Science and its Limits: Contemporary and Kantian Perspectivesifpp.fk14.tu-dortmund.de/cms/ifpp/de/forschung/... · the Limits of Science? Reflections on Present-Day Cosmology and

ScienceanditsLimits:ContemporaryandKantianPerspectives

April11–12,2019

TUDortmund,Germany

Organizers:KristinaEngelhard(TUDortmundUniversity)andClausBeisbart(UniversityofBern)

Conferencedescription:

Doessciencehaveitslimits?Arethereprincipledboundstowhathumanscanknow,graspor understand using scientificmethods? Or will the success story of scientific discoveriescontinueuntileverythingisknowninscientificterms?Giventhespectacularbreakthroughsthat the history of science has seen, it may first seem unlikely that there are principledlimitations of scientific inquiry. In philosophy, a naturalistic worldview is popular, whichleaves no space for things that are not in principle accessible to scientific inquiry. But atcloser inspectionof various special sciences, thereare reasons tobecomemore skeptical.For instance, in fundamental physics, researchers got stuck in their attempts to representgravitation and the other forces in a unified theory. In cosmology, there is an intensivedebateaboutthequestionofwhetherascientificcaseforthemultiversecanbemade.JohnHorgan,inhis1996book,wentasfarastoclaimtheendofscience.Thisconferenceaimstocontrastandcomparecontemporaryperspectivesonscienceanditslimits with Kant’s view on this topic. Relating Kant’s arguments to science as it is donenowadays is verynatural sincemanyof his skeptical points have apredictive component:they foretell that certain kinds of knowledge will not become feasible. Were Kant’spredictionsright?Ordoadvancesin,e.g.,moderncosmologyormolecularbiologyshowthathegot itwrong?Ifso, istherestillanyvalue inhisverdictsoncosmologyandmechanisticexplanation?Mayheevenhavesucceededincallingattentiontofundamentalproblemsthatarestill relevant today?Anddoeshisœuvrecontain resources foraconvincingcritiqueofnaturalism?Thesearesomeofthequestionsthatshallbeaddressedbythecontributionstothisconference.Onefocus liesonsomespecialsciences,e.g.,cosmology,but furthermoretheconferencecoversaspectsofKant’sgeneralphilosophyofscience,e.g.,unificationanditslimitations.TheconferenceisorganizedinhonorofBrigitteFalkenburg.

Speakers:

ClausBeisbart(Bern)

SilviaDeBianchi(Barcelona)

NancyCartwright(SanDiego,Durham)

KristinaEngelhard(TUDortmund)

AndreasHüttemann(Cologne)

KatharinaKraus(NotreDame)

WolfgangRhode(Dortmund)

GregorSchiemann(Wuppertal)

ConferenceVenue:

Emil-Figge-Str.50,RoomEF50,R.0.442,44227Dortmund,Germany

Participation:

Interestedscholarsarewelcometoattendtheconference.Attendanceisfreeofcharge,but

onlyalimitednumberofplacesareavailable.

Toregister,[email protected],2019.

Weblink:https://bit.ly/2T7yt48

Program

Day1(April11,2019)

14:00–14:15 KristinaEngelhard,ClausBeisbart WelcomeandIntroduction

LimitsoftheSpecialSciences:TheExamplesofPsychologyandCosmology

14:15–15:30 KatharinaKraus KantianPerspectivesonPersonhoodandPsychology 15:30–16:00 CoffeeBreak 16:00–17:15 SilviaDeBianchi Space,TimeandWorld.Kant’sPhilosophyofCosmology 17:15–18:30 GregorSchiemann TheEmptinessoftheUniverse.

CosmologyfromthePerspectiveofPhilosophyofNature

18:45-19:45 Concert:ASpanish-CanadianJourney20:00 ConferenceDinner:Tapas&More,Hansastr.30,44137DortmundDay2(April12,2019)TheQuestforUnification

09:15–10:30 ClausBeisbart WhatCanKant's(first)AntinomyofPureReasonTeachUsaboutthe

LimitsofScience?ReflectionsonPresent-DayCosmologyandNaturalism 10:30–11:00 CoffeeBreak 11:00–12:15 WolfgangRhode Unification,BigDataandArtificialIntelligence

FromSciencetoMetaphysics?

13:45–15:00 KristinaEngelhard FoundationalisminMetaphysicsandtheRoleofScience

fromaKantianPerspective 15:00–15:30 CoffeeBreak

15:30–16:45 NancyCartwright InDefenseofPhysicsasanInstrument 16:45–18:00 AndreasHüttemann HowLawsExplain

Abstracts

ClausBeisbart:WhatCanKant's(first)AntinomyofPureReasonTeachUsabouttheLimitsofScience?ReflectionsonPresent-DayCosmologyandNaturalismtbaNancyCartwright:InDefenceofPhysicsasanInstrumentManypicturephysicsasabodyofknowledge.Ipictureitasabodyofpractice.Ontheknowledgepicture,wenavigatetheworldbyderivingnewclaimsaboutwhathappensfromalreadyestablishedlawclaims.ThisparallelsNature’smethods:tofixwhathappens.Naturelookstoseewhatasetofpre-establishedlawsimply.Iwilltelladifferentstory.Predictionscannotbederivedfromlaws.Rather,weconstructthembyartfulmodelling.Ifthat’showwedoit,Ishallurge,wehavelittlereasontothinkNaturedoesitdifferently.Naturetooisanartfulmodeler.SilviaDeBianchi:Space,TimeandWorld.Kant'sPhilosophyofCosmology

