Since Euclid defined a point as “that which has no part” it has been widely assumed that points are necessarily unextended. It has also been assumed that this is equivalent to saying that points or, more properly speaking, degenerate segments, have length zero. We challenge these assumptions by providing models of Euclidean geometry where the points are extended despite the fact that the degenerate segments have null lengths, and observe that whereas the extended natures of the points are not recognizable in the given models, they can be recognized and characterized by structures that are suitable expansions of the models.

Jaegwon Kim has argued that if psychological kinds are multiply realizable then no single psychological theory can describe regularities ranging over psychological states. Instead, psychology must be fractured, with human psychology covering states realized in the human way, martian psychology covering states realized in the martian way, and so on. I show that even if one accepts the principles that motivate Kim's argument, his conclusion does not follow. I then offer a dilemma that forces Kim to concede the possibility of a unified psychology. I close with a discussion of what, according to Jerry Fodor, is “really bugging” Kim.

This article provides a detailed analysis and explores the prospects of the arguments for higher-level causal autonomy available for the proponents of the mechanistic framework. Three different arguments (context based, organization based, and constraint based) are distinguished. After clarifying previously raised worries with regard to the first two arguments, the article focuses on the newest version of the third argument that has recently been revived by William Bechtel. By using Bechtel’s own case study, it is shown that not even reference to constraints can establish the causal autonomy of higher mechanistic levels.

The present paper purports partly to reexamine and partly to summarize several points which occupied and still occupy a central position in more recent discussions among empiricist philosophers. As such discussions are essentially attempts at the clarification of terms, it might also be said that this essay intends to contribute to the analysis of certain very general and highly ambiguous expressions. The words in question are, first and mainly, ‘hypothetical’ and, more incidentally or by the way of exposition, ‘atomic', ‘elementaristic', and ‘extensional.’ In general, it is an attempt to show the impact of some of the ideas developed in the work of Carnap; within a prevailingly logical frame of reference in The Logical Syntax of Language and, in a more epistemological setting, in Testability and Meaning. In particular, it wants to eliminate some ambiguities which could arise from an oversimplified reading of certain passages in TM, as for instance: “If by verification is meant definitive and final establishment of truth, then no (synthetic) sentence is ever verifiable” (p. 420). If this passage is understood to assert that every synthetic sentence is hypothetical, then it is either false or several meanings of ‘hypothetical’ are to be distinguished. This distinction, implicit in TM, will upon closer examination prove to be related to the fundamental distinction between statements within and statements about a linguistic structure.

In the fusillade he lets fly against Foss (1984), Bourgeois (1987) sometimes hits a live target. I admit that I went beyond the letter of van Fraassen's The Scientific Image (1980), making inferences and drawing conclusions which are often absurd. I maintain, however, that the absurdities must be charged to van Fraassen's account. While I cannot redress every errant shot of Bourgeois, his essay reveals the need for further discussion of the concepts of the phenomena and the observables as used by van Fraassen.

This paper is a study in restraint on freedom of speculation. In view of the subtlety of the subject it has seemed advisable to begin the report with a list of the presuppositions initiating and determining the study. These are as follows:

1). That freedom of speculation is a prerequisite to sound mental health, in individuals as well as in large-scale social units.

2). That, consequently, individual and institutional faculties are alike deficient if and insofar as they prevent or abridge such freedom.

3). That the same factors operating in one aspect to restrain the influence of promulgated theories operate in another aspect to inhibit the free conception and hamper the expression of speculation not so promulgated.

4). That as it is the purpose of individual philosophizing to surround with coherent speculation or theory subjects of primarily individual interest, it is the purpose of institutional philosophizing similarly to invest with theory subjects of common social interest.

5). That speculation in general, whether individual or institutional, is free when the prevalent tendency is for subjects of comparable interest to be accorded comparable quantities of speculation; and that when and insofar as this tendency does not prevail speculation is to that extent not free but restrained.

