1.

According to Van Fraassen, the aim of science for the realist is to get true theories, so

that to accept a theory is to believe the theory is to be true. He contends that the aim of

science, according to a constructive empiricism, is to obtain an empirically adequate

theory. A theory is empirically adequate if and only if what the theory says about the

observables is true.

2. I find myself in agreement with the author that the constructive empiricism is not a

satisfactory alternative and along with the rest of earlier and cruder forms of empiricism.

2.1 Based on the development of Newtonian mechanics from 1700 to 1900, it

may be concluded that scientists are not always greatly concerned to make

their model theories more realistic or more adequate empirically.

2.2 According to the constructive empiricist, “there is no purely epistemic warrant

for going beyond our evidence”. But then why does the constructive

empiricist hold that the aim of science involves going beyond our evidence?

Empiricism wants to be epistemically modest, but belief that a theory is

empirically adequate goes well beyond the deliverances of experience. Thus,

it can be objected to constructive empiricism by suggesting that it is not

sufficiently epistemically modest: the doctrine that the aim of science is truth

about what is observable should be replaced with the doctrine that the aim of

science is truth about what's actually been observed.

2.3 Constructive empiricism fails as an explanation of how a committed empiricist can

endorse the activity of science as rational. This is based on what Rosen contends that

a scientist cannot remain faithful both to the epistemic standards of the empiricist at

the same time that they accept various scientific theories in the way that the

constructive empiricist describes.

Reference:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/constructive-empiricism/

http://www.jstor.org/pss/188323
 Argument Paper No. 1

Submitted by:
Reynan P. Rolle, RMT

Submitted to:
Fr. Pederito Aparece, OSA, PhD.