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The development of contemporary Western philosophy of science can be described as chaotic. Starting from logical empiricism, to historicist philosophy of science, scientific realism and anti-realism, to various ideas of knowledge defense, to the current emerging sociology of scientific knowledge, the context of its operation is intricate. However, there are also rules to follow in its development. As we all know, Western philosophy of science since the 20th century, including the analytic philosophy of Russell, Wittgenstein and others, began with anti-metaphysical speculation. "Rejection of metaphysics" is perhaps the common cry of most philosophers of the 20th century! Where exactly does the opposition to metaphysics begin? And how to make this anti-metaphysical theory pleasing and convincing? These questions depend on technological breakthroughs in contemporary philosophical epistemological research. Logical empiricism and analytic philosophy use philosophical logic as a breakthrough to declare the meaninglessness of metaphysical propositions through logical analysis, they regard metaphysical propositions as hypotheses that cannot be confirmed empirically, and all meaningful propositions must be confirmed empirically and proved by logic. In this way, all the propositions of the first philosophy are excluded from their vision. This breakthrough in analytical means and research methods has gradually led to the trend of de-philosophizing contemporary Western philosophy of science. The reason for breaking through the method of research is because by the beginning of the 20th century, the differentiation of philosophy itself had reached its end, and natural science had long been separated from philosophy step by step, and finally psychology was separated from philosophy. Thus, at the beginning of the 20th century, no discipline other than logic remained in philosophy. Thus, the philosophy of science in the 20th century was logic. At the same time, with the development of natural science, the concept of science is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, in people's minds, only those knowledge confirmed by scientific observation are reliable knowledge, and those knowledge that cannot be confirmed by scientific observation can only be suspended and put aside for the time being. As a result, reductionist philosophy emerged, that is, all philosophical ideas are reduced to linguistic propositions, and only by reducing them to linguistic propositions can they correspond to objective facts. In this way, the meaning of a proposition is determined by the corresponding fact or logic. Because, in content, logic is a generalization of the laws that exist in objective facts; Formally, logic is made up of generalized axioms. Logical propositions (analytic propositions) and empirical propositions (synthetic propositions) become two important philosophical propositions, and no other proposition is meaningful. This absolute distinction between analytic propositions and synthetic propositions is by no means unproblematic. Quinn pointed out that the distinction between analytic propositions and synthetic propositions and the reductionist view of empiricism are " two dogmas of empiricism " , arguing that the distinction between analytical propositions and synthetic propositions or reductionism is impossible , and that all propositions ultimately come from experience. However, this basic view of analytic philosophy and logical empiricism is not refuted by Quinn's criticism, as Lakatos said, the scientist is cheeky, he does not easily abandon his opinion because his point of view is criticized, but by changing the philosophical topic, by modifying the auxiliary hypothesis to make the theory continue to develop along his own logic, defending the premises of logical reasoning, and expanding the information content of empirical propositions. However, all philosophies of science or theories of scientific epistemology have two fundamental problems: one is the epistemological premise, that is, the defense of beliefs in reasoning, and the other is whether the theory can be confirmed by observed facts. Because all logical inferences need to have a predetermined premise, through the existence of this premise, we can make reasoning. This premise is called belief, whether this belief is confirmed is the criterion for whether this reasoning can be valid, and if this belief is a true belief that has been confirmed, then the result of this reasoning is true. Third, the concept elaborated by the theory needs to be confirmed by the observed fact, and if an observation fact can agree with the proposition, then the proposition is true. If these two problems are not solved, then all empiricism will lose its roots and will lead to complete bankruptcy. However, the proof of belief as a prerequisite is not easy! Either you must resort to logical inference, or you must resort to the observation of facts, logical inference is prone to circular argumentation, and observing facts is not necessarily an objective process, observation permeates the theory, carries the theory, and is affected by personal background beliefs. Therefore, how to defend these two questions determines the basic direction of contemporary Western philosophical research on science. First, the defense of the premise of logic is accompanied by an infinitely backward circular argument. If we appeal to other proven beliefs in the defense of beliefs, then other confirmed beliefs have to appeal to previous confirmed beliefs, and then there will be an infinite backward circular argument. If a belief appeals to observation, then because observation permeates the theory, it will inevitably carry a certain subjectivity, which is not in line with the requirements of our empiricism. Second, the meaning of philosophical propositions depends on the method of argumentation in philosophy itself, is this method of argument effective? Most contemporary philosophers of science believe that our philosophical approach to arguing philosophical propositions will inevitably leave room for skepticism to refute it. Whether