Scientific metaphor builds a bridge between the given and representation, evidence and guess, convention and hypothesis, and makes it possible for scientists to stride forward from direct and immediate scientific facts and materials of empirical observation to possible and reasonable theoretical construction. It also sets up a springboard to finally realize creative leaps of scientific theories. In this way, scientific metaphor can surmount one-dimensional literal meaning and pure empirical criteria, dispel the stable referential theory and ossified logical construction, and get rid of the logical limits and bounds of the strict causal determinism. It deserves notice that some critics of scientific metaphor attempt to deny the methodological significance of metaphor by citing certain metaphorical cases that have failed in the history of science. However, we cannot take these cases to be the evidence of the whole failure of metaphor in methodology. Every scientific tradition has applied metaphor in different ways to achieve its descriptive function. The effective use of this special resource has great methodological significance and value.

Post positivist epistemology treats science as merely a matter of consensus. The main reason for that is the lack of objectivity. We argue that objectivity is not an essential claim for a scientific methodology. Science as an institutional enterprise is characterized mainly by progressive discourse and not by objectivity. In turn, progressiveness depends on a set of norms and regulative principles. This view of science as progressive discourse provides a more adequate basis for dealing with opinion conflicts, scientific methodology, and questions of authority in science than does the consensus view.

The ‘placement’ of new types of knowledge in certain theoretical systems is thought within the limits of the two side models: Every new knowledge is added to previous knowledge when the principle of cumulativity is used as base. The main problem is how this `addition` is realized. However, there is a second way; the existing system of knowledge collapses and then is constructed once again. The real process usually happens between these two poles. It depends on the compatibility between new knowledge and the theory whether previous knowledge will be preserved or will be destroyed and constructed anew. Together with the methods of verification and falsification it is also possible to examine the accuracy of new theoretical proposals by means of theoretical trial-and-error method. The implementation of this method, which is widely spread in practice, to theory is realized by the way of entering any new idea and proposal directly to the structure of the theory without any control. It becomes a criterion of truth whether or not new knowledge is compatible with the known theoretical system, which has already been tested, and whether it is native or alien to this system.

Taking user’s role and features as milestones for an approach on scientific representation has become a growing trend. We shall investigate the implications that pragmatics bring in the relevant debate. Proponents of pragmatic approaches support that questions such as ‘how an object represents another’ or ‘which features of a certain object represent the target of the representation and in what way’ can be answered only within the given context of representation’s use. Thus, attention is drawn to the intentionality of the representation, in contrast to the semantic tradition, according to which the representational function is based on morphic relations between the representation and the represented object. Given that scientific representations surrogate objects and phenomena in our studies, they should reproduce aspects, relations and interactions of them, possessing the appropriate features. Therefore, we support that user’s intention is not enough to build the representational relation on it. We claim that a) a sustainable and successful theory of scientific representations cannot be grounded on pragmatics b) pragmatic approaches undermine the objectivity of the knowledge inferred by representations c) the important role of the cognizing subject in a theory of scientific representation can be rescued without the burden coming with pragmatic approaches.

In his monograph on the Vienna Circle Kraft writes that “one of the earliest and most fundamental insights of the Vienna Circle” was “that no deductive or logical justification of induction is at all possible” (Kraft 1953, 130). In Logik der Forschung Popper developed his philosophical conception starting from a very emphatic critique of logical positivism and its alleged essential feature inductivism. Although Kraft’s assessment is essentially correct, as the present paper intends to show, Popper’s opinion prevailed and came to dominate philosophical handbooks for decades. However, it must be admitted that the Vienna Circle attitude towards induction might have been misleading, and in a sense invite misunderstandings. Whilst the members of the Schlick-Kreis clearly recognized the impossibility of any logical justification of induction, some of them believed that induction was a part and parcel of scientific conduct and instead of denying its existence they tried to change its epistemological status. The aim of this paper is twofold. Firstly, it is to display this evasive policy—namely, how to keep induction rationally, nevertheless without justification. Secondly, it is to demonstrate that Popper’s criticism of the 1930s was already by then an anachronism.

