Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem
    Unavailable
    Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem
    Unavailable
    Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem
    Ebook733 pages10 hours

    Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem

    By University of Chicago Press

    3/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    What sets the practice of rigorously tested, sound science apart from pseudoscience? In this volume, the contributors seek to answer this question, known to philosophers of science as “the demarcation problem.” This issue has a long history in philosophy, stretching as far back as the early twentieth century and the work of Karl Popper. But by the late 1980s, scholars in the field began to treat the demarcation problem as impossible to solve and futile to ponder. However, the essays that Massimo Pigliucci and Maarten Boudry have assembled in this volume make a rousing case for the unequivocal importance of reflecting on the separation between pseudoscience and sound science.
                Moreover, the demarcation problem is not a purely theoretical dilemma of mere academic interest: it affects parents’ decisions to vaccinate children and governments’ willingness to adopt policies that prevent climate change. Pseudoscience often mimics science, using the superficial language and trappings of actual scientific research to seem more respectable. Even a well-informed public can be taken in by such questionable theories dressed up as science. Pseudoscientific beliefs compete with sound science on the health pages of newspapers for media coverage and in laboratories for research funding. Now more than ever the ability to separate genuine scientific findings from spurious ones is vital, and The Philosophy of Pseudoscience provides ground for philosophers, sociologists, historians, and laypeople to make decisions about what science is or isn’t.  
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateAug 16, 2013
    ISBN9780226051826
    Unavailable
    Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem

    Related to Philosophy of Pseudoscience

    Related ebooks

    Philosophy For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      How to Make Sense of Contradictory Science Papers

      Jun 2, 2021

      The science you can come across today can often appear to be full of contradictory claims. One study tells you red wine is good for your heart; another tells you it is not. Over the past year, COVID-19 research has offered conflicting reports about t

      6 min read

    • Article

      Sacking Scruton

      Apr 12, 2019

      Sacking Scruton
      2 min read

    • Article

      'Enlightenment Now' Says Human Progress Is Real, Remarkable, And Yet Often Unacknowledged

      Feb 27, 2018

      Steven Pinker marshals data from detailed studies that show the stirring extent of progress human beings have achieved since the 18th century.

      4 min read

    • Article

      What Is Pseudoscience?

      May 8, 2017

      What Is Pseudoscience?
      3 min read

    • Article

      We Have to Talk About Doubt: How to tell the difference between scientific and conspiratorial skepticism.

      Sep 1, 2021

      What is the role of reasonable doubt in advancing science? And how should we contrast scientific doubt with the cavilling doubt of conspiracy theories which play little part in advancing understanding? Over the last year we have seen the scientific m

      5 min read

    • Article

      Unleash Your Inner Einstein

      Nov 25, 2021

      Unleash Your Inner Einstein
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Problem With Reason

      Aug 26, 2020

      The Problem With Reason
      8 min read

    • Article

      Lessons For A Young Scientist

      Jan 12, 2022

      I sometimes worry that many who would enjoy a scientific career are put off by a narrow and outdated conception of what’s involved. The word “scientist” still conjures up an unworldly image of an Einstein lookalike (male and elderly) or else a youthf

      8 min read

    • Article

      Lessons For A Young Scientist

      Jan 9, 2020

      I sometimes worry that many who would enjoy a scientific career are put off by a narrow and outdated conception of what’s involved. The word “scientist” still conjures up an unworldly image of an Einstein lookalike (male and elderly) or else a youthf

      7 min read

    • Article

      What Is Pseudoscience?

      Dec 2, 2021

      TO SEND REVIEW COPIES, CONTACT THE BOOK REVIEWS EDITOR AT DVBARRETT@FORTEANTIMES.COM Where Science Meets Pseudoscience Michael D Gordin Oxford University Press 2021 Hb, 120pp, £14.99, ISBN 9780197555767 “Pseudoscience is not a real thing.” As opening

      3 min read

    • Article

      Are There Barbarians at the Gates of Science?: The Increasingly Complex Border Between Science and Society Is Changing Both.: The increasingly complex border between science and society is changing both.

      Apr 28, 2016

      Alessandro Baricco paints a lively portrait of the modern-age barbarian in his 2014 book, The Barbarians. He initially frames the issue as a simple struggle between the shallow and the profound: Mickey Mouse versus Flaubert, Big Mac against the bouil

      5 min read

    • Article

      Killing Truth

      Dec 6, 2021

      Killing Truth
      1 min read

    • Article

      Herbert Spencer’s Principle of Equal Freedom: Is It Well Grounded?

      Sep 1, 2020

      During the mid-to late nineteenth century, Herbert Spencer was the most widely read philosopher in the world. A large part of his appeal was owing to his ambition of providing a complete and comprehensive account of human reality based on scientific

      38 min read

    • Article

      A Defence Of Truth

      Dec 19, 2021

      Humans have always thrived on good information and have often suffered from disinformation. Thanks to science and its most pervasive and invasive recent off shoot, social media, we have never had so much of either, and the contrast between salutary a

      5 min read

    • Article

      Losing Faith

      Dec 25, 2023

      Losing Faith
      5 min read

    • Article

      This Essentially Meaningless Conflict

      Sep 22, 2017

      MARILYNNE ROBINSON’S accomplishments are impressive by any standard: she has won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and the National Humanities Medal, among other honors. But perhaps a better measure o

      8 min read

    • Article

      The Beauty Of Science

      Jan 29, 2023

      The Beauty Of Science
      9 min read

    • Article

      Why Science Needs Metaphysics: Science can’t tell us whether science explains everything.

      Oct 1, 2015

      Technology cannot keep pace with theoretical predictions about subatomic reality coming from physics. The same applies to our ability to observe the far reaches of the universe. Theory outstrips data and can become more extravagant with the claims it

      6 min read

    Reviews for Philosophy of Pseudoscience

    3/5

    1 rating1 review

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      I learned some things from this book, but overall didn't like it. (To be honest, some of it whizzed over my head.) The authors admit, over and over again, that there's no really satisfying definition of what exactly science is. So, of course, it's a bit tricky to demarcate the borderline between science and pseudoscience. Good subject to think about, but I don't think this book is quite worthwhile. Really liked Pigliucci's previous book "Nonsense on Stilts" better - on similar topics but much more readable.