Continues from part 1 and part 2.
In philosophy of science, one of the main debates concerns scientific realism. According to scientific realism, successful and mature scientific theories are approximately true descriptions of mind-independent reality (Psillos 1999, xvii). The debate concerning scientific realism is enormous and here we focus on one argumentative line within it. One of the standard arguments against scientific realism is the so-called argument from underdetermination of theories by the evidence (see Psillos 1999; Stanford 2006). According to this argument, there are, in principle, always mutually incompatible theories that make the same predictions and suggest the same interventions, i.e., are empirically equivalent. The choice between the theories is underdetermined by all available evidence and therefore we cannot conclude that our current theories are true in the realists’ sense. While this problem is an old one and has produced valuable works on the logic of scientific confirmation, a standard argument against it is that, in reality, well-supported alternatives are extremely rare and therefore the possibility of such alternatives is nothing but an age-old skeptical hypothesis. Maybe there are alternatives to our scientific theories, but then again, an evil demon might deceive us. It is difficult to see how such skeptical possibilities should affect our attitude towards the current science.
However, Stanford has put some historical flesh on the logical bones of underdetermination. In the book Exceeding Our Grasp Science. History, and the Problem of Unconceived Alternatives (2006), Stanford argues that the problem of underdetermination is not solved by noting that empirically well-supported alternatives have not actually been present in the history of science. The problem remains as long as we have reasons to believe that there exist well-supported alternatives to our best scientific theories that are presently unconceived by us. This is the problem of unconceived alternatives. Remember that the mere possibility of such alternatives is not what we are looking for. We are looking for reasons to believe that such alternatives exist. Stanford argues that there is a reason to believe that such alternatives exist. On the basis of the history of science, he performs what he calls the New Induction[1]:
“By contrast, I propose what I will call the new induction over the history of science: that we have, throughout the history of scientific inquiry and in virtually every scientific field, repeatedly occupied an epistemic position in which we could conceive of only one or a few theories that were well confirmed by the available evidence, while subsequent inquiry would routinely (if not invariably) reveal further, radically distinct alternatives as well confirmed by the previously available evidence as those we were inclined to accept on the strength of that evidence. For example, in the historical progression from Aristotelian to Cartesian to Newtonian to contemporary mechanical theories, the evidence available at the time each earlier theory was accepted offered equally strong support to each of the (then-unimagined) later alternatives” (2006, 19.)
It follows that there seem to be historical reasons to believe that there exist alternatives to the current science, but we are not able to conceive those alternatives. These alternatives are not trivial or benign variations of the current science but fundamentally different ways of understanding the universe. This indicates that our ability to formulate scenarios of alternative future might be seriously limited. The problem is not just that we do not have time and resources to formulate all possible variations of the current world – this would, of course, be practically impossible task no matter what – but that there are extremely important kinds of alternatives, i.e., fundamentally different alternatives, that we cannot conceive. In other words, even if we attempted to find only the most important alternatives, we would fail. There are several consequences from Stanford’s line of argument.
First, because the argument is not based on mere skeptical fantasies but on the historical record, the evidence supporting the argument is (explicitly) fallible. While it seems an undeniable fact that there have been unconceived alternatives, the implications of this fact can be debated on historical grounds. For example, Psillos argues that historical record shows enough theoretical continuity to not challenge scientific realism (Psillos 2009, 4.2). Thus, the unconceived alternatives might not be as radically different from the known ones as Stanford suggests.
A related issue is whether the past science is a good base for the induction. As Psillos points out, “one could argue that as science grows, theories acquire some stable characteristics (they become more precise; the evidence for them is richer and varied; they are more severely tested; they are incorporated into larger theoretical schemes and others) such that (a) they can no longer be grouped together with older theories that were much cruder or underdeveloped to form a uniform inductive basis for pessimism and (b) they constrain the space of alternative possibilities well enough to question the extent of the unconceived alternatives predicament” (2009, 73). The point here is that since (i) science is different today than it was in the past, (ii) most of the science has been produced in recent decades, and (iii) the science has been quite stable recently, it seems that the historical challenges do not apply to the current state. Again, we must remember that argument of unconceived alternatives gains its power from historical considerations. Even if (i)-(iii) do not exclude the logical possibility of unconceived alternatives, they could cut the link between the historical record and current science.
