Two types of personal knowledge are identified: physical/tacit knowledge and knowledge from personal experience. Both types of knowledge seem to deal with the same problems in natural science: they...Show moreTwo types of personal knowledge are identified: physical/tacit knowledge and knowledge from personal experience. Both types of knowledge seem to deal with the same problems in natural science: they are not accepted as scientifically relevant, and they are not easily translated into words. However, they seem to be of great importance for the decision making and scientific success of scientists (in the field of nanobiology). In this thesis, it is argued that both tacit personal knowledge and personal knowledge from experience should be accepted as scientifically relevant, based on arguments from feminist philosophy of science, and thus incorporated into the scientific practice and communication amongst scientists. Furthermore, empathy is put forward as a possible method for transmission of personal knowledge, based on the account of Edith Stein and other contemporary work on the function and effects of empathy in the practice of natural science.Show less
A concept of life as an emergent property, originating from the interaction of two speci c interpretations of biological individuality and entropy will be discussed in this thesis. Biological...Show moreA concept of life as an emergent property, originating from the interaction of two speci c interpretations of biological individuality and entropy will be discussed in this thesis. Biological individuality will be shown to be a speci c member of the category of individuality and a notion best interpreted as a relative concept which is hierarchically structured by interrelated nested entities. A speci c interpretation of entropy will be described as a statistical notion in which entropy is able to locally increase order as a stable dynamic kinetic state in a closed system. The rise of complex organization will be something that can be explained scienti cally but is interpreted as a predominant emergentist property. In this thesis, I argue that life emerges as a property rising from within the organization of a compartmentalized entity that is able to locally decrease its entropy due to a self-replicating autocatalytic web that jumped into existence. Biological individuality and entropy both relate to a base level of complexity and start to meet at the lowest level of organization. I argue that living biological individuals are not substrate neutral implying life in silico will always be fundamentally di erent from biological life.Show less
Het enactivisme, zoals door Varela, Thompson en Rosch geïntroduceerd in “The Embodied Mind” en waarop is voorgebouwd door onder andere Hutto en Myin postuleert dat alle cognitie kan worden begrepen...Show moreHet enactivisme, zoals door Varela, Thompson en Rosch geïntroduceerd in “The Embodied Mind” en waarop is voorgebouwd door onder andere Hutto en Myin postuleert dat alle cognitie kan worden begrepen als belichaamde act, oftewel als sensomotorische vaardigheden. Deze enactivisten verwerpen hiermee de gangbare opvatting in de cognitiewetenschappen dat cognitie het best kan worden begrepen als het verwerken van mentale representaties. Het probleem van het enactivisme is dat het succesvol wordt bevonden in het begrijpen van online cognitie zoals waarnemen, maar niet in het begrijpen van offline cognitie, zoals bijvoorbeeld herinneren en verbeelden. In hoeverre dit opgaat heb ik onderzocht door waarnemen, net als Varela, Noë en Gibson, te operationaliseren als sensorisch geleide act. Daarna heb ik de veronderstelling van Gibson getoetst die stelt dat herinneren en verbeelden kunnen worden begrepen als het offline in werking treden van sensomotorische contingenties van bepaalde sensorisch geleide acts die al eigen zijn gemaakt. Aan de hand van een fragment uit het dagboek van Cocteau laat ik zien dat procedureel en episodisch herinneren nog goed kunnen worden begrepen als sensorisch geleide acts, maar semantisch herinneren, oftewel herinneren bemiddeld door externe representaties niet. Ook voor verbeelden geldt dat die vormen die worden bemiddeld door externe representaties niet goed kunnen worden begrepen als sensorisch geleide act. Om deze vormen van offline cognitie ook te kunnen begrijpen in termen van sensorisch geleide act moeten ze worden begrepen als tweede-orde sensorisch geleide act.Show less
In this thesis the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences is discussed. I will show that this is a deep philosophical problem for which no easy solution is available. A...Show moreIn this thesis the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences is discussed. I will show that this is a deep philosophical problem for which no easy solution is available. A historical analysis of the role of mathematics in science shows that basic mathematics, an abstraction from empirical observation, evolved into complex mathematics, a human invention completely detached from its empirical roots. The conclusion of this analysis is that the applicability of mathematics cannot be explained by adhering to the empirical roots of mathematics. This poses a philosophical problem: how can something that is anthropocentric describe and predict the intricate workings of natural phenomena so accurately? This question is my main research question and is also thoroughly discussed by Mark Steiner (1998). He places emphasis on the predictive power of mathematics in the natural sciences and I will show that Steiner’s main argument, that anthropocentric elements in mathematics play a crucial, and unreasonable effective, role in the discovery of new physical theories is a valid observation in need of an explanation. The mapping accounts of Pincock (2004) and Bueno and Colyvan (2011) are discussed, who attempt to render the anthropocentric elements in mathematics intelligible. They both turn out to be incomplete and therefore, I have provided an improved inferential mapping account that is able to render parts of the anthropocentric influences in mathematics intelligible. However the successful use of tractability assumptions cannot be explained by this mapping account. This leads to the conclusion that the world looks ’user-friendly’, because our anthropocentric assumptions result in correct knowledge about the natural world. Therefore, one cannot refrain from a metaphysical discussion about the relation between mathematics, mind and world. I discuss several metaphysical accounts, of which the most reasonable is the simple explanation that we just ’see what we look for’. A price needs to be paid however; complete knowledge about the world around us will never be possible. Moreover, it remains mysterious that we are able to control natural phenomena in such a detailed way, whilst only having knowledge of a small part of it. The final chapter mentions the changing role of mathematics in science in the last 30 years, where advancements in theoretical physics increased the importance of mathematical methods, whereas advancements in computer science decreased this role. I conclude that now more than ever, it is important to reflect on the role of mathematics in the scientific method.Show less
