VOL. IV (XXI) 2009 - Departamentul de Filosofie si Stiinte ale ...

ANALELE UNIVERSITĂŢII DE VEST DIN TIMIŞOARA
SERIA FILOSOFIE ŞI ŞTIINŢE ALE COMUNICĂRII
VOL. IV (XXI), 2009
ISSN 1844 – 1351 (online)
ISSN 1842 – 6638 (print)
“FICTION” AND “MODEL” IN SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE
Iasmina PETROVICI
West University of Timişoara
It is a certainty that contemporary epistemology still brings into focus of
heated debates concerning the specific nature of scientific discourse the role
played by imaginary constructs. The Anglo-Saxon epistemology especially
needs an update on the scientific imaginary model, therefore resorting to the
tools of semantics, pragmatics or philosophical hermeneutics 1 . M. Black,
Mary B. Hesse, Tarski, Searle, Davidson, Lakoff, Suppes, Toulmin, Redhead
are just a few authors dealing with the epistemological issue of the
consistency of imaginary constructs in the area of scientific discourse. The
topic of the scientific imaginary has been approached from different angles.
In the current course of the philosophy of science, the core theme is
determined by several attempts to identify a universal criterion for delimiting
the scientific imaginary which would, thus, ensure its legitimacy in the area of
scientific discourse. Therefore, apart from some efforts in contemporary
philosophy of science to regard the scientific discovery more like an aesthetic
experience or to reunite the areas of scientific knowledge on the grounds of
reasoning by analogy, emphasis tends to be focused on cognitive relevance
of imaginary constructs, perceived as transdisciplinary mechanisms at the
junction of different areas of discourse.
1 Related to this observation, see the paper by Newton Da Costa and Steven
French, Science and Partial Truth: A Unitary Approach to Models and Scientific
Reasoning, Oxford University Press, New York, 2003