Explanatory Generalizations, Part I: A Counterfactual Account

Abstract

[Introduction] The nomothetic conception of explanation, according to which all successful explanations must appeal to laws, has dominated the discussion of scientific explanation in the second half of the twentieth century. The best known formulation of the nomothetic conception of explanation is, of course, Hempel’s Deductive-Nomological theory of explanation. While few philosophers today accept the D-N theory of explanation in its original formulation, there is widespread consensus that laws play a central role in explanation, even among prominent critics of the D-N model such as Wesley Salmon (see, e.g., Salmon 1984, p. 262).