the truth of a proposition is valid or not must depend on scientific methods to prove it, because so far only science has brought great success to mankind, and only science has been respected. Science is respected because the essence of a scientific theory is not a hypothesis, it can be cognitively proved according to the experiments of modern cognitive psychology. This makes room for the existence of naturalism. However, science is not perfect either. When we use scientific methods to verify how people's understanding is formed, we find that the knower is influenced by his previous beliefs, cultural background knowledge, etc., and even the thoughts and evaluations of others also affect personal understanding. The sociology of science reveals the interaction between science and society, while the sociology of scientific knowledge reveals the relationship between scientific understanding and the cultural, historical and social factors of the knower. That is to say, the process of scientific knowledge has room for sociological study. Study the sociological factors of scientific understanding, such as the relationship between individual cognition and collective cognition, the relationship between individual cultural background and personal cognition, the relationship between social ideology and individual cognition, and so on. The study of these sociological factors can provide a scientific explanation for the formation of scientific understanding. Therefore, while the study of epistemology is moving towards naturalism, there is also a trend towards sociologization. However, no matter how we study and actively solve the problems that arise in the process of human understanding, we will be harassed by uncertainty, and the contradiction between certainty and uncertainty is a pair of contradictions that are constantly generated and constantly solved and can never be completely resolved. The opposition between the universality of theories and particular counterexamples has always existed. When we cannot resolve this pair dialectically, we logically negate the conclusion of universality with individual counterexamples. Logicians do not realize that individual counterexamples are constant, and that the purpose of science is to obtain generalizations about individual facts that conform to the law of large numbers in probability theory, but cannot exclude individual counterexamples. Even if we summarize 99.9 percent, we cannot rule out that 0.1 percent. But this does not hinder the establishment of scientific authority, and science is a reputation for success. If we look at it from a logical standpoint, when people indulge in logic, people will be disappointed in our cognitive ability and pessimistic because we cannot establish absolute certainty. Therefore, when the debate between scientific realism and anti-realism is endless, some nihilists throw out philosophical pessimistic arguments, they shout anti-metaphysical slogans, hold the flag of postmodern philosophy of science, call back the dead of relativism, and sound the death knell of Dadaism in philosophy of science! It is on this basis that this book summarizes the non-philosophizing trend of contemporary Western philosophy of science. The introductory part is a general explanation, which is to show the general idea of the book, summarizing the development trend of contemporary Western philosophy of science into three aspects, namely, the nihilism of philosophy of science, the naturalization of epistemological research, and the sociology. The following discussion is based on these three aspects, the first part, chapters 1 to 3, which deal with the nihilistic philosophy of science produced in the debate between scientific realism and anti-realism; The second part, chapters IV to VI, deals with the various views of contemporary Western philosophy of science in the defense of knowledge and the tendency towards naturalism on this basis; The third part, Chapters 7 to 9, discusses the sociological trends in epistemological research and what the development of these three trends has implications for us. In discussing these three trends, many of them comment on contemporary Western philosophical views of science. From the perspective of this research, the time involved covers the period from the sixties and seventies of the 20th century to the 21st century, spanning 40 years, and the information involved is vast. Fortunately, under the guidance of Mr. Sharkisson since 1991, I have been involved in the research of contemporary Western philosophy of science, especially the debate between scientific realism and anti-realism, and the teaching and research process has not been interrupted since then. Some chapters of this book have also been published in journals such as Philosophical Research, Academic Monthly, Studies in Dialectics of Nature, and Foreign Social Sciences. As for the historical narrative of certain theoretical views, the author also continues the previous works. Over the years, in addition to the information I usually accumulate, the most helpful research is the "Humanities Hut" of Peking University, she has provided me with very valuable research materials, especially in recent years on Western philosophy of science in English, which can not but be a great help to me to complete this project! It not only saves the time of going to major libraries to search for materials, but also saves the cost of copying those materials. Here, I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to Peking University Humanities Cottage! What is unsatisfactory is that I have not read the material on contemporary Western philosophy of science in a comprehensive and careful manner, and the content is not necessarily very inclusive. On the one hand, this is due to my own limitations, and on the other hand, because time does not allow. The various schools and ideas of contemporary Western philosophy of science still need to be studied and grasped by colleagues, and here I just provide you with a reference point for understanding, and I sincerely hope that colleagues will give more opinions on this! The author is from Zhejiang Normal University（AI翻译）
