Making Prehistory Historical Science and the Scientific Realism Debate

Name: Making Prehistory Historical Science and the Scientific Realism Debate
Price: 46.07 USD
Availability: InStock
ISBN: 9781107406384

ISBN-10: 1107406382

ISBN-13: 9781107406384

Edition: 2012

Authors: Derek Turner

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Description:

Scientists often make surprising claims about things that no one can observe. In physics, chemistry, and molecular biology, scientists can at least experiment on those unobservable entities, but what about researchers in fields such as paleobiology and geology who study prehistory, where no such experimentation is possible? Do scientists discover facts about the distant past or do they, in some sense, make prehistory? In this 2007 book Derek Turner argues that this problem has surprising and important consequences for the scientific realism debate. His discussion covers some of the main positions in philosophy of science - realism, social constructivism, empiricism, and the natural…

Book details

Copyright year: 2012
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Publication date: 8/16/2012
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 238
Size: 5.98" wide x 9.02" long x 0.51" tall
Weight: 0.726
Language: English

Derek Turner is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Connecticut College



Introduction



Asymmetries



The colors of the dinosaurs



Manipulation matters



Paleontology's chimeras



Novel predictions in historical science



Making prehistory: could the past be socially constructed?



The natural historical attitude



Snowball Earth in the balance


Conclusion