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The Evidentiary Boundaries of Scientific Explanation - Domain Transfer, Explanatory Warrant, and Physical Admissibility

Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: Scientific results are often extended from observed settings to new domains, from predictions to causalinterpretations, and from mathematical conditions to proposed physical preparations. This article developsa target-specific analysis of scientific warrant: the evidence and assumptions offered must be appropriate tothe particular strengthened claim, not merely to a related, narrower result. Three distinct obstacles make therequirement precise. First, a saturated two-factor countermodel shows that evidence identifying separatedepartures from a baseline need not identify their joint response; this motivates a bounded joint-transferadequacy (JTA) requirement for such branch combinations. Second, a two-population causal constructiondemonstrates that source experimental evidence and target observational agreement cannot generallysubstitute for assumptions identifying a target intervention effect. Third, canonical position–momentumuncertainty shows why an inadmissible literal preparation must be distinguished from a well-defined butunidentified target, while Gaussian preparations preserve valid controlled comparisons. A documentedlaboratory-to-clinical illustration separates assay, exposure, mechanistic, and clinical-outcome claimswithout imputing errors to the investigators. The three obstacles do not instantiate one mathematicaltheorem: they differ in the object left unwarranted and in the appropriate response. Their integrationprovides a comparative, claim-sensitive account of strengthening scientific explanations, not a newidentification result, a demand for exhaustive knowledge, or a claim of priority over existing work onmodel adequacy and causal warrant.
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.24091605
Author: Willis, John
Language: English
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7225635874
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