Deductive-nomological Model Of Explanation Research Articles

The Scientificity of the Social Sciences: A Reflection on the Deductive Nomological Model of Explanation

The possibility of having a science of human life brings into question whether the methods use in the sciences can be successfully applied in the prediction of human behaviour. This further questions the demarcation between science and the social sciences. This paper, however, argues that the use of DN model of explanation both in the social and natural sciences portends a boundary deconstruction of the two fields of enquiry. While engaging critical analysis method of enquiry, this paper dissects the DN model of explanation and argues that the social sciences are sciences and as such we can have scientific laws to predict, explain and control human behaviour.

ФИЛОСОФИЯ К.Г. ГЕМПЕЛЯ: ДЕДУКТИВНО-НОМОЛОГИЧЕСКАЯ МОДЕЛЬ ОБЪЯСНЕНИЯ ИСТОРИИ

The article is devoted to the deductive-nomological model of explanation, which emphasized the most important aspect of scientific explanation – the connection with scientific laws. It is demonstrated thatthe peculiarity of the historical explanation lies in the fact that general laws are not formulated in an explicit form due to their triviality and obviousness.

Nagel's Reduction Theory Revisited

The aim of this paper is to develop further a model of reduction derived from Nagel’s model and from the deductive-nomological model of explanation. We propose this development by examining its consistency with the history of physics, in particular, with Nagel´s further account of the history of physics. In the first part, we introduce the issue of intertheoretical reduction. In the second, we examine the partial consistency of the derived D-N model of reduction with Nagel’s further considerations on reduction. As a conclusion, we argue that, in agreement with Nagel´s theory, the full consistency with history of science is a criterion needed for any purported theory of reduction and that the autonomy of the reducing science is to be preserved.

Causal Mechanisms, Job Search and the Labour Market Spatial Mismatch

Many studies of the labour market spatial mismatch rely on the deductivenomological model of causation to test the theory that low-skilled, inner-city residents have been isolated from the knowledge of job opportunities by the suburbanization of jobs. The logic of this approach follows the deductivenomological model of explanation which establishes causation by measuring the constant conjunctions between ‘causes’ and ‘effects’. As an alternative, I have used a realist approach to the study of the labour market spatial mismatch that uses a ‘causal-explanatory’ method. This approach entails the qualitative description of the causal mechanism in order to discover and conceptualize its causal properties. The results suggest that the spatial mismatch theory could be refined in order to accommodate the finding that workers in excluded ghettos do not necessarily rely solely on local social networks to find out about job vacancies. Instead, workers with employment experience have strong workplace-based social networks. Since employers recruit workers by relying on referrals from trusted workers, these workplacebased social networks can put job seekers at the front of the hiring queue, regardless of where they live.

The Logic of Process Tracing Tests in the Social Sciences

This article discusses process tracing as a methodology for testing hypotheses in the social sciences. With process tracing tests, the analyst combines preexisting generalizations with specific observations from within a single case to make causal inferences about that case. Process tracing tests can be used to help establish that (1) an initial event or process took place, (2) a subsequent outcome also occurred, and (3) the former was a cause of the latter. The article focuses on the logic of different process tracing tests, including hoop tests, smoking gun tests, and straw in the wind tests. New criteria for judging the strength of these tests are developed using ideas concerning the relative importance of necessary and sufficient conditions. Similarities and differences between process tracing and the deductive-nomological model of explanation are explored.

The Covering Law Model Applied to Dynamical Cognitive Science: A Comment on Joel Walmsley

In a 2008 paper, Walmsley argued that the explanations employed in the dynamical approach to cognitive science, as exemplified by the Haken, Kelso and Bunz model of rhythmic finger movement, and the model of infant preservative reaching developed by Esther Thelen and her colleagues, conform to Carl Hempel and Paul Oppenheim's deductive-nomological model of explanation (also known as the covering law model). Although we think Walmsley's approach is methodologically sound in that it starts with an analysis of scientific practice rather than a general philosophical framework, we nevertheless feel that there are two problems with his paper. First, he focuses only on the deductivenomological model and so neglects the important fact that explanations are causal. Second, the explanations offered by the dynamical approach do not take the deductive-nomological format, because they do not deduce the explananda from exceptionless laws. Because of these two points, Walmsley makes the dynamical explanations in cognitive science appear problematic, while in fact they are not.

