The Scientific Practice Turn as Philosophical Progress

Abstract

Some philosophers have made a turn to scientific practice in the past few decades. In their work, they pay more careful attention to the contingencies of local context, history and perspective in science. After a literature review which examines what the turn consists in, this thesis argues two things. First, that the practice turn not only disagrees with other schools in philosophy about what is true and how to ascertain it, but also in how to characterise philosophical problems and questions and in what it means to have a successful philosophical inquiry. Second, that the practice turn uncovers problems in the thought of Popper, Reichenbach, and others, and systematically resolves those problems by means of the alternate characterisations supplied by the practice turn. I consider several such problems, including conventionalism, grounding methodological rules, logical coordination between theories and reality, and inference to the existence of theoretical entities. Non-practice-oriented approaches fall into question begging, infinite regress, empty abstraction, or empirical falsehood. Taking local context and the analysis of practice into account helps resolve the problems. Thus, far from jeopardising the normative force of the philosophy of science, the analysis of research activities represents progress in doing just that.