واقع گرايي علمي و گريزناپذيري نظريه هاي علمي (با تكيه بر آراي هكينگ و سنكي)

Scientific Realism and Inevitability of Scientific Theories (with Special Emphasizes on Hacking and Sankeyʹs Views)

Howard Sankey has argued that scientific realism is compatible with contingency of scientific theories and does not entail their inevitability. He adds that if scientific realism is strengthened by the reliability of scientific methods, it entails a kind of (trivial) inevitability of scientific theories. In this paper, we first introduce Sankeyʹs account of scientific realism and his defense of it. Secondly, we will consider the relationship between scientific realism and the inevitability thesis from his viewpoint. We will present two critical points regarding Sankeyʹs position. First, we shall argue that Sankeyʹs definitions of contingency and inevitability are not proper, for he tried to develop Hackingʹs definitions but he failed. Next, it will be shown that scientific realism entails the reliability theory and therefore these two cannot be separated. In the final section of this paper, a comprehensive framework will be presented to categorize different approaches to the debate of contingency/inevitability in the philosophy of science. In the next step, the relationship between scientific realism and inevitabilism within this framework will be discussed. It will be argued that scientific realism entails a non-trivial version of inevitabilism. The kind and strength of this entailment depends on whether one accepts methodological pluralism or not.