There has been much recent work in philosophy of science on idealization – the way inaccurate representations can be used to understand a target system. My dissertation concerns a particular sort of idealization that is familiar but often overlooked: rational reconstruction. Rational reconstructions are “cleaned-up” – more coherent and accurate – versions of an individual’s or a group’s attitudes. They are the kind of idealized model that facilitates a crucial aim of the interpretive sciences, the understanding of another’s point of view. I provide an account of rational reconstruction and argue that such an account can help us make sense of many intellectual projects in the humanities and the interpretive social sciences. I then argue that this account can also be used to resolve a problem in democratic theory: how deliberative institutions can facilitate understanding and discursive engagement with “inchoate” points of view. A theory of rational reconstruction thus elucidates an important way that the humanities and interpretive social sciences can be politically significant. / Philosophy
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:harvard.edu/oai:dash.harvard.edu:1/23845505 |
| Date | January 2015 |
| Creators | Prescott-Couch, Alexander |
| Contributors | Hall, Edward, Berker, Selim, Pettit, Philip, Shelby, Tommie |
| Publisher | Harvard University |
| Source Sets | Harvard University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis or Dissertation, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | embargoed |
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