Explorations

Future Paths of Phenomenology

1st OPHEN Summer Meeting

Repository | Journal | Volume | Article

237148

Laws and models in a theory of idealization

Chuang Liu

pp. 363-385

Abstract

I first give a brief summary of a critique of the traditional theories of approximation and idealization; and after identifying one of the major roles of idealization as detaching component processes or systems from their joints, a detailed analysis is given of idealized laws – which are discoverable and/or applicable – in such processes and systems (i.e., idealized model systems). Then, I argue that dispositional properties should be regarded as admissible properties for laws and that such an inclusion supplies the much needed connection between idealized models and the laws they `produce' or `accommodate'. And I then argue that idealized law-statements so produced or accommodated in the models may be either true simpliciter or true approximately, but the latter is not because of the idealizations involved. I argue that the kind of limiting-case idealizations that produce approximate truth is best regarded as approximation; and finally I compare my theory with some existing theories of laws of nature.

Publication details

Published in:

(2004) Synthese 138 (3).

Pages: 363-385

DOI: 10.1023/B:SYNT.0000016425.36070.37

Full citation:

Liu Chuang (2004) „Laws and models in a theory of idealization“. Synthese 138 (3), 363–385.