Scientific method Essay Example for Free

Scientific order EssayOutline and illustrate three characteristics of sense-data. (15 marks) Anticipate the avocation characteristics We atomic number 18 immediately/directly acquaint with sense-data, (from which we infer a mindindependent reality). Sense-data atomic number 18 (usually) mental or mind-dependent. Sense-data exist only as they are perceived. Reports regarding sense-data are incorrigible. Sense-data are nonhing new(prenominal) than how they appear they have no hidden depths. The sense-data I experience volition vary according to the conditions in which I perceive an object. Sense-data, unlike physical objects, can have unresolved process. Sense-data and physical objects/distinguishing sense-data. Illustrate examples are likely to differ depending on the points being made and can be drawn from various sources Illusions and delusions (e. g. bent sticks, mirage, hallucinations), perceptual relativity (the real shape of the coin, the real properties of the table), phenomenology (apparent and real stippled hens) or time-lag arguments (seeing the sun) that distinguish between the way the world appears and the way it is.Consider the claim that the weaknesses of substitute pragmatism outweigh its strengths. (30 marks) Knowledge and Understanding Anticipate the following outline of representative realism thither is a material reality independent of our hold upledge of it an external world from which experience originates. But our perception of material objects is mediated via a greater omentum of perception. Our immediate awareness is of an internal non-material something ideas or sense-data that we subscribe as representative of mind independent external reality.The claim that there is an external world is a hypothesis. Interpretation, Analysis and Application Possible strengths Unlike common sense, representative realism can account for illusions/hallucinations by proposing we experience ideas/sense-data. Representativ e Realism gets the epistemological project right I have to start from my induce experience and work outward to an external world. Representative Realism ac hunch overledges the scientific claim that mind-independent reality is not as it appears to us (and the primary/secondary qualities distinction might be used here to feel out this point.) Representative realism acknowledges a distinction between appearance and reality just it is able to foreclose scepticism it is reasonable to suppose that there is a mindindependent reality that impinges upon me in systematic ways, not stem to will, which my experience represents in ways similar to your experience.Possible weaknesses Representative Realism is incompatible with Empiricism because it makes claims about(predicate) mind-independent reality that transcend any possible experience it makes empty assertions devoid of empirical consequences (e.g. a something we know not what) it illegitimately draws inferences from familiar experi ence (e. g. observations of casual relations) to support judgements regarding a reality that must be strange (Russell). The apparatus employed by representative realism cannot avoid scepticism a veil of perception intermediate between object and perceiver opens up an unbridgeable gap. Representative Realism (at least(prenominal) in its pure empiricist form) does not have the resources to escape solipsism. The scientific appearance/reality distinction postulate not have any exceptional philosophical significance regarding what there is it safe regulates what counts as germane(predicate)/irrelevant when scientists do science (c. f. demarcation issues like Are we doing psychology or sociology? Is that a philosophical point of history? ). A candidate might compare representative realism with other positions (e. g. idealism) just as long as the comparison highlights possible strengths and weaknesses of representative realism. Appeals to Occams Razor. Both direct realism and ideali sm are ontologically parsimonious contra representative realism. Assessment and Evaluation A candidate could argue for the following conclusions The weaknesses outweigh the strengths The strengths outweigh the weaknesses The strengths and weaknesses balance out, more or less. Drawing out the implications of something we know not what as Berkeley was to do. Support of direct realism e. g. exceptions can be allowed if they can be explained, correction by other senses. Presuppositions of recognising deceptions, Reids criticism of phenomenal variability we can explain and predict. External world seen as hypothetical, but is this like a scientific hypothesis? Verification issues. How could we have the concept of a representation if we are only aware of representations. Analysis of how the concept works. If we cannot know physical objects, then neither can we know their causal powers. The external world could never be more than a probability. But how do we do the calculations n eeded for such a claim?