Citation: Cañas, D. (2026). Three epistemological desiderata for HPS practitioners. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2026.102201.

Abstract: I outline an epistemology of evidential reasoning in the history and philosophy of science (HPS). Drawing upon some concrete works in HPS scholarship, I formulate three novel epistemological desiderata for using historical case studies as evidence for philosophical claims about science, to wit: independent historical evidence, metahistorical criticism, and disciplinary alignment. These desiderata bring out epistemic qualities of evidential reasoning that contribute to achieving its primary goal of conferring justification upon philosophical conclusions on the basis of historical evidence. In this way, my proposed epistemology tackles the methodological problem of vicious circularity and the metaphysical problem of disciplinary unsuitability that allegedly jeopardise evidential reasoning, thereby vindicating its positive epistemic status.