BuildinguponFalkenburg'swork, I shallunderline thepivotalaspectsofKant'sphilosophy of cosmology and their relevance for both the historical and thephilosophicalunderstandingof this fundamentalbranchofWesterncultureandscience. Ishallemphasizehowtheguidelineof theconceptof"World"connectsKant'spre-criticalandcriticalworks.ThenIshallshowhowthisguidelineisstillpresent in the thirdCritiqueand theOpuspostumum. I shall concludewithanoverviewofthemainfeaturesofKant'sphilosophyofcosmologythatcanplayanimportantroleinshapingourcurrentunderstandingofcosmologyinrelationshipwiththefoundationsofmathematicsandanthropology.KristinaEngelhard:FoundationalisminMetaphysicsandtheRoleofSciencefromaKantianPerspectiveTheclaimthatmetaphysicsisconcernedwiththefundamentalstructureoftheworldiscommonamongcontemporarymetaphysiciansandalsometaphysiciansofscience.Itispertinentinquestionsaboutwhichentitiesametaphysicaltheorytakestobefundamental.Itisalsorelevantforquestionsconcerninggrounding.However,theconceptoffundamentalityisambiguous;thereareatleastthreesensesthathavetobedistinguished:fundamentalityinanabsolutesense,inarelativizedsenseandinarelativizedyetinvariantsense.Sincemostmetaphysiciansofsciencetodaytakeitthatmetaphysicsshouldbeinformedbytheempiricalsciencesandmakeuseofmethodsusedinthesciences,isseemsthatgoodsenseoffundamentalityinthesecontextscanonlybemadeofrelativefundamentality.Itishoweveranissuewhethertheprojectofmetaphysicsiscompatiblewiththisshiftawayfromabsolutefundamentalityandhowmetaphysicsrelatestoscienceinthispicture.TheseissuesareadvancedfromaKantianperspective.AndreasHüttemann:HowLawsExplain

In this paper I argue that laws explain interms of what has been called "internalgeneralisations". A consequence of this view isthat laws don’t explain theirinstantiations.KatharinaKraus:KantianperspectivesonpersonhoodandpsychologyThehumanpersonisthecentralsubjectmatterofpsychology.Butwhichnotionofahumanpersondoespsychologicalresearchinfactpresupposeandhowcanpsychologycontributetoadeeperunderstandingofwhatahumanpersonis?TheaimofthispaperistoshednewlightontheseissuesbydrawingoncentralinsightsfromKant’saccountsofpersonhoodandpsychology.Thepapercomesintwoparts.First,itexplorestheconceptualresourcesthatKant’stranscendentalphilosophyisabletooffertoempiricalpsychology.Inparticular,itspecifiesasetofdistinctiveconditionsthatgiveregulative(orheuristic)guidancetoanyempiricalstudyofhumanpersons.Secondly,asacasestudy,itappliestheseinsightsdrawnfromKanttopresent-daystudiesofpersonalitytraits.Bywayofconclusion,itpointsoutsomegenerallessonsregardingtherelationshipbetweenconceptualanalysisandempiricalstudiesinpsychology.WolfgangRhode:Unification,BigDataandArtificialIntelligenceThephysicalfundamentalresearchcombininganexperimentalreadinginthebookofNatureandthetheoreticaldescriptionofthesefindingsistoalargepartmotivatedbythegoaltoendinoneunifiedtheoreticaldescriptionofallprocesses.Foralongtime,thisprocesswassuccessfullydrivenbytheapplicationofthe“Galilean”synthetic-analyticmethodbasedonthepreparationofassimple-as-possibleexperimentalsituationsanditsrelationtosimple,ifpossiblepredictive,theories.Duetothegiganticdatavolumesrecordedinparticleandastroparticlephysics,this“Galilean”approachissuperimposedbyaholistic“Baconian”viewontheas-complete-as-possiblesimulatedMonteCarlodescriptionoftheexperiment.Usingdataminingmethods,probabilitycloudsconnectingthemeasureddatawiththeoreticalpredictionsarepropagatedthroughcomplexdataanalysischainsandcondensed.Finally,thecontainedinformationcollapsesintoprojectedhumanandphysicalreadabledatapoints,usedtorestrictthehugeparameterrangeofmodernclassesoftheories.Thus,thisnewaccessopensanewwindowonunderstandingphysicsinphilosophicalterms.GregorSchiemann:Theproximityandremotenessofcosmicemptiness

Thecosmicemptinessextendsfromtheclosercosmicenvironmenttothemostdistantfuturestatesofuniverse.Thediscussionoftheproximityofemptinessrevealsadifferencebetweenhumanbeings’smallscopeforactingonacosmicscaleandtheirimpressiveobservationalcapabilities.Withregardtothedistantemptiness,however,thereisthepossibilityofadrasticrestrictionofobservationalcapabilities.Thisprospectrelativizesthetruthclaimofcontemporaryknowledge.Theassumptionthatmoderncosmologycanmakepredictionsextendingintothemostdistantfuturecallsforanextendedconceptofnaturalphilosophywhosescopeencompassesnotonlyexistinghumanbeings.