Science is replete with falsehoods that epistemically facilitate understanding by virtue of being the very falsehoods they are. In view of this puzzling fact, some have relaxed the truth requirement on understanding. I offer a factive view of understanding (i.e., the extraction view) that fully accommodates the puzzling 1 a puzzling fact 2
Is there progress in philosophy? If so, how much? Philosophers have recently argued for a wide range of answers to these questions, from the view that there is no progress whatsoever to the view that philosophy has provided answers to all the big philosophical questions.However, these views are difficult to compare and evaluate, because they rest on very different assumptions about the conditions under which philosophy would make progress. This paper looks to the comparatively mature debate about scientific progress for inspiration on how to formulate four distinct accounts of philosophical progress, in terms of truthlikeness, problemsolving, knowledge, and understanding. Equally importantly, the paper outlines a common framework for how to understand and evaluate these accounts. We distill a series of lessons from this exercise, to help pave the way for a more fruitful discussion about philosophical progress in the future.
Paulina Sliwa (2015) argues that knowing why p is necessary and sufficient for understanding why p. She tries to rebut recent attacks against the necessity and sufficiency claims, and explains the gradability of understanding why in terms of knowledge. I argue that her attempts do not succeed, but I indicate some ways to defend reductionism about understanding why.
because q), for some q. 2 Such knowledge can be also acquired via testimony. Thus, (K-WHY ≠ CAS).Pritchard's argument for (U-WHY = CAS) is based on two assumptions: (i) Having a sound explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related is a necessary requirement for understanding-why. (ii) Having (p because q) information is not equivalent to having such an explanatory story. He then argues that having an explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related is a kind of CAS and that therefore (U-WHY = CAS).These arguments can be questioned in at least two different ways. Stephen Grimm (2006Grimm ( , 2014, Christoph Kelp (2014), andPaulina Sliwa (2015) argue that coming to believe that (p because q) also requires having an explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related. If they were right, Pritchard's argument for (K-WHY ≠ CAS) would fail, according to his own criteria. If having an explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related is a kind of CAS, then (K-WHY = CAS) and (U-WHY = CAS). Grimm (2012), Daniel Whiting (2012), and J. Adam Carter and Emma Gordon (2014) argue that having an explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related is not a kind of CAS. If so, Pritchard's argument for (U-WHY = CAS) would fail. Then, it seems that (K-WHY ≠ CAS) and (U-WHY ≠ CAS). Either way, being a kind of CAS would not be a feature that sets understanding-why apart from knowledge-why. So, the crucial questions are: Does acquiring (p because q) information require having an explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related? Is having an explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related a kind of CAS?In this paper, I argue that both questions should be answered in the negative. After introducing the concept of a CAS (section 2) and after presenting Pritchard's argument for (K-WHY ≠ CAS) in more detail (section 3), I first elaborate on the explanatory story requirement (section 4). Having a sound explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related is to have information about facts or principles that establish the causal connections between the phenomena in question. Then, I make a positive case for the claim that coming to believe that (p because q), for some q, does not 2 I use round brackets to avoid scope ambiguities with respects to 'know'. 3/33require having a sound explanatory story regarding how cause and effect are related, and I rebut
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