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Born
Bas van Fraassen was born Bastiaan Cornelias van Fraassen on April 5, 1941 in Goes, Netherlands. -
Emigration
Bas van Fraassen was born in the Netherlands while it was occupied by the Nazis. His father worked in a factory during WWII but afterwards the family emigrated to Edmonton, Canada in the summer of 1956 -
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After the War
Bas earned a bachelors in 1963 and a masters in 1964 from the University of Alberta and a Ph.D in 1966 from the University of Pittsburgh -
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Works of Literature Through His Career
Bastiaan van Fraassen published these works his career:
-An Introduction to the Philosophy of Time and Space (1970)
-Formal Semantics and Logic (1971)
-Derivation and Counterexample: An Introduction to Philosophical Logic (1972)
-The Scientific Image (1980)
-Laws and Symmetry (1989)
-Quantum Mechanics: An Empiricist View (1991)
-The Empirical Stance (2002)
-Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective (2008) -
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Teaching Career
Bas has taught at the University of Toronto, Yale University, University of Southern California, and Princeton University since 1982. In 2008 he retired from Princeton -
Laws and Symmetry
Stated that theories could have empirical equivalence but differ in their ontological commitments. Also rejects the notion that science strives to produce and account the physical world that is true and maintains the aim to produce theories that are empirical. -
Scientific Image
In this book Bas coins the term "constructive empiricism" and argues for agnosticism about the reality of observable entities. -
Two Important Questions
Bas has been driven by two philosophical questions, one about philosophy itself, and one about science,
"What Is Empiricism, and What Could It Be?" and "What is Scientific Representation?" the first being answered in The Empirical Stance (2002), and the second in Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective (2008). -
Hobbies and Interests
Bastiaan has a great interest and passion in Rock Climbing. He also likes to hike and has a interest in cats even though he doesn't have any. He does however have dogs.
