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Indispensability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 May 2023

A. C. Paseau
Affiliation:
University of Oxford
Alan Baker
Affiliation:
Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania

Summary

Our best scientific theories explain a wide range of empirical phenomena, make accurate predictions, and are widely believed. Since many of these theories make ample use of mathematics, it is natural to see them as confirming its truth. Perhaps the use of mathematics in science even gives us reason to believe in the existence of abstract mathematical objects such as numbers and sets. These issues lie at the heart of the Indispensability Argument, to which this Element is devoted. The Element's first half traces the evolution of the Indispensability Argument from its origins in Quine and Putnam's works, taking in naturalism, confirmational holism, Field's program, and the use of idealisations in science along the way. Its second half examines the explanatory version of the Indispensability Argument, and focuses on several more recent versions of easy-road and hard-road fictionalism respectively.
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Element
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Online ISBN: 9781009099042
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication: 08 June 2023

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