Granted Projects (last 15 years)

The Roles of Modalities in Scientific Representation (SciRepMod 2021-2023)

Funded by the European Commission (Grant agreement ID: 101022338) with an Intra-European mobility grant

Personnel: Quentin Joel Marie Ruyant (researcher in charge), Mauricio Suárez (PI)

Summary: Modal discourse is ubiquitous in science, but identifying which type of necessity is involved, for example epistemic, natural or conceptual, is not always easy. Funded by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the SciRepMod project aims to circumvent this by examining the representational status of various types of modalities. The purpose is to distinguish different types of modalities pragmatically to provide tools for interpreting the modal aspect of scientific theories and scientific discourses more precisely. The project will focus on non-relativistic quantum mechanics as the field offers a rich modal structure (possible states, observables, outcomes and model parameters) with divergent interpretations. Thus, the project will also be of interest to working scientists, particularly physicists.

Stochastic Representations in the Natural Sciences: Conceptual Foundations and Applications (StochRep 2019-2021)

Funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (PGC2018-099423-B-I00). 

Personnel: María Caamaño, Pedro Sánchez-Gómez, Laura Nuño, Mauricio Suárez (PI)

Summary: The proposal is for a thorough and detailed philosophical inquiry into the conceptual, epistemological and methodological foundations of stochastic representations in the natural sciences. By stochastic representation we mean, as a first approximation, the kind of model building in the sciences that accounts (for the sake of explanation, prediction, or mere accommodation) for phenomena that appear to be essentially “chancy” or indeterministic. The project aims to raise and then answer some fundamental questions about the nature of such representations through a detailed study of methodological practice, in the tradition of Viennese logical empiricism, later on the Stanford school (Cartwright, 1989; Dupré, 1993), and more recently exemplified in the work typical of the successful Society for the Philosophy of Science in Practice (SPSP). The proposal divides this inquiry into three interlinked parts entitled ‘representation’, ‘probability’, and ‘stochasticity’, addressing the nature of each of these contested notions in relation with the practice of stochastic modeling in some natural sciences. The methodology is empirically based, and we first of all propose to pursue a horizontal or descriptive study of the nature and methodology of stochastic modeling across three main natural sciences, namely: the physical sciences (with a focus on quantum mechanics and statistical physics); chemistry (with an historical eye on the chemical revolution, and a more contemporary focus on molecular quantum chemistry), and biology and the life sciences (with an emphasis on evolutionary developmental biology and the modern synthesis, and some of its arguably emergent consequences in the biomedical sciences). At a second, more philosophical or vertical, level we aim to raise and answer theoretical questions regarding the nature of the involved concepts (namely representation, probability, stochasticity (or indeterminism) and probabilistic causation). 

Probability in Science: Propensities, Statistics and the Logic of Conditionals (2015-2018)

Funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economics and Competitiveness (FFI2014-57064-P)

Personnel: Pedro Sánchez-Gómez, Iñaki San Pedro, Mauricio Suárez (PI)

Summary: The proposal is for a thorough and detailed in depth analysis of the concept of objective probability that is characteristic of the natural sciences, and in particular physics, chemistry and biology. The research proposal centres upon so-called propensities, i.e. probabilistic dispositional properties. It canvasses implications for both the methodology and the metaphysics of science. As regards scientific methodology, the starting hypothesis is that the ascription of these properties is part and parcel of the typical explanatory and theoretical activities that inform science. Dispositions are 'sure-fire' in those contexts in which deterministic laws are typical, while they are essentially probabilistic in those contexts in which the laws are indeterministic or stochastic, that is the causes of phenomena in those contexts generate their effects only with certain probability. Thus the nature of propensities in those contexts is intrinsically related to their probabilistic manifestations. As for the philosophy of probability, the starting hypothesis is a pragmatist conception of propensities, which distinguishes very carefully between the possession conditions of propensities and the possession conditions of their manifestations in probabilities. This distinction breaks away with the identity thesis which informs empiricist interpretations of probability. The project aims to apply this pragmatist conception of propensities to a diverse array of scientific fields and approaches where dispositional properties play an explanatory role, whether in chemistry, physics or biology. The project's scientific objectives are therefore naturally divided in two: those of a methodological kind that pertain to one of these three sciences, and others of a more metaphysical, abstract or general kind, which centre upon the implications of the pragmatist conception for the metaphysics of causality, and therefore also for causal inference, the logical relationship between dispositions and their manifestations (and in particular whether it is possible to reduce this relation to conditional statements, appropriately understood), the relationship between dispositions, probabilities, and statistics, and, finally, more technical questions regarding the appropriate formalization of both causality and probability thus understood as a manifestation of underlying propensities (and in particular, formal alternatives to the classical Kolmogorov calculus).  

