Escape from Zanzibar: The Epistemic Value of Precision in Measurement
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Published:2022-06-09
Issue:5
Volume:89
Page:1243-1254
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ISSN:0031-8248
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Container-title:Philosophy of Science
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language:en
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Short-container-title:Philos. sci.
Author:
Isaac Alistair M. C.ORCID
Abstract
AbstractA “Zanzibar” is an island of measurement values that internally cohere, but are detached from independent contact with reality. One manifestation of Zanzibars is through “bandwagon effects,” the tendency of contemporaneous measurements to agree. Bandwagons illustrate how the otherwise virtuous drive towards coherence can have negative epistemic consequences. I argue that precision is an epistemic virtue that mitigates against bandwagon effects and illustrate this claim with a case study from the history of measurements of c. This precision-first reasoning motivates the practice of blind data analysis in bleeding edge precision measurement, where outcomes can point the way to new physics.
Publisher
Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Subject
History and Philosophy of Science,Philosophy,History