The paper analyzes the conception of Mode 2 Science as a new paradigm of doing science. First, main attributes of Mode 2 are characterized as: (1) research in the context of application; (2) trans-disciplinarity; (3) research centers dispersed and heterogenous; (4) a great degree of reflexivity and accountability; (5) new criteria of good science. Secondly, some consequences of developing science in that paradigm are indicated: seeing knowledge as a product and commodity, what changes an organizational form of science and ethical norms governing it as well as social functions of science; criteria of good research develop in the process of merging epistemic and non-epistemic values what incorporates ethical considerations into doing science; the idea of the autonomy of science is changed as the co-evolution of science and society is postulated. Thirdly, some question and objection are formulated. The paper finally shows theoretical and practical reasons why philosophical analysis of Mode 2 is necessary, including the fact that the development of science depends on our understanding of what science is.

Philosophy in the contemporary world is closely connected with the modern techno-scientific civilization. At the same time the present state of reality is defined by scientists as a non-equilibrium word. Scholars and especially methodologists as the subjects possessing the knowledge of thinking technology pay attention to studying the influence of information reality on a person’s life and activity. The focus of attention is directed to “situational” methodology. A set of heuristic methods of the research authorizing search and decision-making in the conditions of uncertainty is considered. Now it is important to estimate the tool value of such methodological means as fractality, attractor, chaos, emergence, complexity. Chaos is now thought of as a “cause of spontaneous structure genesis”. The attractor sets forming “the centre of slipping” into an accumulation point. By doing this the attractors seem to absorb the chaos, structure the surroundings and participate in creating order. Methodology is realized in the meaning of technology of activity which is projected onto the innovation sphere in the context of its genesis, adaptability, spreading and consumption. However it has become clear that scientific forecast is to enable us to avoid large-scale negative consequences of the global technological development.

The paper proves unproductiveness of instrumentalist ideology in interpretation of the nature of scientific concepts and theories. While legitimate on a short distance of science development, it however, inevitably leads on the “long run” of theories to stagnation in science development. The strategy of employing theoretical concepts merely as instruments of predicting new results deprives scientist of a stimulus to emerge “beyond the existing into the sphere of super-existing” (M Heidegger). Under “super existing” Heidegger understands metaphysics. The ignoring of “super-existence” blocks the access to the most valuable source of intelligibility of the very existence.

Modern theoretical physics consists of separate branches (such as classical and quantum mechanics, electrodynamics, etc.) with their own foundations (which is usually out of philosophical reflection). Physics branch foundations (PBF) consist of appropriate system of statements, which define basic ideal entities of a branch. The few of them are called “primary ideal objects” (PIOs). Physical theory of a phenomenon is based on secondary ideal object (SIO), which is built of PIOs (e.g. SIO as system of particles (PIO) with interactions between them). The result is the object-centred two level hierarchical structure of physical theories. PBF has a definite structure, which contains “theoretical ideal objects part” with stratums of physical model and mathematical motion description, and “operational part” with technical operations of preparing <P| and measuring |M>. PBF of contemporary quantum mechanics can be represented as a set of clear postulates, which fill this structure with concrete content. This set consists of 4 subsets: Schrödinger’s postulates, which introduce the mathematical image of the state in the form of wave function ΨA(t) and Schrödinger’s motion equation; Born’s postulates, which introduce probability into the concept of state; Heisenberg’s procedure of quantization; postulate of identity of quantum particles for many-particle systems.

Philosophy has sometimes been considered to be the science of science. Analogously, it can perhaps be called inquiry of inquiry. Traditional modern science has been aimed at acquiring knowledge of truth. Thus, it can be called knowledge-inquiry. It can be debated, however, whether knowledge of truth is the ultimate goal we have to achieve in science. Perhaps solving the problems of living should be brought to the foreground rather than the problems of knowledge. In order to fulfil this task, we have to exchange knowledge-inquiry for wisdom-inquiry as Nicholas Maxwell has suggested. The latter involves the quest for knowledge but adds its application to the picture. There has to be constant improvement of the aims of scientific research in order to reach for the problems of living. This can be achieved in the scope of a new Enlightenment. As the result, the position of social sciences and humanities will be turned into a fundamental one. The attempts to model these fields after physics have to be stopped. The main task of social sciences and humanities is decisively different from that of physics and all other natural sciences. A new methodology has to be invented for these intellectual fields.

