Hostname: page-component-5b777bbd6c-2c8nx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-06-24T10:41:41.622Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Discovery and Justification

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Carl R. Kordig
Carl R. Kordig*
Affiliation:
Georgetown University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The distinction between discovery and justification is ambiguous. This obscures the debate over a logic of discovery. For the debate presupposes the distinction. Real discoveries are well established. What is well established is justified. The proper distinctions are three: initial thinking, plausibility, and acceptability. Logic is not essential to initial thinking. We do not need good supporting reasons to initially think of an hypothesis. Initial thoughts need be neither plausible nor acceptable. Logic is essential, as Hanson noted, to both plausibility and acceptability. An hypothesis needs good supporting reasons to be either plausible or acceptable. Such reasons need not be relative to the particular scientific theory undergoing test at the time. There is no fundamental difference between reasons relevant to plausibility and acceptability. The difference is one of degree. Acceptability requires more than plausibility.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 45 , Issue 1 , March 1978 , pp. 110 - 117
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1978

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

†

Earlier versions of this paper were read at the Minnesota Center for the Philosophy of Science (April, 1974), the Washington Philosophy Club (February, 1975), and Memphis State University (February, 1976). A referee's comments for this journal were quite helpful.

References

[1] Achinstein, P. “Reply.” In Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science. Vol. 5. Ed. by Stuewer, R. H. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1970. Pp. 109–111.Google Scholar
[2] Braithwaite, R. Scientific Explanation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1953.Google Scholar
[3] Darden, L. “Reasoning in Scientific Change: Charles Darwin, Hugo De Vries, and the Discovery of Segregation.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 7 (1976): 127–169.10.1016/0039-3681(76)90014-5CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[4] Feigl, H. “Empiricism at Bay? Revisions and a New Defense.” In Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science. Vol. 14. Ed. by Cohen, R. S. and Wartofsky, M. W. Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel Publishing Co., 1974. Pp. 1–20.Google Scholar
[5] Hanson, N. R. “The Idea of a Logic of Discovery.” In What I Do Not Believe and Other Essays. Ed. by Toulmin, S. and Woolf, H. Dordrecht. Holland: D. Reidel, 1971.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[6] Kordig, C. R. The Justification of Scientific Change. Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel, 1974.Google Scholar
[7] Kordig, C. R. “Observational Invariance.” Philosophy of Science 40 (1973): 558–569.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[8] Kuhn, T. S. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970.Google Scholar
[9] Margenau, H. The Nature of Physical Reality. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1950.Google Scholar
[10] Margenau, H. Open Vistas. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1961.Google Scholar
[11] Margenau, H. “What is a Theory.” In The Structure of Economic Science. Ed. by Krupp, S. R. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1966. Pp. 25–28.Google Scholar
[12] Maritain, J. Scholasticism and Politics. New York: Macmillan, 1940.Google Scholar
[13] Maritain, J. Formal Logic. (Translated by Imelda Choquette.) New York: Sheed and Ward, 1946.Google Scholar
[14] Popper, K. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1965.Google Scholar
[15] Reichenbach, H. Experience and Prediction. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1938.Google Scholar
[16] Salmon, W, The Foundations of Scientific Inference. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1967.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[17] Schaffner, K. “Logic of Discovery and Justification in Regulatory Genetics.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 4 (1974): 349–385.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
[18] Shapere, D. “Plausibility and Justification in the Development of Science.” The Journal of Philosophy 63 (1966): 611–621.10.2307/2024256CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[19] Shapere, D. “Scientific Theories and Their Domains.” In The Structure of Scientific Theories Ed. by Suppe, F. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1974. Pp. 518–565.Google Scholar