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Document Details : Title: De familie der wetenschappen Subtitle: Van een Wittgensteiniaanse naar een procedurele analyse van het demarcatieprobleem Author(s): VERMEIR, Koen Journal: Tijdschrift voor Filosofie Volume: 71 Issue: 1 Date: 2009 Pages: 119-145 DOI: 10.2143/TVF.71.1.2036180 Abstract : A Family of Sciences. From a Wittgensteinian to a Procedural Analysis of the Demarcation Problem Research into the demarcation problem has come to a dead end for some years already. In this text, I reformulate the problem in such a way that a renewed discussion of the problem becomes possible. In contrast to the heritage of the logical positivists, who stressed language and theory, I argue that it is more fruitful to regard science as a practice. Consequently, a Wittgensteinian analysis seems to be a more appropriate method, and I discuss the advantages and disadvantages of such an approach. This, however, does not bring us far enough, and it turns out to be necessary to reformulate the demarcation problem as a concrete problem: 'Is this science?' Subsequently, I formulate a number of conditions that constrain possible solutions to the demarcation problem. Finally, inspired by a number of court cases in which demarcations have been executed in practice, I suggest that a procedural approach is the appropriate way for analysing the demarcation problem. |
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