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Open research questions in Philosophy and History of Science

567 unresolved questions extracted from the limitations and future-work sections of 4,772 Philosophy and History of Science papers in our library. Each links back to the study that raised it.

What the literature leaves open

  • The paper identifies challenges in formulating suitable explanatory targets in scientific practice. It suggests that existing approaches to causal explanation may not fully capture the complexities of scientific practice. The paper also notes that scientists are 'limited beings' who study 'messy systems in the real world', which can make it difficult to develop effective explanations.

    Causal Explanation from a Conceptual Engineering Perspective: Non-Reductionism, Precision, and Pluralism · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in the literature regarding the application of a conceptual engineering approach to causal explanation in biology and neuroscience. It suggests that existing approaches to causal explanation may not fully capture the complexities of scientific practice. The paper aims to address this gap by applying a conceptual engineering approach to emerging claims regarding causal explanation.

    Causal Explanation from a Conceptual Engineering Perspective: Non-Reductionism, Precision, and Pluralism · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in understanding how ontological and ideological parsimony can be commensurable. It identifies a gap in explaining parsimony's role in the special sciences.

    Brute fact parsimony · 2026 · DOI

  • It is unclear what exactly is a scientific explanation. There is considerable philosophical disagreement about the nature and norms of scientific explanation.

    Animating scientific understanding · 2026 · DOI

  • The lack of consideration of the implications of creationism on the metaphysical commitment of abstract objects. The need for an alternative view that can address the problem of indeterminate existence of abstract objects.

    Fictional names, theoretical names, and indeterminate existence · 2026 · DOI

  • The challenge of avoiding double counting the cost of a theory's ontological commitments. The difficulty of quantifying internal complexity and comparing it to numerical ontological parsimony. The need to weigh up theoretical virtues, such as parsimony, explanatory power, and fit with intuition, in theory choice.

    Parsimony and internal complexity · 2026 · DOI

  • The traditional views of ontological parsimony only consider the number of entities, ignoring their internal complexity. There is a need for a more comprehensive understanding of parsimony, considering both numerical and internal complexity.

    Parsimony and internal complexity · 2026 · DOI

  • Tracking and analyzing intellectually inflationary patterns in the history of sciences, - Addressing some of the major challenges in contemporary philosophy of science

    Intellectual inflation: one way for scientific research to degenerate · 2025 · DOI

  • Explanationism faces a dilemma when it comes to account for the epistemic achievements of non-explanatory scientific research.

    Animating scientific understanding · 2026 · DOI

  • In this paper, we show that this regularity-theoretic response is insufficient to break symmetries of determination and, thus, to identify the direction of causation.

    Breaking Symmetry: A New Directionality Criterion for Regularity Theories of Causation · 2026 · DOI

  • What concepts, according to some criteria, are poorly defined and ambigu- ous? How important are these concepts and how does the ambiguity inhibit the use of the theory? c.

    Use and evaluation of theories · 1987 · DOI

  • Throughout my whole career I really have been interested in the decision-making process and, in par ticular, how human beings with very limited access to information, very limited research and computational capacities deal with the world they live in.

    The Failure of Armchair Economics · 1986 · DOI

  • The lack of an integrative theory of causation that combines manipulability and mechanism. The need for a theory that can deal with counterexamples troubling monistic theories.

    Evidential Pluralism, Causal Pluralism, and an Integrative Theory of Causation · 2026 · DOI

  • The article suggests that further testing is needed to establish the broad generality of the proposed architecture. The study recommends exploring the application of the proposed architecture to other domains. The paper implies that future research should focus on developing more advanced architectures that can handle a wider range of tasks.

    THE MODAL DISCIPLINE OF SYMBOLIC DISCOVERY: PIR-JEPA, GRAMMAR COVERAGE, PHYSICS MANIFOLD PRIOR, AND CONFRONTATION WITH THE THEORY OF OBJECTIVITY · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in the current symbolic regression systems in physics, which lies in the grammatical coverage of the expression space. The study recognizes that the current systems fail structurally whenever the canonical form of the law lies outside the predefined repertoire.

