Analyticity: Carnap, Quine, and the Structure of Science

原教旨主义者不断提出“创造论科学”，他们声称，在我们学校的生物学教学中，创造论科学应该与达尔文的进化论并列。事实上，在弗吉尼亚州最近的选举中，有人试图选出一个支持神创论科学教学的学校董事会。然而对科学家来说，“神创论科学”这个词本身就是一个矛盾修饰法。神创论建立在启示宗教的基础上，而科学则是由经验支持或证明的。但“有经验支持”是什么意思呢？除非我们知道什么是经验证实，否则我们怎么能从经验上证实任何理论呢？从循环的痛苦来看，确认理论本身必须独立于经验证据而建立。否则，我们就会说，我们相信某种确认理论仅仅是因为该理论向我们保证，在这种情况下，它本身是值得相信的。此外，即使是最纯粹的经验主义学说，似乎也预设了一些不能用经验检验的东西（或者至少不是非循环的），即观察是可信的。支持信念的经典答案是直觉。然而，直觉是对直接的形而上学洞察力的一种呼吁，是对独立事实的非观察性把握。然而，对于任何认真对待科学的人，或者就此而言，对于任何想要将“神创论”与科学区分开来的人来说，这样的答案是令人震惊的。在这项资助下，Richard Creath教授正在研究过去50年来科学哲学领域的两位最重要的领导者鲁道夫·卡尔纳普（Rudolf Carnap） W. V. O.奎因（W. V. O. Quine）对科学如何被证明是正当的两个相互竞争的答案。这两位科学哲学家塑造了后人对我们如何看待证明科学信仰的过程的看法。利用最近才获得的文献，克瑞斯教授将比以往更充分地阐述卡尔纳普和奎因的不同科学哲学，以及他们各自对对方提出的尖锐批评。然后，他将依次扩展和发展这些批评，以便将卡纳普-奎因辩论的论点充分应用于当前科学哲学中的问题。因此，这项研究有望在澄清基于经验证明的科学与源于神圣或接受的来源的“科学”之间的区别方面走很长的路。

"Creationist science" is continually being raised by fundamentalists who claim that it should have standing beside Darwinian evolutionary theory in the teaching of biology in our schools. In fact, in the recent elections in Virginia, attempts were made to elect a school board which would support the teaching of creationist science. Yet for scientists, the very words "creationist science" is an oxymoron. Creationism is based on revealed religion while science is empirically supported or justified. But what does this mean, "empirically supported"? How can we empirically confirm any theory unless we know what empirical confirmation is? And on pain of circularity it appears that that theory of confirmation must itself be established independently of the empirical evidence. Otherwise, we would be saying that we believe some theory of confirmation simply because that theory assures us that it itself is worth believing in the circumstances. Furthermore, even the barest empiricist doctrine seems to presuppose something that cannot be tested empirically (or at least not noncircularly so), namely that observation is to be trusted. The classical answer to support of beliefs is intuition. Intuition, however, is an appeal to a direct metaphysical insight, a non-observational grasp of independent matters of fact. Such an answer, though, answer is appalling to anyone who takes science seriously or, for that matter, anyone who wants to distinguish "creationism" from science. Under this grant, Professor Richard Creath is examining the competing answers to how science is justified which were given by two of the foremost leaders in the field of philosophy of science over the past fifty years: Rudolf Carnap W. V. O. Quine. These two philosophers of science have shaped the views of succeeding generations on how we are to conceive of the process of justifying our scientific beliefs. Using documents that have only recently become available, Professor Creath will articulate more fully than has been possible heretofore Carnap's and Quine's alternative philosophies of science and the searching criticisms that each made of the other. He will then extend and develop these criticisms in turn so as to bring the arguments of the Carnap-Quine debate fully to bear on current issues in the philosophy of science. This research thus promises to go a long way in clarifying the difference between a science that is based on empirical justification from a "science" that originates from divine or received sources.