Feyerabend and Scientific Values: Tightrope-Walking Rationality

Preface. Introduction. 1: Feyerabend's Reductio ad Absurdum of 'Rationalist' Philosophies. 1.1. Introduction. 1.2. Feyerabends Conception of 'Rationalist' Philosophy. 1.3. Feyerabend's Reductio. 1.4. Feyerabend, Galileo and Rationalist Philosophies. 1.5. Feyerabends Rhetoric: Propaganda, Irrationality and Subjective Wishes. 2: Feyerabend, Lakatos and Anarchism. 2.1. Introduction. 2.2. Feyerabends Reductio of Lakatos's MSRP. 2.3. First Steps Towards a Positive Alternative Account of Rationality. 2.4. Conclusion. 3: Feyerabend's Incommensurability and the Pragmatic Theory of Observation. 3.1. Introduction. 3.2. Feyerabend's Incommensurability as Formal Incommensurability 3.3. Responses to Feyerabend's Incommensurability. 3.4. Feyerabend's Commensurability. 3.5. Conclusion. 4: Feyerabend's Relativism. 4.1. Introduction. 4.2. Realism and Relativism. 4.3. Feyerabend's Changing Attitudes Towards Relativism. 4.4. Quantum Physics and Complementarity. 4.5. Quantum Physics and the Theoretical/Empirical Dichotomy of Traditions. 4.6. Conclusion. 5: Feyerabend and Pluralism. 5.1. Introduction. 5.2. Popper and Empirical Content. 5.3. Relevant and Irrelevant Potential Falsifiers. 5.4. Basic Statements and Initial Conditions. 5.5. Rival Theories and the Duhem Thesis. 5.6. Conclusion. 6: Popper, Methodological Pluralism and Epistemic Values. 6.1. Introduction. 6.2. Popper's Axiological Normativity. 6.3. Feyerabend's Axiological Normativity. 6.4. Feyerabend as a Comprehensively Critical Popperian. 6.5. Feyerabend's 7: Kuhn on Paradigms, Rules and Values. 7.1. Introduction. 7.2. Some Confusions in Kuhn's Philosophy. 7.3. The Importance of Scientific Values. 7.4. Conclusion. 8: Tightrope-Walking Rationality: Feyerabend's Metanarrative. 8.1. Introduction. 8.2. Consolations for the Specialist. 8.3. Feyerabend's Two Argumentative Chains. 8.4. Theoretical/Abstract Versus Empirical Traditions. 8.5. Values-Based Rationality. 8.6. Feyerabend: Postmodernist or Tightrope-Walking Rationalist. 8.7. Conclusion. 9: Feyerabend and World-Views. 9.1. Introduction. 9.2. Non-Reductive Metaphysical World-Views. 9.3. Feyerabend and World-Views. 9.4. Conclusion. References. Index.