Status of Reasons

Do epistemic communities accept reasons during theory acceptance? If they do, what is the nature of the relationship between reasons and scientific change? Is it possible for a theory to remain accepted while the original reason for its acceptance is replaced by another?

Epistemic communities seem to accept or reject reasons for theories. Currently, Scientonomy does not accept reasons and thus lacks an account of the status of reasons. Are reasons theories? Are reasons theories about theories? Are they components of scientific mosaics? Imagine a scenario where a theory T is accepted because of reason R₁. However, 'R₁ is later replaced by another reason 'R₂. Does this change necessarily entail that T should be replaced as well?

In the scientonomic context, this question was first formulated by Hakob Barseghyan, Abdullah Sarwar and Intishar Kazi in 2018. The question is currently accepted as a legitimate topic for discussion by Scientonomy community.

In Scientonomy, the accepted answer to the question is:

• If a theory satisfies the acceptance criteria of the method employed at the time, it becomes accepted into the mosaic; if it does not, it remains unaccepted; if assessment is inconclusive, the theory can be accepted or not accepted.

Scientonomic History

Acceptance Record of the Question

Here is the complete acceptance record of this question (it includes all the instances when the question was accepted as a legitimate topic for discussion by a community):

Community	Accepted From	Acceptance Indicators	Still Accepted	Accepted Until	Rejection Indicators
Scientonomy	18 October 2018		Yes

All Direct Answers

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Accepted Direct Answers

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Current View

In Scientonomy, the accepted answer to the question is The Second Law (Patton-Overgaard-Barseghyan-2017).

Mechanism of Theory Acceptance

The Second Law (Patton-Overgaard-Barseghyan-2017) states: "If a theory satisfies the acceptance criteria of the method employed at the time, it becomes accepted into the mosaic; if it does not, it remains unaccepted; if assessment is inconclusive, the theory can be accepted or not accepted."

According to this formulation of the second law, if a theory satisfies the acceptance criteria of the method actually employed at the time, then it becomes accepted into the mosaic; if it does not, it remains unaccepted; if it is inconclusive whether the theory satisfies the method, the theory can be accepted or not accepted.

Unlike the previous formulation of the second law, this formulation makes the causal connection between theory assessment outcomes and cases of theory acceptance/unacceptance explicit. In particular, it specifies what happens to a theory in terms of its acceptance/unacceptance when a certain assessment outcome obtains.

In addition, this new formulation is clearly not a tautology because it forbids certain logically possible scenarios, such as a theory satisfying the method of the time yet remaining unaccepted.

Related Topics

This question is a subquestion of Mechanism of Theory Acceptance.