Representing and Explaining: The Eikonic Conception of Scientific Explanation

Abstract

AbstractThe ontic conception of explanation, according to which explanations are full-bodied things in the world, is fundamentally misguided. I argue instead for what I call the eikonic conception, according to which explanations are the product of an epistemic activity involving representations of the phenomena to be explained. What is explained in the first instance is a particular conceptualization of the explanandum phenomenon, contextualized within a given research program or explanatory project. I conclude that this eikonic conception has a number of benefits, including making better sense of scientific practice and allowing for the full range of normative constraints on explanation.