In response, Stanford has recently argued that “we have compelling reasons to believe that [current scientists] are actually less effective than those same predecessors in conceiving, exploring, or developing fundamentally novel theoretical conceptions of nature in the first place” (2019, §3). The funding structure, professional specialization and self-identity, and the social organization of “Big Science” have led to a situation where opening research paths that challenge the current theoretical “orthodoxy” is extremely risky and difficult. In §4, we return to this type of reasoning. In essence, the limits of conceivability are, in this case at least, are grounded on structural features of the current institutional and social systems.
This dynamic can be pushed even further. Rowbottom (2019) has analyzed different aspects of science that can have unconceived alternatives. The title “Extending the argument from unconceived alternatives: observations, models, predictions, explanations, methods, instruments, experiments, and values” is a rather good summary of those aspects. For example, Rowbottom points out that scientific theories often lack appropriate predictive force. Models need to be developed in order to achieve predictions. Sometimes the adequacy of a scientific theory to deal with phenomena remains an open question until sophisticated models are developed. This was the case in classical mechanics for over a hundred years. Sophisticated models can be initially unconceived and, given that models are responsible for predictions, there can be unconceived predictions. Given the importance of predictions in theory choice, the unconceived models can impact on our theory choices. The consequences of unconceived alternatives at one level radiate through the whole system.
While it is difficult to tell how much weight we should give to unconceived alternatives in different aspects of science, Rowbottom’s analysis serves as a valuable reminder that the high-level theories are not the only area of science where unconceived alternatives are an issue. The point that “What’s conceived is nonetheless limited, for a variety of reasons; limitations on time and material resources, contingencies about where attention is directed, and so forth” (Rowbottom 2019, 3957) is a good reminder of our historical situation. However, the fact that unconceived alternatives exist in many levels of science does not automatically have any novel consequences. No one denies that science develops and science changes. Moreover, I guess no one would say that all the future changes can be conceived now. The question is how fundamental these changes can be. We can never exhaust the space of all possibilities, and the question is how able we are to conceive radically and interestingly serious possibilities.
Initially, however, Stanford suggested that unconceivable alternatives are a problem in the fundamental domains of science, theoretical science. Stanley argues that eliminative inferences (where conclusions are reached by ruling out possibilities until only one remains) work in cases where we are able to conceive the plausible possibilities. However, the New Induction indicates that scientists have been unable to conceive the plausible theoretical possibilities and therefore the eliminative inferences have not worked in theoretical science (2006, 30-31.) The idea that theoretical science cannot be trusted as “really true” is important in its own right, but one may wonder whether we can really separate different levels or aspects of science from each other (see Stanford 2006, ch. 8, and Psillos 2009, ch. 4, for competing views). Prima facie, theoretical changes could lead us to rethink our eliminative inferences (or inferences in general) in other areas of science as well. Moreover, we have seen that unconceived alternatives can be found below the highly theoretical level. It seems that if an unconceived theoretical change really is possible, then this possibility must be based on new, unexpected, findings in other aspects of science. In order to rethink our theories, new predictions, methods, or values need to be found. This means that one could argue that if there are plausible unconceived alternatives at the theoretical level, there must be such alternatives at other levels of science as well. Theories and other aspects of science are so deeply intertwined that we perhaps should expect that the possible changes in each of the aspects are of a similar magnitude. The limits of conceivability radiate from one level to the whole system.
Where does this take us with respect to the issue of limits of conceivability?
