5 papers · 1 filter
Dark Matters of Principle: Principles in the Dark Matter Paradigm
Patrick Duerr, James Read
This paper re-examines the Dark Matter (DM) problem through the lens of physical principles. We first develop a functionalist account and taxonomy of principles. We propose to defi…
Rationally warranted promise: the virtue-economic account of pursuit-worthiness
Patrick M. Duerr, Enno Fischer
Pursuing a scientific idea is often justified by the promise associated with it. Philosophers of science have proposed a variety of approaches to such promise, including more speci…
Promising Stabs in the Dark: Theory Virtues and Pursuit-Worthiness in the Dark Energy Problem
William J. Wolf, Patrick M. Duerr
This paper argues that we ought to conceive of the Dark Energy problem -- the question of how to account for observational data, naturally interpreted as accelerated expansion of t…
The Change-Driver Account of Scientific Discovery: Philosophical and Historical Dimensions of the Discovery of the Expanding Universe
Patrick M. Duerr, Abigail Holmes Mills
This paper critically examines the models of scientific discovery propounded by Kuhn, McArthur, Hudson, and Schindler. As an alternative, we proffer the $\unicode{x201c}$change$\un…
The Virtues of Pursuit-Worthy Speculation: The Promises of Cosmic Inflation
William J. Wolf, Patrick M. Duerr
The paper investigates the historical and contemporary pursuit-worthiness of cosmic inflation-the rationale for working on it (rather than necessarily the evidential support for cl…