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The Pragmatic Character of Explanation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2022

Pete Achinstein
Pete Achinstein*
Affiliation:
The Johns Hopkins University
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Extract

Some of those, including the present writer, who criticize standard models of explanation, such as Hempel's D-N model or Salmon's S-R model, do so on the grounds that explanation is a “pragmatic” or “contextual” concept—an idea which the standard models seem to reject. Yet the sense in which explanation is, or is not, pragmatic is not always made clear by the critics or champions of the models. Indeed, some critics and some champions may even mean different things by “pragmatic” or “contextual”. In this paper I want to try to clarify a sense in which explanations might reasonably be considered pragmatic, discuss a couple of theories that are or are not pragmatic in this sense, argue the advantages of a pragmatic account, and briefly note some consequences of this for those seeking models of explanation.

Type
Part VII. Scientific Explanation
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1984 , Issue 2: Volume Two: Symposia and Invited Papers 1984 , 1984 , pp. 274 - 292
Copyright
Copyright © 1985 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

1

I am indebted to the National Science Foundation for support.

References

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