Scientific theories
What is a scientific theory ? Philosophical accounts are often divided into:
- Statement, or syntactic, views
- Focuses on scientific theories as linguistic entities, usually in a formal language
- Originates with the logical positivists (Carnap, Hempel, etc)
- Non-statement, or semantic, views
- Focuses on theories as families of models (mathematical structures)
- Originates with Evert Beth and Patrick Suppes
- Prominent defenders are Giere, Suppe, and van Fraassen
There are also pragmatic views that reject a purely formal account of scientific theories.
Personally, I find the dichotomy between statement and non-statement theories to be rather strange, as syntax and semantics are both indispensable in logic: you cannot have one without the other. Model-theoretic realism elegantly incorporates both perspectives.
Literature
Syntacic views
- Ruttkamp, 2002, Ch. 3: The statement account of science (doi)
Semantic views
See also page on scientific models.
- Ladyman & Ross, 2007: Every Thing Must Go, Sec. 2.3.3: The semantic approach
- Ruttkamp, 2002, Ch. 4: Variations on the non-statement view of science (doi)
- Lorenzano, 2013: The semantic conception and the structuralist view of
theories: A critique of Suppe’s criticisms (doi)
- Argues, against Suppe, that the structuralist view of theories belongs to the family of semantic conceptions
- Sec. 6: Short historical overview with helpful bibliography