 Yeah Okay, so for the last but not the least It is my honor and privilege to introduce to you. I will just And Matthews coughs, you know, I have only second languages I never master one Progress in metaphysics Yeah Thanks to the organizers for organizing this thanks To you all for staying here. It's been an exciting day already. I hope we can keep it up so we will talk about progress in metaphysics and of course we will look at this topic from the perspective of the meta metaphysical view that we already heard a lot about today And we call this here. Yeah, somewhat reluctantly naturalistically inclined metaphysics In a first approximation it can be they are characterized as the thesis that metaphysical theories should be firmly based on the natural sciences and Yeah, we've heard several exemplifications of this mode of doing metaphysics today and we've also heard several Problems that come up when one tries to formulate this view more precisely One thing that we did not hear much about today is the notion of progress that's naturally comes with this mode of doing metaphysics and This notion of progress would be that Scientific progress actually boosts metaphysical progress. So metaphysicians make progress when scientists make progress for example Our metaphysical theories now a lot better than they were say 500 years ago because our Scientific theories are much better than they were 500 years ago and Hopefully in 500 years we have we will have even better metaphysical theories because we will then have better scientific theories And maybe even have something like a final scientific theory Um So this idea of progress has been criticized by Carrie Mackenzie recently Before I get to that we'll see here a quote by lady man and Ross everything must go and They say we expected our particular positive account of the nature of the world Will be deemed mainly or perhaps even entirely incorrect by future philosophers who will know future science So just like our current scientific theories are probably one The metaphysical theories that are based on the scientific theories are of course also probably wrong Now this might be accepted If it is the case that we at least make in progress, right? If it is at least the case that our Scientific theories that are based on the currents of our metaphysical theories that are based on the current scientific theories Are better due to being based on a better scientific However as Mackenzie argues Progress in metaphysics does not go hand-in-hand with progress in the natural science in this way So the fact that a metaphysical theory is based on a better Scientific theory doesn't mean that it necessarily makes progress towards a final metaphysical theory in the way that the scientific theory Make might make progress towards the final scientific theory And this raises questions for how we can understand metaphysical progress for one The question is can we make progress in metaphysics at all if it's not boosted by scientific progress and for the other What's the value of our current metaphysical theorizing if we are not making progress? Given the quote of a lady man and Ross before if we are not even making progress and the theories are wrong What's the point of doing it? Yeah, and this is Mackenzie's challenge and our aim of this talk is to give a defense of naturalistically inclined metaphysics against this challenge we will do so by focusing on the notion of progress and We will propose a notion of progress that can be understood as exploring and constraining theory space Good. Here's the outline of our talk First we'll go into a little bit more detail concerning Mackenzie's challenge Then we'll briefly discuss a reply by Emerson Then we will introduce our own notion of progress and explain how this Gives us an answer to Mackenzie's challenge and finally if we still have time We'll have a brief comment on the relation to inductive metaphysics Which is one kind of this naturalistically inclined metaphysics So let's start with Mackenzie's challenge So the observation is that scientific theory change is a problem for naturalistically inclined metaphysics basically because The kind of progress that we find in science Which rests on the ideas that? scientific theories that are a scientific theory and its successor Related by a certain approximation relations. So the successor contains the predecessor as an approximation and This is what gives us progress in science Mackenzie at least but Canonical metaphysical claims cannot mean if you be regarded as approximately true in the same way We cannot have like Approximation relations between different metaphysical theories or at least so Mackenzie argues so there are actually two distinct ways to Frame this challenge. I would say the one way would be to focus on the observation that we lack a final scientific theory So why bother doing metaphysics when we don't have to find Scientific theory the other would be to Focus on the lack of a good notion of progress. So how can we make sense of metaphysical progress? We will focus on the second way to frame the challenge and the reason is that Actually, the lack of a final theory seems to be unproblematic if we at least make in progress, right? And for example in physics, it is unproblematic that we have a final not have a final theory because we're at least making progress So that's a focus on this notion of progress Progress as an approximation. This is the kind of progress that Mackenzie has in mind So a new theory a new physical theory for example T new Approximates an old theory to all it if T new contains to old and see mathematical limits so for certain ranges of values or something the two theories will get the same results and possibly like the history of science can be read as such a Chain of theories that stand in such approximation relations. So general relativity contains the journey mechanics in a mathematical limit quantum gravity Contains