Parsimony and inference to the best mathematical explanation

DOI10.1007/s11229-015-0723-3zbMath1358.00092OpenAlexW2027794684MaRDI QIDQ516215

Alan Baker

Publication date: 14 March 2017

Published in: Synthese (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-015-0723-3

zbMATH Keywords

parsimonyPlatonismnominalismindispensabilitymathematical explanationperiodical cicadas

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Philosophy of mathematics (00A30) Philosophical and critical aspects of logic and foundations (03A05)

Related Items (5)

Scientific explanation, unifying mathematics, and indispensability arguments (a new Cicada MES) ⋮ Why inference to the best explanation doesn't secure empirical grounds for mathematical Platonism ⋮ The enhanced indispensability argument, the circularity problem, and the interpretability strategy ⋮ The silent hexagon: explaining comb structures ⋮ Optimal representations and the enhanced indispensability argument

Cites Work

• Optimisation and mathematical explanation: doing the Lévy walk
• Magicicada, mathematical explanation and mathematical realism
• Periodical cicadas
• The honeycomb conjecture
• Optimus prime: paraphrasing prime number talk
• On the Primes in the Interval [3n, 4n]
• Mathematics and Scientific Representation
• What Makes a Scientific Explanation Distinctively Mathematical?
• The Enhanced Indispensability Argument: Representational versus Explanatory Role of Mathematics in Science
• The Explanatory Power of Phase Spaces
• Primes in the interval [2n,3n]
• On the Application of the Honeycomb Conjecture to the Bee's Honeycomb
• Mathematics, Explanation, and Scientific Knowledge
• The prime number periodical cicada problem

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