The nature of scientific explanation has been an important topic in philosophy of science for many years. This book highlights some of the conceptual problems that still need to be solved and points out a number of fresh philosophical ideas to explore. Anyone interested in causal and probabilistic explanation, explanation-seeking questions and contrastive explanations, inference to the best explanation, or explanations within the special sciences should find something of interest in this book.

THEORY OF EXPLANATION.- EXPLANATIONS ARE ABOUT CONCEPTS AND CONCEPT FORMATION.- WHAT TO ASK OF AN EXPLANATION-THEORY.- THE IDEA OF CONTRASTIVE EXPLANANDUM.- THE PRAGMATIC-RHETORICAL THEORY OF EXPLANATION.- CAUSAL EXPLANATION PROVIDES KNOWLEDGE WHY.- CAUSAL EXPLANATION AND MANIPULATION.- ASSESSING THE EXPLANATORY POWER OF CAUSAL EXPLANATIONS.- SOME NOTES ON UNIFICATIONISM AND PROBABILISTIC EXPLANATION.- ISSUES IN EXPLANATION.- SELECTION AND EXPLANATION.- IBE AND EBI.- EXPLAINING WITH EQUILIBRIA68.- EXPLANATION AND ENVIRONMENT.- BIOLOGICAL NOTIONS OF INNATENESS AND EXPLANATION OF LANGUAGE ACQUISITION.- ASPECT KINDS.