general relativity and finally will end up at the final theory that again will contain the predecessor in an approximation In metaphysics, we don't seem to have like these chains and Especially we don't have these mathematical approximations because we just don't have like the mathematical apparatus That would allow to have such mathematical approximations in metaphysics at least often times So does this mean that in metaphysics we do not make any progress And Here's a reconstruction of Mackenzie's arguments So what we end up with is that naturalistically in climate of physics is in fact not valuable at all So we have to add some premises apart from that. It's not making progress And first of all we would have to say that metaphysics is valuable only if it makes progress Then we have this specific notion of progress. It makes progress only if it approximates truth But it approximates truth only if it's centric came to claims can be approximately true And then finally the central claims cannot be approximately true due to their male binary non-mathematical nature Yeah, we could discuss all of these premises We will focus on the premise that Mackenzie also focuses on namely the claim the central claims claims of Metaphysics cannot be approximately true What made it might it mean for the claims of metaphysics to be approximately true? Well, they could either be True about approximately everything or they could be approximately true about everything or They can be expressed mathematically in the way that scientific claims Could be expressed mathematically and then we would have the same kind of Approximation as in science. However For neither of these options. It is possible to apply them to metaphysics. Why let us have a look at a paradigmatic metaphysical claim The claim of structural realism all properties are extrinsic What could it mean for this to be approximately true? Well, it could mean Approximately all properties are extrinsic But strictly speaking this would mean that not all properties are extrinsic and then structural realism would be false rather than approximately true Then all properties are approximately intrinsic extrinsic Well, what could it mean for something to be approximately extrinsic? It would mean to be not exactly extrinsic, but that again we would say that Structural realism is false rather than almost true or something and the third option mathematical This is out of the picture just as I've said because of this binary nature of the clan, right? So there is no sense to be attached that such a clan could contain something in a mathematical How will we reply to this well our basic strategy is to say that Metaphysics can make progress without approximating truth in Mackenzie sense And as we'll later see there is still a if you like modal sense in which metaphysics approximates true like we Make the modal Area in which the truth theory might be smaller and smaller if you like and this could be understood as a form of approximation and Yeah, the notion of progress that this thing relies on is progress as exploring and constraining theory space and as we will see This notion of progress is inspired by physics because the examples that motivate this notion of progress come from physics It is also applicable to metaphysics and it reestablishes the connection between physical and metaphysical progress and With that I give the word to Kian Yeah Thanks, yes Yeah, so before I come to this To presenting our proposal then Let's first Briefly discuss recent reply by Emerson also to do a carrying Kansas challenge And essentially Emerson draws on progress as increasing understanding so He says that we make progress in science and In metaphysics if we grasp explanations of increasing depth And the depth of an explanation is then measured with respect to the range of interventions you can perform and still have it being varied and I'll make our main criticism here is that Emerson then still relies on what you could call a Direct relation between predecessor and successor theories, so you have two theories and they stand in a direct relation to each other and Then you can say that I've actually progressed from theory a to theory b and We think that this still demands too much and so Progress can be had already in science without such direct progress relations between two theories and Yeah, so this is now all kind of progress as exploring and constraining theory space as Matias already said So again, generally we hold that direct approximation relations are too demanding already in science And for illustration, we would like to consider the case of particle physics Here we find that theories are tested and eventually eliminated by empirically constraining the parameter space Where a plethora of theory where the plethora of theories of particle physics are situated in and then we we can we can Eliminate by constraining this parameter space several theories at once and this is Opposed to to kind of probing specific theories one after the other So Yeah, the theories of particle physics will vary or do vary with respect to that particle content, of course particle masses coupling constants and all kinds of parameters and Those parameters are really testable. So for example, you can you can find out which which Particles exist what the masses of these particles are how they couple to each other So whether some whether some theory is empirically adequate it can be determined by measuring values of such parameters and then theories We come up with in particle physics or physicists come up with in physics Sensitive to the empirically determined values of such parameters So for example if certain collider experiments constrain the mass of the Higgs boson to 125 gv the many theories that predict mass of the Higgs of Say 115 gv or around that Mass I'm purely excluded and this is already prior to discovery so such So this I think the Higgs exclusion chart just just