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“Truer”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

D. Goldstick  and
B. O'Neill
D. Goldstick
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy University of Toronto
B. O'Neill
Affiliation:
Department of Industrial Engineering Northwestern University
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Abstract

When can one say that a new theory is truer than the old one it contradicts, even though neither is absolutely true? We are primarily concerned with the case in which the conflicting theories offer answers to the same questions, and so we do not introduce considerations of “logical width”. We propose that part of the new theory is truer than part of the old one when the former part gets right whatever the latter part got right while the former does not make any new mistakes. Pragmatic considerations will determine the relative importance of whatever new mistakes the new theory does make as a whole. To avoid artificial counterexamples, we restrict the parts compared to those that are “convex”. A “convex” theory is one that holds in all cases intermediate between any two cases in which it holds.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 55 , Issue 4 , December 1988 , pp. 583 - 597
Copyright
Copyright © 1988 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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