Philosophy of Science
SECTION A
1 ‘Scientists need philosophy like birds need ornithology.’ Discuss.
2 ‘The success of scientific theories suggests that they are true, but the history of
scientific theories suggests that they are false.’ Discuss.
SECTION B
3 Either (a) Can we defeat epistemological scepticism without giving up the
Closure Principle for Knowledge?
Or (b) Could induction be both unjustifiable and rational?
4 Either (a) In what sense do causes ‘bring about’ their effects?
Or (b) Are laws merely patterns?
5 What is the difference between ‘knowing that’ and ‘understanding why’?
6 Why are experimenters’ skills of interest to the sociology of knowledge?
7 Are the ‘paradoxes of confirmation’ really paradoxical?
8 Either (a) Is negative evidence more powerful than positive evidence?
Or (b) Is the moral to draw from Kuhn that science is irrational or that
rationality is not what we thought it was?
9 Is Intelligent Design Theory good science, bad science, or no science at all?
10 Is it possible to have value-free science when science is funded by government
and industry?