“Presentism,” defined as a lack of interest in history in general, is a characteristic of many if not most Western philosophers, according to a recent contributor to the New York Times online philosophy forum, The Stone. Although I agree that most 20th century philosophers were “presentists,” I argue that contemporary philosophy is beginning to change its attitude toward history and that this is due, at least in part, to the influence of T. S. Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, which set a powerful example of a broader and more interdisciplinary image of the discipline. I do not examine what Kuhn said about paradigms, but I discuss several ways in which his work is itself a paradigm in the sense of being an exemplar for future research: 1) it takes a historical approach to a discipline that had traditionally been viewed as unhistorical; 2) it is profoundly interdisciplinary in that it undermines boundaries between traditional disciplines; 3) it has been fruitful in opening up new fields of research. Using these three criteria, I point to recent developments in philosophy that carry on Kuhn’s legacy and suggest some possible candidates for new paradigms.

A philosophical theory of explanation should provide solutions to a series of problems, both descriptive and normative. The aim of this essay is to establish the claim that this can be best done if one theorizes in terms of explanatory games rather than focusing on the explication of the concept of explanation. The development of the precise meaning of the concept of scientific explanation occupies centre-stage in all contemporary approaches. The alternative position that seems obvious and which is adopted is that of an explanatory pluralism. At every moment of time there is a stock of explanations available in a society proposed by ordinary people “in the wild” or by specialists organized formally or semi-formally within specific organizational structures such as churches, universities, etc. The terms of provision, control, and dissemination of explanations in this collective explanatory enterprise are regulated by the different rules that the participants have come to adopt over time. These rules incorporate the normative standards that guide the processes of discovery and justification of explanations as well as the modes of their communication, dissemination, and adoption. They constitute the rules of the explanatory game that the participants are playing. The philosophical project consists in describing and normatively appraising the rules that constitute these games. This project is fundamentally liberal, in the sense that participants and non-participants to the game alike engage in the critical discussion and revision of the rules or to put it in other terms, the project is fundamentally naturalistic - philosophers and scientists equally take part in it.

Nelson Goodman (1976) argued convincingly that in order to understand the representation relation one should dissociate it from the relation of resemblance because of the logical differences between the two concepts. Resemblance is reflexive and symmetric whereas representation is not. Furthermore, Goodman suggested that what lies at the core of representation is denotation. According to Goodman, if X represents Y then X must denote Y, but he recognized that by opting for an analysis of representation only based on this idea of denotation we run into problems. There are two reasons for this. The first reason is that X could be considered to be a representation of Y by mere stipulation. The second reason is that in many cases X represents Y but Y does not exist and thus there is nothing that X denotes. Both of these problems are important when addressing questions about scientific representation. First, we do not think that we do justice to scientific practices by thinking that scientific models represent by mere stipulation. Second, some of our scientific models represent what we often label ideal systems or ideal states of affairs, and if such systems do not exist in the actual world then it would also not make much sense to claim that our models denote such systems. I argue in this paper that there is a way to overcome these two problems and explicate “representation” by means of “denotation”.

Most contemporary proponents of scientific realism advocate some form of selective realism. One of the most prominent variants is the working posits view, which claims that the essential propositions of a successful theory are those that are involved in the actual derivations of predictions. In this paper, I offer a systematic examination of this view, surveying no fewer than six competing interpretations of it. I argue, however, that none is satisfactory. A general reason to reject the working posits view is that it focuses on individual successful derivations, as opposed to the empirical success of a theory as a whole. In response to this, I suggest an alternative positive view, which regards as essential those theoretical posits which “unify” a diverse or large collection of other posits.