    THE MODAL DISCIPLINE OF SYMBOLIC DISCOVERY: PIR-JEPA, GRAMMAR COVERAGE, PHYSICS MANIFOLD PRIOR, AND CONFRONTATION WITH THE THEORY OF OBJECTIVITY · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper suggests that future research should explore the implications of emergent gravitational dynamics. The paper suggests that future research should investigate the compatibility of emergent gravitational dynamics with the Theory of Objectivity.

    EMERGENT GRAVITATION: a critical-propositional reading of the article Emergent gravitational dynamics from a photon action with an effective refractive index, by Vicente Cotrino Bautista, in confrontation with the Theory of Objectivity · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in the understanding of gravitation as an emergent phenomenon. The paper identifies a need for a framework that can provide ontological grounding for emergent gravitational dynamics.

    EMERGENT GRAVITATION: a critical-propositional reading of the article Emergent gravitational dynamics from a photon action with an effective refractive index, by Vicente Cotrino Bautista, in confrontation with the Theory of Objectivity · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper suggests that future research should focus on the development of Codex Alpha as a theory. It notes that the theory requires maturation and empirical confrontation. The paper does not provide a comprehensive list of future research directions.

    THE INFORMATIONAL CODE OF THE COSMOS: a critical–propositional analysis of Codex Alpha 3.0 English Version ICONOCLAST, by Davide Cadelano, in confrontation with the Theory of Objectivity · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in the understanding of Codex Alpha and its relation to the Theory of Objectivity. It notes that the theory may reconfigure the physics of spacetime but does not fully resolve the genesis of the informational principle itself. The paper argues that Cadelano's work does not yet fully satisfy the objectivist demand for modal necessity.

    THE INFORMATIONAL CODE OF THE COSMOS: a critical–propositional analysis of Codex Alpha 3.0 English Version ICONOCLAST, by Davide Cadelano, in confrontation with the Theory of Objectivity · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper notes that Cui's proposal lacks an explicit modal origin. The paper notes that Cui's use of metaphors may weaken the scientific status of the argument. The paper notes that the extension of the model to consciousness, biodiversity, and spiritual wisdom requires further development.

    SUBSTANTIAL SPACETIME, MODAL ONTOLOGY, AND TRANSCENDENT INFORMATION: a critical–propositional analysis of Hugang Cui's article in confrontation with the Theory of Objectivity · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in Cui's proposal regarding the lack of an explicit modal origin. The paper identifies a gap in the development of new physical theories that can account for the relationship between spacetime and consciousness, biodiversity, and spiritual wisdom.

    SUBSTANTIAL SPACETIME, MODAL ONTOLOGY, AND TRANSCENDENT INFORMATION: a critical–propositional analysis of Hugang Cui's article in confrontation with the Theory of Objectivity · 2026 · DOI

  • Future research can build on the paper's findings to develop new theories and models. Future research can explore the implications of the paper's results for model-building in particle physics. Future research can investigate the application of Bayesian inference to other areas of theoretical physics.

    It’s all in your head—naturalness arguments do not require aleatoric uncertainty · 2026 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in the understanding of naturalness arguments. The paper recognizes that recent evaluations of naturalness have been unclear and misleading.

    It’s all in your head—naturalness arguments do not require aleatoric uncertainty · 2026 · DOI

  • The gap between what is claimed and what is warranted by the evidence. The lack of a methodological response to assess the proportionality of scientific claims to the strength of the evidence.

    The Bayesian audit: evaluating the proportionality of scientific claims to evidence — a case study on social priming and walking speed · 2026 · DOI

  • The lack of a history of science literacy component in science education, - The need for a simple and powerful pedagogical tool to apply HPS lessons to current science, - The importance of distinguishing phenomenal claims from explanatory claims in scientific reasoning

    History of Science Literacy as a Core of Science Literacy · 2026 · DOI

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567 open questions have been extracted from the limitations and future-work passages of 4,772 Philosophy and History of Science papers in our library. Each one below links back to the study that raised it, so you can read the original claim in context.

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