First, an obvious lesson is that an argument can be made that the future of science may be different in a now-unconceived way. At any given time, there have been changes that were not conceived earlier. The original argument was that these changes are fundamental, i.e., that is plausible that we have not conceived a theoretical science that is fundamentally different but equally well supported than our current theoretical science, but we have seen that the limits of conceivability tend to radiate from one level to the whole system. Our ability to conceive alternative futures with respect to one domain may essentially depend on our ability to conceive alternative futures in other domains.
Secondly, one of the most interesting dimensions of the debate is Stanford’s argument that even though science has changed and, therefore, the inductive base can be questioned, we have independent evidence that the current structures in science may hinder the search for unconceived alternatives. In this type of reasoning, we identify a possible problem in some activity by studying its history and then attempt to search for conditions in the present that could make the problem acute even if the present conditions differ from those of the past. This reasoning has the following structure: A was a problem in the past when B was the case. Now B is not the case anymore but C is, and C may lead to A. (For example, A = inability to grasp unconceived alternatives; B = limited number of scientists, C = conservative incentives in science.) This type of reasoning could be fruitful in other projects as well. We are not assuming that the past repeats itself but we can still use the problems of the past to ask whether our current situation could produce similar problems.
Finally, the philosophical debate on unconceived alternatives as implications for futures studies. However, the implications are not straightforward. As we have seen, the problem of unconceived alternatives in science threatens our trust in the ontological truth of our current scientific theories. The problem is therefore about our epistemological underpinnings. In contrast, if there exists a problem of unconceived alternative in some other field, it is difficult to say what that problem concerns in addition to our ability to know the possible alternatives to the current world. The world is what it is, and unconceived alternatives do not automatically challenge it. Even if Yesterday could have been performed differently, this does not mean that we should not trust the actual Yesterday or that it might be ultimately erroneous version of the song. Such claims are nonsensical.
However, the problems that unconceived alternatives pose to futures studies are not trivial or benign. Surely, many of the problems in the study of the future go back to our inability to conceive and map events and processes that are novelties and affect the course of the future. Despite this – or even for this very reason – it would be important to analyze the different logics and causes that lead to inconceivability. Probably not all inconceivability has similar logic, causes, and consequences. I separate logic and causes because we can say, in the case of unconceived alternatives in science, that the logic of the problem is that there have not been sufficient eliminative inferences in theoretical science, and this logical problem is caused by things like the cognitive limitations and incentive structure of science. To generalize this, we could ask, for example, whether there are unconceived alternatives for the society and how this affects futures studies. We could wonder whether political tensions cause a fragmentation of the space of future possibilities. Is it possible that we miss some possible ways of organizing the society because only politically clear-cut visions of the future get their voice heard in the atmosphere of increasing political tensions? We could add that the logical problem in the politically fragmented futures is that if we cannot conceive a future outside the ends of political (n-dimensional) spectrum, it becomes difficult to answer normative questions on how people should live in a society. If there were unconceived alternatives that would have been better for many people, can we justify the reinforcement of the actual system? In this way, we can extend the thinking through unconceivable alternatives beyond science.
References
Laudan, Larry (1981). “A confutation of convergent realism”. Philosophy of Science 48 (1):19-49.
Psillos, Stathis (2009). Knowing the Structure of Nature: Essays on Realism and Explanation. Palgrave.
Rowbottom, Darrell (2019). “Extending the Argument from Unconceived Alternatives: Observations, Models, Predictions, Explanations, Methods, Instruments, Experiments, and Values”. Synthese 196. 3947–3959.
Stanford, P.K. (2006). Exceeding Our Grasp: Science, History, and the Problem of Unconceived Alternatives. New York: Oxford University Press.
Stanford, P. (2019). “Unconceived alternatives and conservatism in science: the impact of professionalization, peer-review, and Big Science”. Synthese 196 (10):3915-3932.
[1] Old one being the pessimistic metainduction: There have been false successful theories. Therefore, our successful theories may be false (see Laudan 1981).