. . .And Away from a Theory of Explanation itself

[Introduction] There is much good sense to be found in Halonen and Hintikka’s paper ‘Toward a Theory of the Process of Explanation’ (hereafter TTPE). In particular, it contains three good ideas that are brought together in an elegant way. Ultimately, however, I think it does little to shed light on the nature of explanation in the sciences and everyday life. Those readers who still favor a broadly Hempelian deductivist approach to explanation will disagree, and ought to find TTPE a valuable contribution to the literature. For those of us raised on a standard diet of counterexamples to the Deductive-Nomological model of explanation, however, the efforts of Halonen and Hintikka fail to transcend the limitations of the deductivist framework within which they operate.

Is Gerard Debreu a Deductivist? Commentary on Tony Lawson's Economics and Reality

Tony Lawson has argued that the methodology of neoclassical economics is deductivist: in constructing their formal models, economists hope to be able to provide explanations based on laws, as described by the deductive-nomological model of explanation. This article argues in contrast that neoclassical economics cannot be understood as following just one methodology. It is argued that neoclassicism exhibits two methodologies, one “official” and one tacit. The former is empiricist, and corresponds to the practice that has been described by Lawson. The latter, which can be called “hypothetico-deductive rationalism”, amounts to the position that knowledge of the world can be obtained without any empirical verification of one's assumptions, simply by exploring the implications of the assumptions one makes.

The role of inductive generalizations in Sellars' theory of explanation

Wilfrid Sellars' theory of explanation is a rich and complicated analysis of a most complex issue. It is based on his commitment to scientific realism and to his belief that any adequate philosophy of science must provide the foundation for a theory of scientific development ([8]-[13]). In what follows I provide a partial explication of Sellars' account of explanation in which I show how using Sellars' approach provides a coherent integration of statistical generalizations into the discussion of explanation. My point of departure is Hempel's attempt to solve the Theoretician's Dilemma ([2]) by requiring that theories provide not only for deductive systematization, but inductive systematization as well. Sellars, I argue, provides the justification for what Hempel only assumes. He does so at some cost, however. We are forced to give up the primacy of the deductive-nomological model of explanation, D-N. This is not to say that we must abandon it, but rather subsume it under Sellar's more general account. In general, I will be quite brief with respect to what I have to say about Hempel. His view simply has to be assumed as the starting point.

Reply to Lugg

Mr Lugg’s first point is that one might “cling to the idea that deducibility guarantees explanation” and then it would follow that I was wrong. My paper was obviously based on a rejection of the deductive-nomological model of explanation. The point that ifthe deductive-nomological model of explanation is correct after all, then I am wrong is one that I should have thought would be evident to any reader of the paper. My position is that explanation is essentially a pragmatic notion. In my view, whether or not a putative explanation is really an explanation depends on many factors besides the logical relations between the putative explanation and whatever is to be explained; for instance, the explanation must relate in an appropriate way to the interests of the questioner, there are questions of scientific fruitfulness to be considered, etc. To illustrate the way in which explanation is interest-relative, let me use an example due to Alan Gartinkel.* Suppose a priest asks Willy Sutton “Why do you rob banks?“. And Willy Sutton replies “because that’s where the money is”. Clearly something has gone wrong. In my view, what has gone wrong is this: The priest was really interested in knowing why Sutton robs banks us opposed to not robbing at all (this is what Garfinkel calls the explanation space of the question). If Sutton had been asked the same question by another robber, then his answer would have been explanatory. But the other robber would have had a quite different ‘explanation space’. Another example may bring out the point even more sharply. Suppose the question is asked, “Why was Professor McJones, who was previously believed to be an exemplary member of the academic community, found stark naked in the women’s dormitory at 12:OO midnight?” To answer: “He was stark naked in the women’s dormitory at 12:00 midnight because he was stark naked in the women’s dormitory at 12:OO midnight minus epsilon and it was not possible for him either to put on his clothes or to leave the women’s dormitory in epsilon seconds without violating the law that nothing can move faster than the speed of light”, would not be to explain why Professor McJones was found naked in the women’s dormitory at 12:00 midnight, even though all the requirements of the deductive-nomological model of explanation are met. (Again, Garfinkel’s notion of an explanation-space presupposed by a