Structural realism

Structural realism is a structural version of scientific realism compatible with theory change.

Literature

See also bibliography in the SEP article.

  • Worrall, 1989: Structural realism: The best of both worlds? (doi)
    • First contemporary presentation of structural realism
  • Ladyman, 1998: What is structural realism? (doi)
    • Distinguishes epistemic and ontic forms of structural realism
    • Argues for the latter
  • Bain, 2004: Theories of Newtonian gravity and empirical indistinguishability (doi, pdf)
    • Very technical
    • Cited in ETMG, Sec 2.1.4 as example of theory underdetermination (which is not problematic for structural realism)
  • Ladyman & Ross, 2007: Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalized
    • Ladyman, 2017: An apology for naturalized metaphysics (doi)
  • Tegmark, 2008: The mathematical universe (arxiv, doi)
    • Advocates “a Pythagorean form of OSR”
    • Popularized in Tegmark, 2014: Our Mathematical Universe

Connections to category theory, especially theory equivalence in categorical logic:

  • Bain, 2011: Category-theoretic structure and radical ontic structural realism (doi, pdf)
  • Eva, 2016: Category theory and physical structuralism (doi)
  • Halvorson & Tsementzis, 2016: Categories of scientific theories (pdf)