Methodology of Science: An Introduction

Description

The book is divided into six chapters. The first, “Science and its methodological characteristics”, tackles the question of how we can distinguish science from other fields, such as “common sense”, pseudoscientific systems and religion. In the second chapter, “A toolbox of scientific methods”, we zoom in on some of the methods of science used at the linguistic (conceptual) and empirical levels of scientific research. Chapter 3, “Types of scientific research: the h-d model” introduces the hypothetico-deductive model, a model of scientific research which is illustrated using (certain parts of) Durkheim's study of Suicide. It offers a basic characterization of the main stages of (empirical) research and looks at the roles played by the various methods. The fourth chapter, “Hypotheses and empirical evidence”, concentrates on the relationship between empirical data (or evidence) on the one hand and (testable) hypotheses on the other. We introduce some of the main approaches and basic concepts used to test hypotheses. In some disciplines, “causal language” is used to describe or explain certain phenomena. Therefore, the fifth chapter, “Causation and its role in science” provides an overview of some of the philosophical approaches to questions such as “What are causes?” and “Under what conditions can an event, phenomenon, or fact, be identified as the cause of another event, phenomenon or fact?”. Finally, the last chapter, “Scientific explanation”, offers a bird's-eye view and critical analysis of the main models of scientific explanation that dominated the methodological debates in the latter half of the 20th century. Contents......Page 5 Preface......Page 11 Science and society......Page 15 The problem of demarcation......Page 16 Methodological traits of science......Page 20 Methodology of science: a science of science......Page 26 Study questions......Page 27 What makes a method scientific?......Page 29 Language and meaning......Page 33 The method of definition......Page 37 The method of explication......Page 47 Methods of analysis......Page 51 Classification......Page 53 Methods of abstraction and idealization......Page 60 Reasoning as a method......Page 63 Observation......Page 99 Measurement......Page 103 Experimentation......Page 110 Study questions......Page 112 Typology of research......Page 115 Émile Durkheim on suicide......Page 120 The structure of scientific research: The h-d model......Page 126 Study questions......Page 134 Data, evidence and the logical form of hypotheses......Page 137 Verification, falsification and models of confirmation......Page 148 Verifiable and verified hypotheses......Page 149 The falsification of hypotheses......Page 150 Models of the confirmation and disconfirmation of hypotheses......Page 152 Study questions......Page 164 Introduction......Page 167 Causation: concepts and approaches......Page 168 Regularity theories of causation......Page 169 Causes as inus conditions......Page 173 The counterfactual approach......Page 177 Probabilistic theories of causation......Page 181 Manipulationist accounts......Page 185 Using theories of causation......Page 189 Study questions......Page 190 Scientific Explanation......Page 191 Models of scientific explanation......Page 192 The deductive-nomological model of explanation......Page 193 The inductive-statistical model......Page 202 Causal models......Page 207 Concluding remarks......Page 212 References......Page 213 Subject Index......Page 225 Name Index......Page 231