Mechanisms and Models: an Interpretive Framework for the Study of the Sciences

Drawing on the work of William Bechtel and Ronald Giere, the book outlines an interpretive framework for the study of the sciences based on mechanisms and models rather than laws. The first part looks at the history of mathematics and mechanistic explanation, which developed hand in hand in the 17th century and provided support for the idea that scientific knowledge is epitomized by laws of nature. The second part develops a framework for mechanistic explanation that is not based primarily on laws. The third part presents a model-based account of scientific explanation and a naturalized account of reasoning and judgment, in which scientists are seen as constructing models that are similar to various aspects of the real world rather than discovering universal generalizations, or laws of nature, the truth of which can be warranted by the employment of universal principles of rationality that can be justified a priori; and the use of models to represent the world can only be understood within the context of scientific practice, in which interests and purposes, as well as empirical observations, play a role in determining what models are proposed,