How Hegels’s Cognitive Semantics Undergirds Newton’s “Rule 4 of Experimental Philosophy” and thus Undermines van Fraassen’s “Constructive Empiricism”

Abstract

Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason developed an insightful, incisive semantics of singular, specifically cognitive reference to particulars, which justifies important consequences for epistemology and philosophy of science; it holds altogether independently of transcendental idealism and remains cogent today. Disentangling this cognitive semantics from transcendental idealism is Hegel’s achievement. Here I demonstrate that this cognitive semantics directly and powerfully undergirds Newton’s methodological Rule IV, thus further supporting Newton’s causal realism regarding gravitational force. I first consider Newton’s Rule IV of experimental philosophy and its role in his justification of causal realism regarding gravitational force (§ 2). Then I summarise this cognitive semantics (§ 3) and show how it is embedded within Rule IV and thus strongly supports Newton’s rule (§ 4). This result exposes a crucial, previously unrecognised fallacy in Bas van Fraassen’s core argument for his anti-realist “constructive empiricism”, a fallacy central to many common objections to causal realism, especially in the sciences (§ 5). This problem reveals a second inadequacy of constructive empiricism, in short, that it, so to speak, is itself “empirically inadequate”, insofar as it is not at all adequate to Newton’s classical mechanics (§ 6). This inadequacy highlights a chronic empiricist misunderstanding of Newtonian mechanics (§ 7). Furthermore, this cognitive semantics contributes to an improved “semantic interpretation” of scientific theories, in part because it undercuts the mistaken idea that physical laws literally “lie” (§ 8). In these regards, Newton, Kant and Hegel provide crucial insights for contemporary history and philosophy of science (§ 9).