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Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective This page intentionally left blank Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective Bas C. van Fraassen CLARENDON PRESS · OXFORD 1 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxford OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. ItfurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwidein Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress intheUKandincertainothercountries PublishedintheUnitedStates byOxfordUniversityPressInc.,NewYork BasC.vanFraassen2008 Themoralrightsoftheauthorhavebeenasserted DatabaserightOxfordUniversityPress(maker) Firstpublished2008 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, withoutthepriorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress, orasexpresslypermittedbylaw,orundertermsagreedwiththeappropriate reprographicsrightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproduction outsidethescopeoftheaboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment, OxfordUniversityPress,attheaddressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisbookinanyotherbindingorcover andyoumustimposethesameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData Dataavailable TypesetbyLaserwordsPrivateLimited,Chennai,India PrintedinGreatBritain onacid-freepaperby BiddlesLtd,King’sLynn,Norfolk ISBN978–0–19–927822–0 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 for Janine Blanc Peschard and the memory of Dina Landman van Fraassen This page intentionally left blank Preface When I began to rewrite the Locke Lectures I gave in Oxford in 2001 I found the comments I received leading me into new paths, some quite unexpected. My main concern had been, and remained, the possibilities for an empiricist version of structuralism in philosophy of science. But how I came to conceive of those possibilities was altered first of all by closer contact with the revivals of transcendentalist and neo-Kantian thought, and secondly by the lively and growing interest I encountered in technology, instruments, and experimental practices both in contrast with, and complementary to, philosophical reflection on scientific theories. Not all of my debts will appear explicitly in the text. I am thankful especially for the great good fortune I had to meet Isabelle Peschard, my main interlocutor on both these subjects. My thanks also to the writings,helpfuldiscussion,andcorrespondenceofMichelBitbol,Michael Friedman, Alan Richardson, and Thomas Ryckman for more insight into the neo-Kantian tradition, and to Mieke Boon, Nancy Cartwright, Margaret Morrison, and Hans Radder for discussions of instruments and experimentation. These debts are in addition to many debts, accumulated with respect to structural realism and surrounding topics, to Jeffrey Bub, Jeremy Butterfield, Otávio Bueno, Chris Fuchs, Hans Halvorson, James Ladyman, Bradley Monton, Carlo Rovelli, and Simon Saunders. On the subject of representation in the sciences, as will be quite clear, I have substantial debts to Ronald Giere and Paul Teller. In addition, Bradley Monton and Paul Teller went through an early manuscript version with a finetoothcombandmademanyvaluabledetailedcommentsonthetext.I ampainfully aware that I owe moredebts tomore people than I canrelate here. But my greater debt, beyond words, is to Isabelle Peschard. ThemainadditiontothelockelecturescomesinPartTwo,onmeasure- ment as representation, which is also the more technical part of the book. While in any logical ordering this material precedes the third and fourth parts, the less patient reader may wish to skip ahead to them. viii  The generous sabbatical and leave policy of Princeton University, a splendid yearatthe Center for Advanced Study inthe Behavioral Sciences inStanford,andthehospitalityenjoyedatAllSoulsandMagdalenColleges inOxford,theCREA(CentredeRechercheenEpistémologieAppliquée) inParis,andtheUniversityofTwenteintheNetherlands,aswellasSenior ScholarAwardSES-0549002fromtheNationalScienceFoundation,made this work possible. My special thanks to Ralph Walker, Jean Petitot, and Philip Brey for making me welcome at their institutions in Oxford, Paris, and Twente respectively. Bas C. van Fraassen List of Figures 2.1. ReflectionandRefraction 44 3.1. PerspectiveAltimetry 62 3.2. WindowandCheckerboard 63 3.3. Du¨rer,TheDraughtsmenoftheLute 65 3.4. FrameofReference.Perspective 67 3.5. SpeedinPerspective 68 3.6. CrossRatioInvariance 73 4.1. GeometryoftheRainbow 102 4.2. ImageCategories 104 6.1. MeasurementSchema 147 6.2. CoherenceofMeasurement 153 8.1. AdequacyasSymmetry 196 10.1. Putnam’sParadox 230 12.1. Copernicus’sModelofRetrogradeMotion 288 13.1. FailureofSupervenience 293