Does All Knowledge Come from Experience?: Hume and the Necessity of Experience
David Hume, the third major empiricist starts from the premise that all knowledge of the world must come from experience. He underscores this point by emphasizing how much more vivid sense impressions are than the copies we make of them by merely th...
Does All Knowledge Come from Experience?: Empiricism's Alliance with the Natural Sciences
Empiricists from Locke to the present feel a close alliance with the natural sciences, inspired by Newton's theories of science "inferred from the phenomena." One of the things that distinguishes empiricists from rationalists is that they tend to ad...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Conflict Between Consensus Theories of Truth and Popper's Scientific Realism
Agreement in a community of scientists can also be taken as a measure of truth, a human-centered concept that Arthur Fine calls "consensus theories of truth." In looking at the shift from Sir Isaac Newton's theory of gravity to Albert Einstein's, Ka...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Coherence Theory of Truth, The
A second general theory of truth that arises as part of idealism holds that truth comes from the way our various beliefs, thoughts and judgments cohere with each other. Coherence theory can be accused of leaving out external reality, but it focuses ...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Conceptual Relativism
Conceptual relativism in many ways parallels the coherence theory of truth. The idea is that any representation of reality will always be influenced by the information available. There undoubtedly will be opposing points of view that do not reconcil...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Quantum Mechanics Challenge to Theories of Truth: Bohr and the Instrumentalist View
One of the sharpest debates between the realist and instrumentalist views of science comes in relation to quantum mechanics, the theory of atomic and subatomic phenomena which led to breakthroughs in atomic energy, lasers, and electricity. When you ...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Pragmatism Theory of Truth, The
A third theory of truth known as pragmatism considers success to be the main marker of truth. In contrast with intellectualists who view truth as a stagnant property, pragmatists test the performance of a belief by seeing if it can sustain an indust...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Quantum Mechanics Challenge to Theories of Truth: Einstein and the Realist View
The realist side of the quantum mechanics debate is headed by Albert Einstein, the most eminent scientist of the era. Einstein proposes that if quantum theory breaks down categories such as space and time we should look for a different set of concep...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Instrumental Side of Pragmatism, The
Pragmatic criteria guided early creatures in evolutionary history toward those activities that would enhance their survival. Similarly, in its application to science, pragmatism or instrumentalism as its sometimes called, looks for theories that are...
Does Science Give Us Truth?: Correspondence Theory of Truth and Scientific Realism, The
The correspondence theory of truth is considered the default position about truth. If a statement is true it is because it corresponds to some feature, some reality in the world independent of our ideas abut it. An approach to science called scienti...