According to mainstream linguistic phonetics, speech can be modeled as a string of discrete sound segments or “phones” drawn from a universal phonetic inventory. Recent work has argued that a mature phonetics should refrain from theorizing about speech and speech processing using sound segments and that the phone concept should be eliminated from linguistic theory. The article lays out the tenets of the phone methodology and evaluates its prospects in light of the eliminativist arguments. I claim that the eliminativist arguments fail to show that the phone concept should be eliminated from linguistic theory.

In this article we will not undertake the more inclusive task of defining metaphysics or of discussing metaphysical principles, such as the principle of causation, or of considering the use of metaphysical entities in general. Rather our remarks will be confined primarily to metaphysical entities in the field of physics. A good example of such an entity is the electron.

It has been tacitly assumed that certain fundamental “laws” of science have the same meaning and significance in the different scientific disciplines. Outside of quantum physics the law of causality was regarded as such a concept which was most generally applicable in the description of the systems of nature. However, the role of causality in recent research in biology seems not quite clear. There an explanation of the specific properties of biological systems does not assume the form of a simple law such as a mathematical expression relating different states of one and the same system. Rather it is attempted to show how the properties of the system as a whole are established by the specific interaction of the parts of the system.

Scientific method in philosophy has been so greatly developed and widely accepted in our day that it seems almost ready to lay claim to the self-evidence which an older rationalism professed. It is my belief that it leaves out something essential to philosophy. I shall not attempt to define scientific method in philosophy, since it is a movement with several wings, rather than a definite set of propositions accepted by all its advocates; but its intent is clear. The theme of current criticisms of metaphysics and speculation has been that philosophy has no private access to the truth, no monopoly of such knowledge as human beings possess; it stands on an equal footing with the sciences. The observation is sound and timely; but from it has been drawn, at least by implication, the conclusion that there is no such thing as philosophy at all. For unless it has a peculiar method, or a distinct subject matter, or some other distinguishing trait, philosophy is only a convenient name for a certain group of men and the books they wrote. The criticism was made because philosophy had come to be identified with a set of dogmas. I wish to suggest instead that it is a peculiar kind of inquiry into a distinct subject matter. Philosophy is the attempt to formulate principles or categories which the philosopher already possesses, in common with everyone else, but in an unformulated state. Philosophy is always developing theories and systems, but they are tentative, not final and dogmatic; the categories are certain, but their statement is provisional; therefore, the process of inquiry is unending.

Stevens (7 pp. 249-251) has presented a “lusty embryonic” Science of Science, as having arisen out of “operationism as a revolution against absolute and undefinable concepts in physics, behaviorism as a revolution against dualistic mentalism in psychology, and Logical Positivism as a revolution against rational metaphysics in philosophy.”

If we may rely for our evidence on simple observation, it would appear that the tendency of random or unguided activity in external nature is opposed to the development of complex organization and favorable to structural simplicity—in the sense of uniformity in the distribution of elements. This anti-organizing trend of purely physical processes is illustrated in ordinary large-scale mixing and stirring operations, as well as in the automatic increase of entropy with time in systems subject to the laws of thermodynamics (material or molecular systems in general). It is common experience that complex systems which are the seat of physical activity tend to become simpler when left to themselves, i.e., they lose organization. Recently Eddington has given the whole matter an admirably clear expression: “Entropy may most conveniently be described as the measure of disorganization of a system. ... We can see chance creeping in where formerly it was excluded.” Unless counteracted by directive action the casual or random element in nature tends to increase. If things are left to chance, not only does organization of any high degree of complexity fail to develop, but what organization there is tends to lapse or disappear. Hence in those cases, such as living organisms, where the existence and activity of the system depend on a special and complex organization, it appears necessary to assume the continued operation of a stable directive influence or factor which pervades the whole system and excludes or compensates casual factors as far as possible. The presence of this factor is what makes possible the development and maintenance of the organization required for vital activity.