pre-discovery from I think 2012 and So what you see here are the various bands where previous That is found that the Higgs is not situated So we have the Tableton Exclusion bands the Atlas and CMS Exclusion bands and so on and then you see that Or maybe you don't see it, but yeah, so so you have here and here. There's a small window where the Higgs could still be and Yeah, so already prior to discovery you would find that particle physicists will look at such exclusion charts for for for parameter like the Higgs mass and Take this as important resource as an important resource for modeling Yeah, so More is to be said obviously on the notion of theory space So I Said that there are plenty of parameters in our physical theories So if you have n parameters, then those span an n dimensional theory space and each point of that theory space will Correspond to a specific theory for specific parameters according to These n parameters and each region corresponds to like a set of theories that are If they are situated closely by then they have some similarities obviously So importance also to so I've so Parameter like the mass is obviously a quantitative Parameter so but you could also think about having qualitative parameters as well So for example, you could think of theories being local or non-local and these kinds of things And then you would have qualitative dimensions in theory space as well and then This in this theory space basically the set of theories is ordered according to similarity relations and differences between those theories in By drawing on on these different parameters different dimensions so theory space orders the plethora theories by exploiting information about the parameters that invigorate them and Then in this sense, we can still say that The relations between the theories are relevant But they're not as I will come to in a moment relevant for the Claim that we need to make progress. So we just have some information about how the theories are related, but we do not Pin down our notion of progress on such relations directly I think I don't have one So just this this slide is for considering three space in science, right? Yeah. Yeah, that's still science Yes, it's it's pretty similar in metaphysics then in metaphysics then but I come to that So if you then empirically constrain the values of the parameters as I showed you in the Higgs case You will constrain theory space and the set of candidate candidates for sign of theories encircled in a way and narrowed down so this is kind of a meta way of Approximating the truth as you also I think sent Yeah, so the important point now is that also in physics we we do not only have like this falsification on this Notion of constraining theory space and excluding theories, but we also have a notion of exploring theory space So we basically or physicists basically then identify series possibilities And that's obviously connected to a notion like model building. So we try to model certain we can't try to come up with new models that are still In agreement with the available empirical data So we've tried to find theories that are located in non-excluded parts of theory space And that might be within a within a given framework or that might be just like broadly searching in exploratory Searches, and that's related then to what well also some people have worked on recently how like in collider experiments you can also have Experiments that do not depend on a certain background theory So if you take that point of view then You will find that If some experiment phase to exclude some region then this typically triggers an increased interest in that region And people come up with models that sit in that region. So this is kind of explained why why there is this What is this happening in science? and So we had that like for for various We had that for various light hits Theories we had that for split Susie models and these kinds of things and Maybe also you could say that the this this explanatory mode is best exemplified by cases of let's call it false alarm So you have some preliminary experimental data you think that That holds but but then eventually it turns out to be wrong So people come up with models that would Confirm that they would be confirmed by that data, but eventually We just just this dies out and it's not Research further because Yeah, the this was false alarm So for example superluminal neutrinos would have been such a case or the bicep to data Just a couple of years ago So How does that now relate to approximation? Or more specifically, can we still make sense of the notion of approximation? So first of all if you have these kinds of This this kind of exploratory and and constraining theory space mode in Science then this cannot be counted for in terms of McKinsey's notion of approximation So we made progress in science, but this is not Because there are certain theories that are related by approximation relation, but it is because theories are eliminated And theories are explored So the eliminated theories and particle physics are not less accurate predecessors Of the truth theory. They're just different fields. You can just yeah, you have no direct relation to me So This practice cannot be accounted for in terms of direct approximation But in our account, we think that approximation case cases can be accounted for For example Newton's theory is apparently ruled out But general activity is not yet So this is like a short version of how we can Account for approximation cases in our proposal And the the the basic reason why that is is of course that we have a less demanding notion of progress So exclusion exploration already constitutes progress So now progress in metaphysics We think that this view easily translates to metaphysics where you have an exploring mode in terms of you formulate new theories that have not been considered before or you refine excellent theories Defending them against objections, etc