Studies in the Logic of Explanation
1948/04/01 by Carl G. Hempel, Paul Oppenheim · 3,118 citations
Arts and Humanities · Mathematics · Neuroscience · #Computer science #Cybernetics and Technology in Society #Embodied and Extended Cognition #Epistemology #Function (biology) #Logical analysis #Logical conjunction #Mathematical statistics #Mathematics #Philosophy #Philosophy and History of Science #Philosophy of science #Scientific law #Scientific theory #Sociology #Subject (documents) #Subject matter
paper · doi:10.1086/286983
published in Philosophy of Science 15(2), 135-175 (Cambridge University Press)
openalex publication_date 1948/04/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/02
Abstract
To explain the phenomena in the world of our experience, to answer the question “why?” rather than only the question “what?”, is one of the foremost objectives of all rational inquiry; and especially, scientific research in its various branches strives to go beyond a mere description of its subject matter by providing an explanation of the phenomena it investigates. While there is rather general agreement about this chief objective of science, there exists considerable difference of opinion as to the function and the essential characteristics of scientific explanation. In the present essay, an attempt will be made to shed some light on these issues by means of an elementary survey of the basic pattern of scientific explanation and a subsequent more rigorous analysis of the concept of law and of the logical structure of explanatory arguments.
Citations
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