This treatise presents an argument that no metaphysical account of laws can succeed. The author analyzes and rejects the arguments that there are laws of nature, or that we must believe that there are. He argues that we should discard the idea of law as an inadequate clue to science. After exploring what this means for general epistemology, the book develops the empiricist view of science as a construction of models to represent this phenomena. The text explores concepts of symmetry, transformation and invariance to illuminate the structure of such models. A central role is played in science by symmetry arguments, and it is shown how these function also in the philosophical analysis of probability.
- ISBN10 0198248113
- ISBN13 9780198248118
- Publish Date November 1989 (first published 2 November 1989)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 4 December 1992
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Oxford University Press
- Imprint Clarendon Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 410
- Language English