ATOCHA ALISEDA LOGICS IN SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY

ABSTRACT. In this paper I argue for a place for logic in scientific methodology, at the same level as that of computational and historical approaches. While it is well known that a a whole generation of philosophers dismissed Logical Positivism (not just for the logic though), there are at least two reasons to reconsider logical approaches in the philosophy of science. On the one hand, the present situation in logical research has gone far beyond the formal developments that deductive logic reached last century, and new research includes the formalization of several other types of reasoning, like induction and abduction. On the other hand, we call for a balanced Philosophy of Science, one in which both methods, the formal and the historical may be complementary, together providing a pluralistic view of science, in which no method is the predominant one. KEY WORDS: abduction, heuristics, logic, scientific discovery 1