Publisher's Synopsis
This volume presents an advanced introduction to some of the most important issues lying at the intersection of philosophy of science, epistemology, and metaphysics. Four broad areas receive the lion′s share of attention: the nature of scientific confirmation, the nature of the so–called "physical modalities" (laws, causation, and objective chance), the relationship between the (many) "scientific" images of the world and the "manifest" image, and the nature of scientific explanation.
Philosopher Ned Hall takes a lightly historical approach, attempting to lay out the most interesting and significant contemporary positions on these topics, as responses to earlier and influential work of the logical empiricists in particular. The text provides both a sophisticated overview of fundamental philosophical questions about science and valuable insight into the many ways in which an understanding and close scrutiny of modern science can inform debate about traditional issues in metaphysics and epistemology.
