Judging the worth of pursuing: assessing the dynamic responsivity of a project to experimental and model-building practices

Abstract We argue that scientific projects should be judged as pursuit-worthy in virtue of their dynamicity. We give three non-exhaustive dimensions of dynamicity, developed in the context of three case studies: (1) dynamic responsivity to experimental and observational practices, developed by comparing Ptolemaic astronomical projects to pseudoscientific geocentrism; (2) dynamic responsivity to concurrent developing modeling projects, developed by analyzing epidemiologist risk-assessments and resulting projective choices; (3) responsivity to evolving contexts for application and implementation, the evolution of which is driven by the very development of the project, developed by analyzing the 2013 Eindhoven conference assessment of climate modeling and shaping of policy. We argue in the second half that judgments of dynamism can be philosophically and practically implemented in real-time assessments of current projects. Specifically, tracking responsivity to increasingly stable past practices allows us to track a project’s changing viability, and tracking responsivity to projections of stabilizing projects and practices allows us to track a project’s changing promise. We argue that both of these assessments can be most effectively performed by those who both understand the history and philosophy of science and the specific science projects themselves. Therefore, we argue that embedding philosophers of science, who continue to participate in the philosophical community for assessment of their philosophical work and capability, will yield the best results for judging the worth of pursuing a scientific project. Decisions about the proportional allocation of resources will therefore be made as part of dynamic trajectories of support, rather than static determinations of value and worth.