Reasoning on an Inconsistent basis: The Case of Scientific Theories
Sprache des Vortragstitels:
Englisch
Original Tagungtitel:
XXV World Congress of Philosophy
Sprache des Tagungstitel:
Englisch
Original Kurzfassung:
This paper deals with ?reasoning on an inconsistent basis in science?. I will provide examples from the history of science where theories were inconsistent and scientists kept working, and reasoning, with them. This is prohibited by classical logic due to logical explosion, so the
underlying logic of those theories cannot be classical. Therefore, a strong candidate that can explain this phenomenon is paraconsistent logic, a non-classical logic which is non-explosive. I suggest that
instead of focusing solely on the inconsistencies in the history of science, and their underlying logic, we need to accept the connection between the triptych science-logic-reasoning, which is something
that some dispute. This is so because to argue that scientific reasoning is based on non-classical logic, we need to accept that science and logic go hand-in-hand, and that logic and reasoning are intimately
connected. A connection that many philosophers of science abide by, but scientists do not always do so.
Forschungs-