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Against Selective Realism(s)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Dana Tulodziecki
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Abstract

It has recently been suggested that realist responses to historical cases featured in pessimistic meta-inductions are not as successful as previously thought. In response, selective realists have updated the basic divide et impera strategy specifically to take such cases into account and to argue that more modern realist accounts are immune to the historical challenge. Using a case study—that of the nineteenth-century zymotic theory of disease—I argue that these updated proposals fail and that even the most sophisticated recent realist accounts remain vulnerable to the challenge from history.

Type
Representation and Realism
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 84 , Issue 5 , December 2017 , pp. 996 - 1007
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

For productive and fun conversations about realism and the zymotic theory I thank Anjan Chakravartty, Hasok Chang, David Harker, Chris Haufe, Tim Lyons, Dean Peters, Juha Saatsi, Jutta Schickore, and Peter Vickers. Many thanks also to the audiences at PSA 2016 and at the History of Science and Contemporary Scientific Realism conference in Indianapolis in February 2016. Special thanks are due to Peter Vickers for his careful and constructive comments on a previous version of this article.

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