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Bas van Fraassen on success and adequacy in representing and modelling

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Ghins, Michel [UCL]

In his Scientific Representation. Paradoxes of Perspective (2008), Bas van Fraassen offers a pragmatic account of scientific representation and representation tout court. In this paper I examine the three conditions for a user to succeed in representing a target in some context: identification of the target of the representational action, representing the target as such and such and correctly representing it in some respects. I argue that success on these three counts relies on the supposed truth of some predicative assertions, and thus that truth is more fundamental than representation. I do this in the framework of a version of the so-called “structural” account of representation according to which the establishment of a homomorphism by the user between a structure abstracted from the intended target and some relevant structure of the representing artefact is a necessary (although certainly not sufficient) condition of success for representing the target in some respects. Finally, on the basis of a correspondence view (not theory) of truth, I show that it is possible to address what van Fraassen calls “the loss of reality objection”.

Document type Contribution à ouvrage collectif (Book Chapter) – Chapitre
Access type Accès libre
Publication date 2016
Language Anglais
Host document Claudia Casadio and Lorenzo Magnani (ed.) ; "Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. Theoretical and Cognitive Issues."- p. 21-42 (ISBN : 978-3-319-38983-7)
Collection Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics (SAPERE) - 27
Publisher Springer (Berlin)
Publication status Publié
Affiliation UCL - SSH/ISP-Institut supérieur de philosophie
Keywords representation ; scientific realism ; bas van fraassen ; realism
Links
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Bibliographic reference Ghins, Michel. Bas van Fraassen on success and adequacy in representing and modelling. In: Claudia Casadio and Lorenzo Magnani (ed.), Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. Theoretical and Cognitive Issues., Springer  : Berlin 2016, p. 21-42
Permanent URL http://hdl.handle.net/2078.1/175897