Partial structures and ontic structural realism: from happy allies to strange bedfellows

• Grant number: 22/15992-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Post-doctor
• Start date: May 22, 2023
• End date: May 21, 2024
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Philosophy
• Principal Investigator: Itala Maria Loffredo D'Ottaviano
• Grantee: Raoni Wohnrath Arroyo
• Supervisor: Matteo Morganti
• Host Institution: Centro de Lógica, Epistemologia e História da Ciência (CLE). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Italy
• Associated to the scholarship: 21/11381-1 - Quasi-realism: combining quasi-truth and scientific realism, BP.PD

Abstract

According to a relevant version of structural realism, viz. ontic structural realism, we should believe in the existence of structures that represent empirical phenomena. Their primary motivations are to respond to the pessimistic meta-induction and the underdetermination problem. Such a significant version of structural realism calls for adopting partial structures to resolve the latter. We use a current examination of non-relativistic quantum mechanics to illustrate the relevant issues, and argue that the concept of quasi-truth involves an epistemological conception embedded in the formulation of partial structures. At issue here are inseparable theses that are not often acknowledged. Formulated in terms of quasi-truth, the structural realist approach to underdetermination states that we can accept (but not believe) each of the quantum theories insofar as they are all quasi-true, i.e., empirically adequate. A significant shift away from belief and truth has been implemented. But the distinctions between belief and acceptance as well as between representation and empirical adequacy are characteristic of empiricism not of realism. In the end, structural realism cannot use partial structures if it wants to remain a realist stance. (AU)

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

RAONI ARROYO; LAURO DE MATOS NUNES FILHO; FREDERIK MOREIRA DOS SANTOS. Towards a process-based approach to consciousness and collapse in quantum mechanics. Manuscrito, v. 47, n. 1, 2024-03-01. (22/15992-8)