Can science interpret morality? Ethics is pertinent to science. To explain morality scientifically is to understand moral concept and behaviour better. In view of Darwinism, the origin of morality is closely related to human hereditary evolution and biology can interpret morality. As it develops, science can interpret morality alone. Science can provide the only correct answer to the moral problems confronting us. But we should keep in mind that the interpretation has limitations and cannot decide or replace morality.

Davidson’s critique of conceptual relativism depends on the application of the principle of charity. I suggest that his argument is insufficient to reject a type of partial relativism. First, I propose a thought experiment, in order to show the shortcomings of the application of the principle of charity. Then, I examine the holism, as a possible answer to the experiment. Finally, I argue that Davidson either must leave the holism, or must accept a partial relativism.

Recently, David Lewis’ counterfactual theory of causation has been attacked by context-relativists, who point to a number of intuitively absurd consequences of Lewis’ view – e.g. that my birth is a cause of my death – in order to argue that whether or not an event c is a cause of some distinct event e varies relative to certain contextual factors. Not all (e.g. Menzies (2004); Schaffer (2005); Maslen (2004); Northcott (2007)) agree on how contexts should be fixed; but all argue that context-relative analyses better account for our intuitions about causes. In defense of his invariantist account, Lewis argues that the intuitions by which the relativist-accounts purport to be informed are, in fact, intuitions about contrastive explanation rather than causes. That is to say, Lewis accepts that my birth is a cause of my death, and argues that it is odd to say so precisely because the pragmatics of explanation deem saying so inappropriate in most cases. I will examine a definitive objection from Peter Menzies (2004) to Lewis’ proposed defence and argue that the former reveals that the true locus of the relativist-invariantist debate lies in the question of how we ought to order possible worlds.

There are two main sources of risk in contemporary society, one is uncertainty, the other is modern fracture arising from the rapid development of science and technology. From the perspective of risk research, current thinking is focused on the ethical dimension, neglecting culture fracture in specific countries and regions caused by the development of modern science and technology. This article attempts to discuss Chinese cultural fracture by analyzing the Chinese traditional culture and the characteristics of modern western science.

Time, as we know, belongs to the subjects not only of science but also of metaphysics and it certainly is an entity of a special kind; one needs adequate methodological tools to research it. Currently, one of such widespread tools is interdisciplinary approach. However, it appears that its use runs into a difficulty associated with the fact that reality of a scientific theory is set by its ontology. This means that the ontology of time in various scientific theories, strictly speaking, should be different. The ontology of scientific and metaphysical theories of time will differ even more. Consequently, the study of time as an interdisciplinary subject from a methodological point of view requires the introduction of such epistemological presupposition to understand the reality, to which the constructions of time both in the natural sciences and metaphysics could be considered ontologically coherent. It appears that the role of such one can play the premise associated with the belief in the existence of an external world independent from the perceiving subject (so-called the ultimate reality). Coherent interdisciplinary ontology of time is, in this case, a part of the study of ontology of the ultimate reality which is the subject both of science and metaphysics.

W. V. Quine (1908-2000) and P. Feyerabend (1924-1994) shared many essential ideas in both historical as well as methodological contexts. Both claimed to be descended from the Vienna Circle. Both inherited the result of the protocol statements debates taking place in the Circle and considered it a crucial part of their philosophies. Both resorted to something like conceptual schemes by which they interpreted all experiences, even the most commonplace ones (the idea of “ontology” for Quine and the idea of “theory” for Feyerabend). These similarities enlisted here do not intend to be exhaustive, yet they offer a picture that Quine and Feyerabend are analogous in their ideas. This helps us to see the significance of comparing them, especially the part that while Quine’s philosophy of science is not entirely exempted from the tag of relativism, nor should Feyerabend be considered a prominent member of “epistemological nihilism”. The outcome of this comparison shows that while Quine offered in fact a ‘tolerant’ philosophy of science, Feyerabend instead demonstrated his constructive view of science by proposing a pluralistic methodology.