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Explanation in science (view source)
Revision as of 19:54, February 20, 2016
, 19:54, February 20, 2016causal explanations
{| class="infobox bordered" style="font-size:95%; width:25em;"
! style="font-size:120%; background:green; text-align:center; padding:5px 0;" | Causal explanations
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| style="padding:15px;" |«''Facts are reliable, but readers of facts will inevitably and legitimately differ about causal explanations.''»
<div style="padding-left:40px;">— Henry Power<ref name="Rappaport1997">{{cite book |title=When Geologists Where Historians, 1665-1750 |author=Rhoda Rappaport |publisher=Cornell University Press |place=Ithaca and London |year=1997 |pages=62-3 |isbn=978-0801-433863 |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=30U3W2kI7foC |quote=}}</ref> </div>
|}
'''Explanation in [[science]]''' is a description of the unknown in terms of the [[knowledge|known]].<ref name="DismantlingBB">{{cite book|author=Alex Williams, John Hartnett|title=Dismantling the Big Bang|publisher=Master Books|location=Green Forest, AR, USA|year=2005|page=128|pages=346|isbn=978-0-89051-437-5|url=http://books.google.no/books?id=FR7basoxkSwC&printsec=frontcover&dq=hartnett+dismantling+the+big+bang&hl=en&sa=X&ei=JvNwT_6nJJOP4gTP6fG_Ag&sqi=2&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=hartnett%20dismantling%20the%20big%20bang&f=false|quote=}}</ref> When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behavior, it is difficult to test it [[experimental science|experimentally]], much less use it as a catalyst for [[scientific discovery]].<ref>{{cite web |author=Philip Skell |title=Why Do We Invoke Darwin?|publisher=The Scientist|date=August 29, 2005 |url=http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/16649/title/Why-Do-We-Invoke-Darwin-/|accessdate=June 13, 2013}}</ref> Explanation in science, and anywhere else, if it is to avoid an [[infinite regress]], always lead to certain things that are regarded as [[First cause|ultimate]].<ref name="LENNOX">{{cite book
'''Explanation in [[science]]''' is a description of the unknown in terms of the [[knowledge|known]].<ref name="DismantlingBB">{{cite book|author=Alex Williams, John Hartnett|title=Dismantling the Big Bang|publisher=Master Books|location=Green Forest, AR, USA|year=2005|page=128|pages=346|isbn=978-0-89051-437-5|url=http://books.google.no/books?id=FR7basoxkSwC&printsec=frontcover&dq=hartnett+dismantling+the+big+bang&hl=en&sa=X&ei=JvNwT_6nJJOP4gTP6fG_Ag&sqi=2&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=hartnett%20dismantling%20the%20big%20bang&f=false|quote=}}</ref> When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behavior, it is difficult to test it [[experimental science|experimentally]], much less use it as a catalyst for [[scientific discovery]].<ref>{{cite web |author=Philip Skell |title=Why Do We Invoke Darwin?|publisher=The Scientist|date=August 29, 2005 |url=http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/16649/title/Why-Do-We-Invoke-Darwin-/|accessdate=June 13, 2013}}</ref> Explanation in science, and anywhere else, if it is to avoid an [[infinite regress]], always lead to certain things that are regarded as [[First cause|ultimate]].<ref name="LENNOX">{{cite book
|author=John C. Lennox
|author=John C. Lennox
|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=jaV4gLt24HYC
|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=jaV4gLt24HYC
|isbn=978-0-7459-5371-7
|isbn=978-0-7459-5371-7
|quote=}}</ref>
|quote=}}</ref> Claude Perrrault remarked that the main aim of science was to explain effects as best one could. However, as there may possibly be different causes capable of producing the same effect, it is hard to achieve agreed-upon explanation even for a single [[phenomenon]]. The French expression ''"le moins mal qu'il est possible"''{{#tag:ref|ca. The least wrong is what is possible.|group=note}} conveying this pessimism occurs already in Claude's Perrault's 1680 ''Essais de physique''.<ref name="Rappaport1997"/>
== Notes ==
<references group=note/>
== References ==
== References ==