R. Hilpinen - Böcker

In these papers derived from an international conference held in 1992 in Beijing, Chinese and Western philosophers treat current as well as historically situated issues of realism and anti-realism in the understanding of scientific knowledge. There are four sections: (1) philosophical arguments proper (Hilpinen, Krejci, Musgrave, Niiniluoto, Qiu Renzong, Sfendoni-Mentzou, Bahm, Wallner and Peschl); (2) realism and general methodology (James Brown, Franklin, Gavroglu, Kaiser, Chin-Tai Kim, Wartofsky, Watkins, Wright, Wu Qiongbing, Yin Zhengkun); (3) physical sciences (Fan Dainian, Folse, He Zuoxiu, Hong Dingguo, Jin Wulun, Johansson, Li Li, Luo and Hu, Mao Shiying, Schagrin, Schlagel, Zhou Jihong); (4) social and biological sciences (Maki, Shanahan, Paul Tang and Ralph Brown III, Cohen). The conference was inspired by the late Professor Tscha Hung of Beijing, for many years Director of the Institute of Foreign Philosophy at Beijing University, and a distinguished PhD from the University of Vienna in 1934 under Moritz Schlick.

The present volume is a product of an international research program 'Foundations of Science and Ethics', launched in 1976 by the Inter­ University Centre of Post-Graduate Studies, Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia, with the financial support of the V olkswagen Foundation. According to the outline ofthe program, formulated in 1976 by a committee consisting of Professors Dagfinn F~llesdal, Rudolf Haller (coordinator), Lorenz Kruger, Karel Lambert, Keith Lehrer, Kuno Lorenz, Gunther Patzig, Ivan Supek and Paul Weingartner, its general purpose was to investigate the interplay of various internal and external factors in the development of science. Generous financial support from the Volkswagen Foundation made it possible to plan four annual conferences, the first of which was held in Dubrovnik on March 6-12, 1978. This volume contains the majority of the papers presented in the first Dubrovnik conference; the main theme of this conference was 'Rationality in Science and Ethics' (Some of the papers appear here in a thoroughly revised form. ) Further results of the research program will be discussed in three other conferences, to be held in Dubrovnik in 1979-1981; the papers presented in these conferences will be published separately. Professor Rudolf Haller of the University of Graz assumed the burden of the practical planning and organization of the first conference (as well as that of the other three conferences). I wish to thank Professor Haller on behalf of all participants for carrying out this demanding and time-consuming task.

The present volume is a sequel to Deontic Logic: Introductory and Systematic Readings (D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht 1971): its purpose is to offer a view of some of the main directions of research in contemporary deontic logic. Most of the articles included in Introductory and Systematic Readings represent what may be called the standard modal approach to deontic logic, in which de on tic logic is treated as a branch of modal logic, and the normative concepts of obligation, permission and prohibition are regarded as analogous to the "alethic" modalities necessity, possibility and impossibility. As Simo Knuuttila shows in his contribution to the present volume, this approach goes back to late medieval philosophy. Several 14th century philosophers observed the analogies between deontic and alethic modalities and discussed the deontic interpretations of various laws of modal logic. In contemporary deontic logic the modal approach was revived by G. H. von Wright's classic paper 'Deontic Logic' (1951). Certain analogies between deontic and alethic modalities are obvious and uncontroversial, but the standard approach has often been criticized on the ground that it exaggerates the analogies and tends to ignore those features of normative concepts which distinguish them from other modalities.

x I wish to express my thanks to all contributors to this volume for their collaboration, and especially to Professor laakko Hintikka, Editor of Synthese Library, for his help in editing this book. THE EDITOR INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND IMPRESSION The articles included in this collection represent what may be called the standard modal approach to deontic logic (the logic of normative concepts), in which deontic logic is treated as a branch of modal logic, and the normative concepts of obligation, permission (permissibility) and prohibi- tion are regarded as analogous to the 'alethic' modalities necessity, possi- bility and impossibility. In his recent paper [16] Simo Knuuttila has shown that this approach can be traced back to late medieval philosophy. Several 14th century philosophers observed the analogies between deontic and alethic modalities and 4iscussed the deontic interpretations of various laws of modal logic. A relatively simple deontic system of this kind (called the system D or K D; cf. Lemmon and Scott [17], pp. 50-51, Chellas [10], p.131) is obtained by adding to propositional logic two deontic axioms (or axiom schemata), (K) O(A :::J B) :::J (OA :::J OB) and (D) OA :::J ~ 0 ~ A, where '0' is the obligation operator, and the deontic variant of the 'rule of necessitation' (0) From A, to infer ~A.

In these papers derived from an international conference held in 1992 in Beijing, Chinese and Western philosophers treat current as well as historically situated issues of realism and anti-realism in the understanding of scientific knowledge. There are four sections: (1) philosophical arguments proper (Hilpinen, Krejci, Musgrave, Niiniluoto, Qiu Renzong, Sfendoni-Mentzou, Bahm, Wallner and Peschl); (2) realism and general methodology (James Brown, Franklin, Gavroglu, Kaiser, Chin-Tai Kim, Wartofsky, Watkins, Wright, Wu Qiongbing, Yin Zhengkun); (3) physical sciences (Fan Dainian, Folse, He Zuoxiu, Hong Dingguo, Jin Wulun, Johansson, Li Li, Luo and Hu, Mao Shiying, Schagrin, Schlagel, Zhou Jihong); (4) social and biological sciences (Maki, Shanahan, Paul Tang and Ralph Brown III, Cohen). The conference was inspired by the late Professor Tscha Hung of Beijing, for many years Director of the Institute of Foreign Philosophy at Beijing University, and a distinguished PhD from the University of Vienna in 1934 under Moritz Schlick.