructing logical procedures for the codifi cation

of mathematical truths contained two elements: a conceptual one

that defi ned mathematical notions in terms of logic, and a doctrinal

component that derived mathematical truths using logical techniques.

C1. The empiricist attempt to provide an evaluation or derivation of

scientifi c truths on the basis of sensory experience contains the same

general features: a conceptual side concerned with the defi nition of

concepts in sensory terms, and a doctrinal side focusing on the justifi

cation of truths of nature in sensory terms (analogy, P1, P2).

P3. If the empiricist program is to be successful, it then needs to address:

(A) The conceptual requirement of showing how theoretical concepts

(e.g., body) can be defi ned in terms of sensory experience.

(B) The doctrinal requirement of showing how scientifi c laws or generalizations

can be derived from sense experience.

P4. (A) cannot be achieved because concepts and sentences have experiential

consequences only as a collective body, and not in isolation from each

other (holism). (B) cannot be achieved because even the simplest generalizations

based on experience outrun the empirical evidence (Hume ’ s

problem).

C2. No independent philosophical foundation for science is then available

within empiricism ( modus tollens , P3, P4).

P5. There are no better standards of justifi cation available between formal

derivation and the standards of empirical science itself (Quine ’ s scalar