Article ID: CBB001210957

The Third Path to Structural Realism (2012)

unapi

Ainsworth, Peter M. (Author)


HOPOS
Volume: 2, no. 2
Issue: 2
Pages: 307-320

In addition to the upward and downward paths to structural realism, there is a third path, scouted by Grover Maxwell. The purpose of this article is to critically examine this third path. Maxwell explicitly notes that his argument relies on a neo-Russellian principle of acquaintance. It also tacitly relies on the assumption that a predicate is observational if it applies to an observable object. It is argued here that (i) this assumption is evidently false if one adopts an intuitive notion of an observational term but that (ii) the assumption seems plausible if one works with a notion of an observational term like that Maxwell himself seems to have had in mind but that (iii) if one works with this notion of an observational term then the principle of acquaintance leads to absurdity.

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Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB001210957/

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Authors & Contributors
Borghini, Andrea
Davide Bondi
John Erik Hmiel
Zalabardo, José L.
Maria Cristina Amoretti
Nathan, Marco J.
Concepts
Philosophy
Realism
Logic
Philosophy of science
History of philosophy of science
Structuralism
Time Periods
20th century
21st century
20th century, early
19th century
Medieval
Ancient
Places
Americas
United States
Greece
Germany
Berlin (Germany)
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