Probabilities, Propensities and Conditionals: Implications for Logic and Empirical Science (2013-2015)

Funded by the European Commission (FP7-People-2012-IEF) with an Intra-European mobility grant

Host Centre: School of Advanced Study, London University

Personnel: Dorothy Edgington (PI), Barry Smith (PI), Mauricio Suárez (researcher in charge)

Summary: The study is for a complex and interlocking set of topics in the philosophy of science, logic, and the foundations of probability and statistics, and of quantum mechanics. The focus of the project is on important and unexplored connections between objective probability, physical propensities, and the logic of conditional statements. The main expected outcome is an improved understanding of the nature of probability and its role in the empirical sciences, particularly in relation to quantum physics. The topics are of great current interest and relevance across a number of disciplines, including philosophy of science, logic, probability and statistics, and the foundations of quantum physics. There are further potential applications to computer science, statistical methodology, scientific modeling, and causal inference. The project is very carefully structured in a number of work packages with a number of specific objectives and deliverables for each: i) propensities and dispositions, ii) the logic of conditionals, iii) conditional probability and the probability of conditionals, iv) propensities and conditionals, v) alternative calculi of probability, vi) applications to foundations of quantum mechanics, vii) further applications, and viii) historical developments.

Inference, Causation, and Science (2012-2014)

Funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (part of the coordinated project "Metaphysics and Science" FFI2011-29834)

Personnel: Carl Hoefer, Pedro Sánchez, Mauricio Suárez (coordinator & PI), Iñaki San Pedro, Jon Williamson, Henrik Zinkernagel

Summary: The project’s overall aim is to test the need for a metaphysics for science in four different areas of current philosophical interest: representation, causal inference, propensities and kinds. In all these areas our approach is deflationary: we aim to show one can go a long way towards a full understanding of these notions and their workings in practice without incurring any heavy duty metaphysics cost. In some areas (mainly 1 and 3 below) we have a pretty well developed conception already, and must only work out details; in others we are starting to work. 

1. The Inferential Conception of Scientific Representation. This deflationary view of representation has been articulated by one of us in a series of past papers and articles (Suárez, 2004, 2010). The aim is to provide a book-length treatment. It will include case studies from astrophysics and quantum mechanics (see also point 3 below), besides a comparison between the modes of representation in art and science.

2. Causal Inference. This will continue our ongoing research in this area, in particular in connection with quantum correlation phenomena. In past publications (Suárez, 2007; San Pedro, 2008, San Pedro and Suárez, 2009; San Pedro, forthcoming) we divided Reichenbach’s Principle of Common Cause into a metaphysical and a methodological part, and began to explore their connections with the Causal Markov condition and genuine indeterminism. But given the intense attention paid to these notions by contemporary philosophers of science, much further work is needed for a full understanding of what deflationism requires here. Williamson’s contributions have been particularly valuable (2005).

3. Quantum Propensities. In the context of the ongoing development of a deflationary theory of propensities (Suárez, 2007, forthcoming), we aim to explore an issue that has not yet been broached, namely a study of the nature of the relation between quantum propensities (probabilistic dispositions) and their probabilistic manifestations.

4. Chemical Physics. We aim to investigate two main themes in this regard. First we aim to apply the inferential conception to the models of chemical kinds and bonds, or at least study the conditions under which such an application is possible. Sánchez will then continue his research into natural kinds in chemistry, arguing for an internalist viewpoint consistent with the constructivism prevalent in the pedagogy of chemistry. 

Propensities and Probabilities in Quantum Mechanics: Representation and Application (2009-2011)

Funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (part of the coordinated project "Philosophy of Physics: Propensities, Causality and Spacetime" FFI2008-06418) 

Personnel: Carl Hoefer, Pedro Sánchez, Iñaki San Pedro, Mauricio Suárez (coordinator & PI), Henrik Zinkernagel

Summary: The overall aim of this project is to research the intertheory relations between quantum physics, classical physics and relativity. The more specific aims of the project cluster up in three mutually interrelated thematic units. Firstly we aim to carry out an extensive analysis of the application of the notion of propensity to quantum mechanics – in its diverse interpretations and variants, such as Bohmian mechanics, and multiple applications, such as quantum chemistry. The second generic cluster of objetives aims to elucidate the relationship between classical and quantum physics, and particularly the role that classical physics concepts play in the framework of quantum physics and in cosmology. Finally, our last generic cluster objective aims to research the fundamental nature of spacetime structure, in particular issues related to the nature of spacetime as a background. We will deal with the much discussed issue of whether a quantum theory of gravity must be background-independent, like General Theory of Relativity, and if so, how the quantum theories, which are background dependent might emerge or be compatible with it.

Causality, Propensities, and Causal Inference (2005-2008)

Funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (part of the coordinated project "Causal and Classical Concepts in Science" HUM2005-07187-C03-01) 

Personnel: Carl Hoefer, Julian Reiss, Pedro Sánchez, Iñaki San Pedro, Mauricio Suárez (coordinator & PI), Henrik Zinkernagel

Summary: We propose to form a coordinated network of three research projects, with the overall aim to research the nature of causation and the methods of causal inference within classical, quantum and relativistic physics, and their inter-theoretic relations. The main overall objectives could be summarised as follows:

1) To research metaphysical and methodological aspects of the practice of causal inference in science, with a particular emphasis on quantum physics.

2) To research the nature of causality in the General Theory of Relativity, defending a sceptical position with respect to a robust and well defined form of causation in that theory.

3) To clarify the relationship between classical and quantum physics, with the aim of establishing whether the presence of classical concepts (such as classical Newtonian causation) in quantum physics is inevitable, or rather a legacy that could be superseded by means of a reduction of the classical to the quantum.