Sikorski Michał, Andreoletti Mattia
Warsaw University of Technology, Warsaw, Poland.
Department of Health Sciences and Technology, ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland.
Found Sci. 2024;29(4):1071-1088. doi: 10.1007/s10699-023-09901-4. Epub 2023 Feb 18.
Replicability is widely regarded as one of the defining features of science and its pursuit is one of the main postulates of meta-research, a discipline emerging in response to the replicability crisis. At the same time, replicability is typically treated with caution by philosophers of science. In this paper, we reassess the value of replicability from an epistemic perspective. We defend the orthodox view, according to which replications are always epistemically useful, against the more prudent view that claims that it is useful in very limited circumstances. Additionally, we argue that we can learn more about the original experiment and the limits of the discovered effect from replications at different levels. We hold that replicability is a crucial feature of experimental results and scientists should continue to strive to secure it.
可重复性被广泛视为科学的决定性特征之一，对其的追求是元研究的主要假设之一，元研究是一门因应可重复性危机而兴起的学科。与此同时，科学哲学家通常对可重复性持谨慎态度。在本文中，我们从认识论的角度重新评估可重复性的价值。我们捍卫正统观点，即复制在认识论上总是有用的，以反对更为审慎的观点，后者认为复制仅在非常有限的情况下有用。此外，我们认为，通过不同层面的复制，我们可以更多地了解原始实验以及所发现效应的局限性。我们认为，可重复性是实验结果的关键特征，科学家应继续努力确保其实现。
