You might also like

Availability alert

More about Constellations and Conjectures

• Book details
• Synopsis
• Trending among others

You get 410 loyalty points

Book synopsis

An occurrence is explained by being related to prior events through known laws. Other intellectual activities may also constitute explanation - but this much certainly does. Ideally, an explained occurrence (0) could have been predicted in a connected way - by extrapolation from prior events (e) via the same laws (L). Schematically, 1 Explanation: 0 -Lt, 2, 3-(e e e )'-AI t 2 3 01 Prediction: (e e e )I-L , 2, 3_ +.11 t 2 3 t Thus Mars' backward loop in late summer, 1956, is explained by showing how this follows from (e ) its mean distance from sun and earth, (e ) its t 2 mean period of revolution, (e ) its past positions relative to earth, etc. 3 - by way of the laws of Celestial Mechanics (including (Lt) Kepler's Laws and Galileo's, (L2) Newton's, and (L3) those of Laplace and Lagrange. Moreover, this loop (0) could have been predicted from such events (e -e ) via the laws of Celestial Mechanics. t 3 This is an ideal situation. It crystallized late in the history of planetary theory. The Greeks found explanations for heavenly motions: the back ward loops were explained to their satisfaction. But they could not predict these motions, not in terms of Attic explanatory cosmologies.

Book details

Book category Books in English Mathematics & science Science: general issues Philosophy of science

• Full title: Constellations and Conjectures
• Author: N.R. Hanson, Willard C. Humphreys
• Language: English
• Binding: Hardback
• Number of pages: 285
• EAN: 9789027701923
• ISBN: 902770192X
• ID: 01970032
• Publisher: Springer
• Weight: 599 g
• Dimensions: 223 × 152 × 23 mm

Trending among others

---

---

---