Checking for consistency and so on and so forth And you can constrain theories although that might be less common in metaphysics than Physics for example by revealing inconsistencies or Revealing incompatibility with scientific So Then we think that there amongst others These ways of how scientific progress can then boost metaphysical progress in the exploring mode You can get inspiration from development from the development of new theories for example if you find that quantum gravity is Coming up in physics and there are certain suggestions from quantum gravity that space-time might not be fundamental in a specific sense then you could take this for inspirations and develop space-time and in metaphysics or You find new problems in science. For example, you find certain features of quantum mechanics that then may raise issues for indisturability of particles metaphysics The refinement of excellent theories for example, you have Louisiana in metaphysics and then you find that there's quantum mechanics and there's entanglement and then maybe you've Come up with a new way of having a world-making relation Which builds on entanglement instead of distance relations Um So Yeah, and then how much time Thanks, and so Yeah, and you can develop new arguments for excellent theories you can draw on quantum mechanics to have new arguments for structural realism and so on and so forth and For the constraining part that might be more problematic in metaphysics and we can discuss this of course later But we think that there's still There are still cases where you have it for example classical humanism is certainly Challenged by quantum mechanics and there is a sense in which Humanism is then excluded from from the theory space Yeah, if we have the time then you can know yeah, yeah, I'll be quick right so We've had a general notion of progress now that we hope nicely aligns with the general idea of naturalistically inclined metaphysics I now want to briefly discuss The relation of this notion of progress to one specific kind of naturalistically inclined metaphysics in the inductive metaphysics So what is inductive metaphysics? Well The rough characterization that can give is on the one hand it relies on certain sources of knowledge and excludes other sources of knowledge and The sources of knowledge that are encouraged and respected especially are of course experience and Like the same kind of sources of knowledge that the sciences rely on and the full range of scientific theories where we have like the Scientific theorizing in between right so you have the experiences then you have the scientific theories And then metaphysicians can take on the scientific theories as it were as data for their view right So those are the respected sources of knowledge then we have a certain methodology and here the most Special part of inductive metaphysics is probably its reliance on abductive inference so The idea would be just that just like in the science inferences to the best explanation and different forms of abductions are an important instrument also on metaphysics Abductions should be like the main form of inference that brings us to metaphysical hypothesis and Theories and at the same time it also allows for more conceptual methods as we will see it also allows for example conceptual engineering which might be like one very important part of certain abductive inferences actually And yeah, the hope is that in this way one can cash out the idea that inductive metaphysics is firmly based on the science Though it also allows for like a priority elements So how does it relate to our notion of progress here the idea is that? Form of inference abduction is actually well aligned with the two aspects we had for progress Because we typically one can distinguish between two forms of abduction then the creative abduction and Selective abduction and those two are related to one another in the following way by creative Abduction one forms Explanatory hypothesis that would explain a certain set of phenomena and one does so by Introducing new concepts Right, so for example in the case of metaphysics. Let's take non-reductive physicalism as a metaphysical theory that is Supposed to explain maybe the relation between the sciences how how comes that Special sciences can form their own laws with their own With their own categorizations and so on and then we would introduce the notion of ontological dependence as one Element of the hypothesis that explains this observation, right? And here we can have like in the case of creative abduction We have a correspondence to the exploring of theory space, right? This is where we like come up with certain options then Selective abduction This is maybe more the typical kind of Inference that what has in mind when one thinks of inference to the best explanation Well, we have like a set of hypothesis and then select one of those that best fulfill certain criteria of the quality of explanations And here So possibly in metaphysics this would include like the theoretical virtues that Nina also talked about earlier and this would correspond to constraining theory space in metaphysics, so Yeah, this for now is just the observation that Our notion of progress is well aligned with this methodology of inductive metaphysics, okay No, I give the last one. Yeah, so to conclude Scientific theory change is a potential challenge for naturalistic in the climate of physics. That is what Kerry McKenzie is getting at and We think that the challenge can be met by basically relaxing her notion of progress and We think that progress in science is best understood as exploring and constraining theory space Which then inspires a generalization to metaphysics Scientific progress then also boosts metaphysics in specific ways and Progress as exploring and constraining theory space Seems to be especially well aligned with what is called ineptive metaphysics Yeah, so Maybe I shall start