Theories Of Knowledge And Reality

How does science work? Does it tell us what the world is “really” like? What makes it different from other ways of understanding the universe? In Theory and Reality, Peter Godfrey-Smith addresses these questions by taking the reader on a grand tour of more than a hundred years of debate about science. The result is a completely accessible introduction to the main themes of the philosophy of science. Examples and asides engage the beginning student, a glossary of terms explains key concepts, and suggestions for further reading are included at the end of each chapter. Like no other text in this field, Theory and Reality combines a survey of recent history of the philosophy of science with current key debates that any beginning scholar or critical reader can follow. The second edition is thoroughly updated and expanded by the author with a new chapter on truth, simplicity, and models in science.

The contemporary treatment of this introduction to philosophy text uses an issues approach within a historical framework and includes critical thinking tools.

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Excerpt from Truth and Reality: An Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge IT is my hope that this volume may serve a pur pose as an introduction to the theory of knowledge. While we have pretentious works covering the field of logic and epistemology, we are not so well supplied with books giving a general survey of the main problems in volved in the investigation of truth. The time seems peculiarly ripe for such an effort. In the bewildering amount of discussion and misunderstanding to which the pragmatic movement has led, there is need for fresh em phasis of the main issues. There is also need for building out the pragmatic theory in neglected directions. In a small way, this book tries to serve both purposes. This book is intended to be used in connection with a course in elementary logic or as an introduction or sequel to it. It is hoped that its human interest will also make it available for the general philosophic reader and as an introduction to philosophy. To the cultured public, not technically trained in philosophy, the first and the last chapters may be of special interest. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

XIV The stability of a philosophical construction will depend not only upon the solidity of the blocks, of the pillars and architraves that make it up, but also upon the way in which all these parts are connected. Of course, it will not be possible to argue for every single part of a philosophical building: to do so would mean to embark in a virtually endless enterprise. Accordingly, some of the parts of a philosophical building will have to be taken from the literature on the subject as 'ready made' or 'semi-finished' elements, while others will be argued for in the course of building. This is what happened in my work too. In some cases (for in stance, in the case of epistemic relativism), my concern was to illustrate theses which I believed to be sufficiently consolidated, rather than to ar gue for them. In other cases - where I was directly engaged in building the theory that I want to fonnulate - I did exactly the opposite. This is what I have tried to achieve, for example, for those proper architraves of my construction, viz. the connection between scepticism and metaphysi cal realism. and the thesis of the nonnative value of the fundamental epistemological notions (truth, objectivity, and rationality).