ABSTRACT
The failure of theoretical deductivism and the muting of confirmation holism are purely epistemic both in character and in their implications. Nancy Cartwright (1983), making many of the same points about scientific methodology that I’ve raised in § 2, has drawn metaphysical anti-realist conclusions from them, specifically the denial of the truth of high-level physical laws. I object to this line of thought in what follows, as it arises in her work and in that of others: I argue that the truth-predicate must play a special role in scientific theories, and that this constraint is not respected by the kind of anti-realist strategy she and others employ.
