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Full Description
This book presents a thoroughly empiricist account of physics. By providing an overview of the development of empiricism from Ockham to van Fraassen the book lays the foundation for its own version of empiricism. Empiricism for the author consists of three ideas: nominalism, i.e. dismissing second order quantification as unnecessary, epistemological naturalism, and viewing classification of things in natural kinds as a human habit not in need for any justification.
The book offers views on the realism-antirealism debate as well as on the individuation of theories as a thoroughly neglected aspect of underdetermination. The book next discusses a broad range of topics, including the predicates body, spatial distance and time interval, the ontology of electromagnetism, propensities, the measurement problem and other philosophical issues in quantum theory. Discussions about the direction of time and about string theory make up the final part of thebook.
Contents
Preface.- Part I. Background. 1. Problems in Philosophy of Physics.- 2. Some Important Episodes in the History of Physics.- Part II. General Philosophy of Science. 3. Empiricism from Ockham to van Fraassen.- 4. Mathematical Knowledge and Mathematical Objects.- 5. Induction and Concept Formation.- 6. Explanation, Unification and Reduction.- 7. Realism, Theory-Equivalence and Underdetermination of Theories.- Part III. Philosophy of Physics. 8 Causation in Physics.- 9. Space, Time and Body; Three Fundamental Concepts.- 10. Laws.- 11. Electromagnetism: Fields or Particles?.- 12. Propensities.- 13. Direction of Time.- 14. Identity, Individuation, Indistinguishability and Entanglement.- 15. Quantum Waves and Indeterminacy.- 16. The Measurement Problem.- 17. What is Spacetime?.- 18. Summary and Conclusions.- Bibliography.- Index.