Thanks very much. This is interesting to apply this paparian notion of progress to this problem. I Am a little bit worried about how this is going to work in practice. Let me explain so In a lot of situations where we're constraining possibilities And this is the sort of case that Kerry really considers in her papers We come to realize that everything in this in the space of possibilities. We were considering is wrong And so we have to rethink the space of possibilities and in doing so some possibilities that we eliminated That were associated with a particular metaphysics that we thought was eliminated re-emerge in their space right, so I mean we could look at some examples historically, but like in the case of quantum theory for instance might think Human is human simple. Humanism is done for but then maybe in the new and then a theory of quantum gravity Humanism becomes another possibility because it modifies quantum theory in some way, right? It's in marges the space of possibilities that allows for the possibility of a new metaphysics that we thought we have eliminated before if this possibility is the case then we don't have the we have a lit we have we can have a paparian notion of progress for science but not for metaphysics because the metaphysical possibilities can be Compatible with many different scientific theories including ones that we haven't consumed so far. That's the concern This is the sort of example that I think Kerry is really worried about. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's that's fair. Yeah so what I would say and Yeah, so So one way To think about this is of course so so on the one hand theory space. I think we agree is a dynamic Entity so it is you completely right you you have to come up with you will build you will find new dimensions in this theory space You will find that certain parts where you thought you had excluded them maybe pop up again or something like that That's that's fair I guess but On the other hand maybe so I mean one way to to address your worry would be to just say where we thought we excluded it, but it's very hard to exclude this in metaphysics, so We should be careful about this, but there are still cases and that that's why I brought up the classical union There's still there are cases where you where you're quite where you're very confident that you have excluded those Okay, you are not well. I mean the history of science is full of examples from people. You're right. It turns out. Yeah. Yeah, but yeah But but anyway, so even if we accept that I think or maybe then especially Linking progress to exploring theory space and potentially excluding parts of it is a better way to go then to just directly aim for truth and Link progress to truth because that might be where you worry is is getting Most of it because if you if you aim for truth and we thought that was wrong You made progress with respect to truth and then this comes Then you were like not making progress, but we could then still say what we learned a lot about About the theory space. So that's what we actually want to do. So we have a like way more modest proposal That might cope better actually with what you said. Yeah Yeah, it's just briefly I wonder what you thought about the world by David Lewis Which seems to go in pretty much the same direction we said that a reasonable goal for a philosophy is to actually bring our opinions into the And so the common task is to find what Equilibria there are can we stand our explanation, but then it remains to each of us to come to present one or other of them So it is basically exploring these kind of theories Also, finally, I think a lot of what you said to resonate with some of the links were by who's I think yeah same very similar thing. So Okay, yeah But yeah, I'm not sure it's published yet. No, there's a little bit here. Yeah, but I think there's a couple of things Yeah, yeah, we also I mean this is obviously Like low hanging fruit to some extent. So maybe it's not and it's not that yeah, but yeah, thanks I think the loose port is also the Connection of the idea that we can have like at the end of inquiry various equally good Yeah, and I think this is probably unfortunately compatible But this I mean the main main problem is that like exclusion is so hard in their physics And this is probably a difference to science those things. It's maybe not really exclusion Yeah, you have figuring out where in this kind of potential Right, I mean, we would have made a lot of progress when we end up with Say three candidates for the true metaphysical theory, right? If we then cannot proceed any further than Soviets, but yeah Yeah, I have a question that Question I had for the previous talk I'm wondering about all this naturalized metaphysics stuff towards an extent you have you Because you went all at the continuity between science and metaphysics But there must be distinct if you want to your claim to be about something that is not science And I'm wondering when I listen to you There is any more there is any room for distinction between the two Mm-hmm. Yeah, in a way the more you emphasize the continuity pieces the more you would say probably that Metaphysicians are just doing more science I Right I mean you could you could say that they are traditionally there are certain questions you would pose in science and would pose in metaphysics but That I mean we often will will find that that things are Interrelated in a very interesting sense and that you cannot really draw this very specific line, but I'm also Yeah, I'm I Tend to like kind of go back and forth. So for example, Kerry has like these very interesting remarks on why metaphysics is a very different pro and then and Not continuous to science in that way. So yeah, I'm Not entirely sure It's not because two things overlap that they are missing No, it seems obvious, but now today it's completely home So Unfortunately or fortunately Let's go today