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Title: Causality and Explanation by Wesley C. Salmon ISBN: 0-19-510864-7 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 December, 1997 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (2 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: state of the art -- understanding an indeterministic world
Comment: If you were forced to rely on only one book on the philosophy of science today (2002), this would be the one. A collection of 26 essays, "Causality and Explanation" represents the state of the art. Salmon dedicates the book to Carl G. Hempel, who developed the deductive-nomological, or covering law model of scientific explanation. Clearly, then, Salmon is no post-Kuhnian epistemological radical. There is progress beyond Hempel, but it is not in the social constructionist direction. Not for Salmon, anyway, and not for me either. Rather, it points in the direction of probabilistic, stochastic, explanation replacing the vestiges of Laplacian determinism. Many of the essays are quite dense, but the book contains a Key of sorts, in the form of three essays that are grouped as "Concise Overviews." Read these first and the rest makes much more sense. Salmon is an analytical philosopher, and analytical philosophy is a tradition that values clarity of expression. This book is a marvelous accomplishment. It has proved quite useful in clarifying my thinking as I try to teach sociology undergraduates the scientific method, particularly on the distinction between deterministic and probabilistic causation. It is truly sad that it is not read by everyone who ever runs into Thomas Kuhn and the postmodern vector that he inspired.
Rating: 5
Summary: The Portia de Rossi of Philosophy.
Comment: In an increasingly uncertain world Salmon has to be regarded as the heir to throne apparent vis a viz Scientific Explanation. The king is dead (Hempel) long live the king. This topic, as Salmon openly admits is currently a very sexy subject in philosophy. What Dame Edna Everage is to Epistemology, Portia de Rossi is to Scientific Explanation. Salmon ditches the Hempelian deductive nomological model with it's assumptions firmly rooted in Laplacian determinism and takes up the challenge of causality starting with Xeno's Arrow with his At-at theory combined with smatterings of Reichenbach's mark transmission theory and Railtons ideal explanatory text. In the end we have the leather glove of neo-causally underpinned explanation and pragmatic relevance slapping the likes of Hume and Russell firmly across the chops. His topic pervades all areas of scientific philosophy today and as with Four Decades Salmon references with a clarity and ease that makes reading his work an absolute luxury compared with much of contemporary philosophy - rife with punctuated unintelligible vernacular. If causality and explanation is your thang, Wes is your man. This publication is a must read for any budding empirically bent philosopher.
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Title: Causality: Models, Reasoning, and Inference by Judea Pearl ISBN: 0521773628 Publisher: Cambridge University Press Pub. Date: 01 March, 2000 List Price(USD): $43.00 |
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Title: Science Without Laws by Ronald N. Giere ISBN: 0226292088 Publisher: University of Chicago Press Pub. Date: 01 June, 1999 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
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Title: The Philosophy of Science : A Contemporary Introduction (Routledge Contemporary Introductions to Philosophy) by Alexander Rosenberg ISBN: 041515281X Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group Pub. Date: October, 2000 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Explaining Science: A Cognitive Approach by Ronald N. Giere ISBN: 0226292061 Publisher: University of Chicago Press Pub. Date: 01 June, 1990 List Price(USD): $22.48 |
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Title: Causation by Ernest Sosa, Michael Tooley ISBN: 0198750943 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 April, 1993 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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