Fact and Method

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In this bold work, Richard Miller aims to reorient the philosophy of science by challenging both positivism and its critics. He addresses urgent issues surrounding justification, explanation, and truth, presenting new solutions through a wealth of examples from natural and social sciences. The text applies a revised understanding of scientific reasoning to various fields, including biology, physics, history, sociology, anthropology, economics, psychology, and literary theory. With explicit analysis of alternative views, it serves as both an introduction to the philosophy of science and a significant attempt to reshape the discipline. Like the influential works of Hempel, Reichenbach, and Nagel, it seeks to challenge and educate those interested in science and its boundaries. For the past 25 years, the philosophy of science has faced a crisis due to positivism's failure to resolve fundamental methodological questions universally. Miller introduces a perspective where explanations, causes, confirming tests, and evidence for unobservables are shaped by specific substantive principles, informed by the actual history of inquiry. He draws on the arguments of figures like Darwin, Newton, Einstein, and Galileo to critique positivist views of rationality while also reinforcing the notion that significant theoretical insights can often be justified from multiple reasonable perspectives.