Realist Methodology and the Articulation of Modes of Production (ص 31)
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- Realist Methodology and the Articulation of Modes of Production (ص 31)
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always had a particular form in the past then it will
continue to have the same form in the future. The logical
structure of the contending argument is: 1f general
scientific laws are composed from the repeated observation of
events of which we have had experience then we cannot
logically assume that events of which we have not had
experience will continue to follow the same pattern of
behaviour as the past events which we have experienced. (35)
We have no warrant, in empiricist criteria, to reason from
phenomena we have observed to phenomena of which we have had
no experience. This results ina particular paradox for
empiricism. For if reasoning is restricted to a posteriori
forms of argument then these forms must also necessarily be
ex post facto. Empiricism is concerned with the past and cannot
legitimately, according to its own criteria, predict the
outcome of future events. This is a critical indictment of
empiricism from within the limits of its own problematic. If
experience is the singular determinant of knowledge then it
is a form of discourse which remains caged in the past. For
Hume himself, to speak in future terms about the possible
outcome of events would be a move from the realm of
scientific factuality to the realm of "beliefs". For others
it would imply the operation of discourse which nas a4
rational or theoretic warrant.
No less a figure than Bertrand Russell has argued that once
we come up against the logical limits of induction then:
_..every attempt to arrive at general scientific
17 - تاريخ
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- المنشئ
- Alex Pollock
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