Transcript The Received View of Science week 1

The Received View of Science
week 1
Economic
Methodology
Course information
Marcel Boumans
lectures
Wednesday 11:00-13:00
E9.13, 4197
[email protected]
all groups
A4.04
Murat Kotan
classes
Thursday
13:00-15:00
E9.08, 4299
[email protected]
group 1
E1.50
Thursday
group 2
15:00-17:00
E0.09
Assessment
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Written examination: January 25, 9:00-11:00.
Max. 20% exemption possible:
2 presentations in class
see Requirements presentation on blackboard
Reading material
Reader Economic Methodology
Including entries from The Handbook of
Economic Methodology.
Reading schedule
Wk 1: Ch.1, Positivism, Scientific Explanation
Wk 2: Ch. 2, Instrumentalism, Friedman, As if
Wk 3: Ch. 3, Duhem-Quine Thesis, Falsificationism,
Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes
Wk 4: Ch. 4, Paradigm/Normal Science, Relativism
Wk 5: Ch. 5, Sociology of Scientific Knowledge,
Reflexivity, Constructivism
Wk 6: Ch. 6, Rhetoric, Poststructuralism, Methodological
Pluralism
Wk 7: Ch. 7, Positive-Normative Distinction, Economics
and Ethics, Economics as a Profession
David Hume (1711-1776)
When we run over libraries, persuaded of these
principles, what havoc must we make? If we take
in our hand any volume of divinity or school
metaphysics, for instance, let us ask, Does it
contain any abstract reasoning concerning
quantity or number? No. Does it contain any
experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact
and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames,
for it can contain nothing but sophistry and
illusion. - An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding)
Wissenschaftliche Weltauffassung
Der Wiener Kreis 1929
Purity and clarity are aimed at, dark distances
and unfathomable depths declined. In science
there are no ‘depths,’ all over is surface...
Published by Ernst Mach Society
Rudolf Carnap, Otto Neurath, Hans Hahn, Kurt
Gödel, Phillip Frank, Viktor Kraft and Moritz
Schlick
Judgement of ...
Context of Discovery
Context of Justification
Eureka!
Research results
Logical reconstruction
Syntactics: logical structure
First-order language
variables
functions and predicates
logical symbols






x, y, z, …
A, B, C
(‘not’)
(‘and’)
(‘or’)
(‘if … then’)
(‘for all individuals
(‘for some individual’)
Axiomatization
Axiom 1
S1
Axiom 2
S2
S3
…
Axiom n
Sm
Meaningful sentences
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Analytical statements: true by definition
e.g. “A dog is an animal.” “5 + 3 = 8.”
Synthetic statements a posteriori:
e.g. “Bulldogs are dangerous.” “The US
unemployment rate is 4.7% in Oct. 2007.”
Synthetic a priori statements
E.g. “Every object or event that occurs within the
spatio-temporal universe has a cause.”
Analytical
Synthetic a posteriori
Scientific explanation
Explanation is an answer to a ‘why?’-question.
Carl Hempel deductive-nomological (DN) model:
True statements of initial conditions: c1, …, cn
Laws: L1, …, Lm
_____________________________________
Explanandum: E
Law (nomos)
Syntactic definition:
x[A(x)  B(x)]
Semantic requirements:
not accidental = unrestricted universal: not for
a particular object only and not for a definite
date or temporal period
Examples
“The surnames of all students taking Economic
Methodology consist of less than 20 letters.”
“Copper expands on heating.”
“As the price of a good or service increases,
consumer demand for the good or service will
decrease and vice versa.”
Symmetry thesis
Explanations:
initial conditions
?
_____________
explanandum
Prediction:
initial conditions
laws
_____________
?
?
laws
_____________
explanandum
The problem of induction
All swans we have observed are white.
 ?
All swans are white.
Is the next swan we will observe necessarily
white?
Instrumentalism
Laws are not
meaningful but useful:
Their truth value is not
crucial but how
effective laws are in
explaining and
predicting phenomena.
Moritz Schlick (1882-1936)
Confirmationism
Probabilistic laws
x[A(x)B(x)]
A(a)
____________
B(a)
y%
Rudolf Carnap (1891-1970)
y%
The problem of operationalisation
F=ma
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acceleration (a): defined in terms of ‘time’ and
‘position’, measured with a clock and a meter.
mass (m): defined in terms of weight,
measured with a spring balance at sea level on
the equator.
Force (F): ?