Putnam's Critical and Explanatory Tendencies Interpreted from a Machine Learning Perspective

Sheldon Z. Soudin

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arXiv · 2501.03026

Putnam's Critical and Explanatory Tendencies Interpreted from a Machine Learning Perspective

Sheldon Z. Soudin

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Abstract

Making sense of theory choice in normal and across extraordinary science is central to philosophy of science. The emergence of machine learning models has the potential to act as a wrench in the gears of current debates. In this paper, I will attempt to reconstruct the main movements that lead to and came out of Putnam's critical and explanatory tendency distinction, argue for the biconditional necessity of the tendencies, and conceptualize that wrench through a machine learning interpretation of my claim.

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Sheldon Z. Soudin. 2025-01-06. Putnam's Critical and Explanatory Tendencies Interpreted from a Machine Learning Perspective. https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.03026

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