Measurement

Michele Luchetti (Central European University)
This paper analyses the case study of Ohm's law of electric current in order to exhibit a novel approach to coordination between theory and measurement procedures. Ohm's scientific practice suggests that there are different 'layers' of constitution identifiable at different epistemic stages. His researches, in fact, involved several epistemic activities including instrument calibration, data reduction, measuring, experimental testing, and mathematical theorising. Some of the connections between these activities show how certain epistemic components had to be constituted, and thus integrated, within Ohm's empirical inquiry, rather than being ready-made features of the world to be used in his scientific reflection.

Jean Baccelli (Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy)
The representational theory of measurement (RTM) has long been the central paradigm in the philosophy of measurement. Such is not the case anymore, partly under the influence of the critique according to which it offers too poor descriptions of the measurement procedures actually followed in science. This can be called the metrological critique of RTM. Assessing this critique matters not only because the correct interpretation of RTM’s research program is at stake. It matters also because the metrological viewpoint, now dominant in the philosophy of measurement, risks to overly restrict the kind of questions explored in this field. My main claim is that, contrary to what is presupposed by the metrological critique, it is not RTM’s goal to offer descriptions of the measurement procedures actually followed in science. To support this claim, I present various cases where RTM can be said to investigate measurement without specifying any measurement procedure. I argue that such limit cases reveal that the metrological critique rests upon a misinterpretation of RTM. I also explain that they illustrate the kind of questions which the philosophy of measurement can explore, when it is not bounded by the metrological viewpoint.

Alistair Isaac (University of Edinburgh)
Recent philosophy of measurement has emphasized the existence of both diachronic and synchronic "loops," or feedback processes, in the epistemic achievements of measurement. A widespread response has been to conclude that measurement outcomes do not convey interest-independent facts about the world, and that only a coherentist epistemology of measurement is viable. In contrast, I argue that a form of measurement realism is consistent with these results. The insight is that antecedent structure in measuring spaces constrains our empirical procedures such that successful measurement conveys a limited, but veridical knowledge of "fixed points," or stable, interest-independent features of the world.

Matthias Michel (Université Paris-Sorbonne)
As for most measurement procedures in the course of their development, measures of consciousness face the problem of coordination, i.e., the problem of knowing whether a measurement procedure actually measures the quantity that it is intended to measure. I focus on the case of the Perceptual Awareness Scale to illustrate how ignoring this problem leads to ambiguous interpretations of subjective reports. In turn, I show that empirical results based on this measurement procedure might be flawed.