Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science

<p>Nancy Cartwright is one of the most distinguished and influential contemporary philosophers of science. Despite the profound impact of her work, there is neither a systematic exposition of Cartwright’s philosophy of science nor a collection of articles that contains in-depth discussions of the major themes of her philosophy.</p><p>This book is devoted to a critical assessment of Cartwright’s philosophy of science and contains contributions from Cartwright's champions and critics. Broken into three parts, the book begins by addressing Cartwright's views on the practice of model building in science and the question of how models represent the world before moving on to a detailed discussion of methodologically and metaphysically challenging problems. Finally, the book addresses Cartwright's original attempts to clarify profound questions concerning the metaphysics of science.</p><p>With contributions from leading scholars, such as Ronald N. Giere and Paul Teller, this unique volume will be extremely useful to philosophers of science the world over.</p> <p>Acknowledgments</p><p>1 Hoefer: Introducing Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science</p><p>Part I. Models and Representations</p><p>2 Bailer-Jones, D. Standing up Against Tradition: Models and Theories in Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science</p><p>Replies by Cartwright</p><ol> <ol> <p> </p> <li>Gäehde, U. Nancy Cartwright on Theories, Models and Their Application to Reality: A Case Study</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Morrison, M. Models as Representational Structures</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Teller, P. The Finewright Theory</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p>Part II. Causes and Capacities</p> <p> </p> <li>Giere, R. Models, Metaphysics and Methodology</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Suarez, M. Experimental Realism Defended: How Inference to the Most Likely Cause Might Be Sound</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Psillos, S. Cartwright’s Realist Toil: From Entities to Capacities</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Woodward, J. Invariance, Modularity, And All That: Cartwright on Causation</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Martel, I. The Principle of the Common Cause, The Causal Markov Condition, and Quantum Mechanics: Comments on Cartwright</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Reiss, J. Social Capacities</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <li>Schmidt-Petri, C. Cartwright and Mill on Tendencies and Capacities</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p>Part III. Antifundamentalism and the Disunity of Science</p> <p> </p> <li>Hoefer, C. For Fundamentalism</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Esfeld, M. Cartwright on Wholism</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Falkenburg, B. How Classical and Quantum States Relate: Cartwright’s Views of Quantum Theory</li> <p>Replies by Cartwright</p> <p> </p> <li>Nordmann, A. Getting the Causal Story Right: Hermeneutic Moments in Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science</li> </ol> </ol><p>Replies by Cartwright</p><p>Notes on Contributors</p><p>Index</p>