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Humeans hold that laws of nature are nothing more than particularly effective summaries of what actually happens. This volume presents cutting-edge research in this area, with innovative new work on the epistemology of laws and chance, the problem of induction, counterfactuals, special science laws, and a Humean account of essence.
List of contents
- Preface
- Humeanism and the pragmatic turn
- 1: Craig Callender: Humean Laws of Nature: The End of the Good Old Days
- 2: Jenann Ismael: Humean Disillusion
- 3: Wolfgang Schwarz: Knowing the Powers
- 4: Alison Fernandes: Naturalism, Functionalism and Chance: Not a Best Fit for the Humean
- 5: Heather Demarest and Elizabeth Miller: Generalizing the Problem of Humean Undermining
- 6: Barry Loewer: Are Humean Laws Flukes?
- 7: Harjit Bhogal: The Package Deal Account of Naturalness
- 8: Markus Schrenk: Properties for and of Better Best Systems
- 9: Chris Dorst: Predictive Infelicities and the Instability of Predictive Optimality
- 10: Thomas Blanchard: Best-System Laws, Explanation, and Unification
- 11: John T. Roberts: A Discourse on Methods; or, Humean Metaphysics of Science Without Best Systems
- 12: Ned Hall: Humean Reductionism about Essence
About the author
Michael Townsen Hicks is a philosopher focusing on philosophy of science, metaphysics, and philosophy of physics. He has published papers on Humean reductionism about laws of nature, the symmetries of physical laws, locality considerations in physics, the nature of explanation in science and metaphysics, and the logic of conditionals. He continues to be interested in the way science and physics helps us understand the world, and the way in which philosophy can help us understand science and physics.
Siegfried Jaag is a philosopher working mainly on themes at the intersection of metaphysics and science, and in particular on the role of modality in science. He has published papers on pragmatic versions of Humean reductionism about laws of nature, dispositionalist accounts of natural modalities, counterfactuals conditionals and scientific and metaphysical explanations.
Christian Loew is Associate Professor in Philosophy at Umeå University. His primary research is in metaphysics, philosophy of science, and philosophy of action. He has published articles on topics pertaining to the direction of time, causation, counterfactuals, laws of nature, free will, and personal identity.
Summary
Humeans hold that laws of nature are nothing more than particularly effective summaries of what actually happens. This volume presents cutting-edge research in this area, with innovative new work on the epistemology of laws and chance, the problem of induction, counterfactuals, special science laws, and a Humean account of essence.
