Common-Sense Realism and the Unimaginable Otherness of Science
Bas van Fraassen endorses both common-sense realism — the view, roughly, that the ordinary macroscopic objects that we take to exist actually do exist — and constructive empiricism — the view, roughly, that the aim of science is truth about the observable world. But what happens if common-sense real...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina
2007-12-01
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| Series: | Principia: An International Journal of Epistemology |
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| Online Access: | http://www.periodicos.ufsc.br/index.php/principia/article/view/16482/15047 |
| Summary: | Bas van Fraassen endorses both common-sense realism — the view, roughly, that the ordinary macroscopic objects that we take to exist actually do exist — and constructive empiricism — the view, roughly, that the aim of science is truth about the observable world. But what happens if common-sense realism and science come into conflict? I argue that it is reasonable to think that they could come into conflict, by giving some motivation for a mental monist solution to the measurement problem of quantum mechanics. I then consider whether, in a situation where science favors the mental monist interpretation, van Fraassen would want to give up common-sense realism or would want to give up science. |
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| ISSN: | 1414-4247 1808-1711 |