Phil. 125 final exam
Fall 2003, Prof. Dowden

Place all your answers in your bluebook.


1. (10) Answer one, but only one, of the following two parts:

a. Discuss what you consider to be philosophically significant about the following
passage:

     Philosophers of science are especially attuned to finding assumptions that others
     rely upon, and they are attuned to uncovering just how certain these people can
     be in accepting those assumptions.  For example, science books say there are
     60 seconds in a minute.  Many scientists are absolutely certain that there are
     60 seconds in a minute. Yet scientists cannot rule out the possibility that in some
     places on earth there might be 62 seconds per minute or perhaps 63.  Definitely
     there aren't always 60 in every frame of reference.  After all, Einstein's special
     theory of relativity implies that time is relative, doesn't it?  But Einstein's theory
     is very well confirmed, and it implies that in some reference frames there are
     more and in some reference frames less than 60 seconds per minute.  So,
     scientists should be more cautious when they tell others that there are 60
     seconds in a minute.     

b. Describe Hempel's Raven Paradox, his paradox of confirmation, and discuss how to
solve it.

2. (10) "A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees."
     --William Blake  
This line, excerpted from Blake's poem, might be considered a precursor to the theory
that Hanson called "the theory-ladenness of observation".  Describe this theory.

3. (10) Discuss the classical problem of induction.
     
4. (20) Discuss Thomas Kuhn views on the nature of scientific revolutions.

5. (25) Discuss the scientific method, especially the hypothetico-deductive method of
confirmation of hypotheses.

6. (25) Compose the reply for the Case Study about creating a new science.  See
pages 99 and 100 of your Klemke textbook.