"An essay concerning subjectivity and scientific realism: Some fancies on Sellarsian themes and onto-politics"

• Main Author: Garnar, Andrew Wells
• Other Authors: Science and Technology Studies
• Format: Others
• Published: Virginia Tech 2014
• Subjects: Scientific Realism; Subjectivity; Pragmatism; Onto-politics; Wilfrid Sellars
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10919/29029; http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-09192007-194730/

I develop a framework for making visible the impacts that science has on human subjectivity, along with demonstrating how these transformations support the existing social order. In order to develop this framework, I critique the work of Wilfrid Sellars. Sellars is one of the few analytic philosophers of science who directly addresses the connections between science and subjectivity. What makes Sellars particularly interesting is the way he sought to preserve a strong conception of normativity alongside a quasi-eliminativist scientific realism. I set the stage for my critique of Sellars by contrasting two different accounts of subjectivity, one Cartesian, the other pragmatic. I argue in favor of the pragmatic because it completely grounds the subject in the world (a point with which Sellars basically agrees). I begin my critique of Sellars by explaining his scientific realism. This is then connected to his vision of the interconnections between science and subjectivity. I then argue that Sellarsâ scientific realism is fundamentally incoherent, which leads his system into nihilism. From this I trace out the role that science can play with respect to subjectivity in a nihilistic world. To partially counter this nihilism, I articulate an alternative to scientific realism that is based, in part, on my pragmatic account of subjectivity. I conclude by re-appropriating elements of Sellarsâ philosophy, routed through my alternative scientific realism, in order to complete the framework discussed above. === Ph. D.