A Defense of Scientific Realism
Establishing the Grounds for Atoms, Protons, and Electrons
Scientific Realism is a philosophical position that, although varied, generally holds that: (1) observable and unobservable entities of theories are real; and (2) science can tell us to some extent how the world is independent of our minds and conceptual frameworks. In an essay entitled “Positivism and Realism”, the German philosopher Moritz Schlick (April 14, 1882-June 22, 1936) presents an argument for Scientific Realism, and of the validity, objectivity, and reality of the invisible entities (electrons, atoms, etc.) constitutive of scientific theories.
On Objectivity
Schlick understands “objectivity” as meaning: there are objects that exist independently of our thoughts and ideas we form of them. Objects are objective because they do, and will continue to, exist without the need of our perceptions of them to instantiate them.
Schlick gives an example with the proposition: “There is a castle in the park before the town”. The proposition, and thus the castle, are easily verified by putting ourselves in a position that gives rise to a specific state-of-affairs: namely, perceiving the castle mentioned, and its being in the park which is before the town.
Because the castle is an objective object anyone with the proper perceptual capacities is able to put one’s self in a position to experience it empirically. If the castle ceased to exist when not perceived by an individual it would thus be dependent upon our perceptions of it, and fail to be objective.
On Validity and Verification
To verify an object requires repeated, regular sense-perceptions or experiences of the object in discussion; and these experiences of the object must be regulated by constant law-like connections. If single observations of objects are allowed as verification we run into the problem of how to account for illusions.
Schlick maintains, then, when we verify real objects we are saying, “…there is quite a specific connection between perceptions or other experiences, that under given circumstances certain date are presented”. Take the castle example again, and the connection runs as such: the perception is of the castle, while the circumstance is being in the park before the town. Multiple repetitions of this circumstance would always give rise to the data/perception of the castle.
On Reality
For Schlick, attributing reality to an object is nothing more than saying “‘x is actual’ or ‘x is real’”. We observe a dog and say: “this dog is real”. When, by “suitable manipulation” we give ourselves tangible or visual presentations of an object, we can then claim that the object is real.
Furthermore, to claim something as real is not to give an object the possession of any property. Schlick maintains that “Realists” often try to conflate the notion of “real” with some extra “transcendent” quality: something more ‘real’ than observable data. But this is nonsense because saying something is real is just to claim its existence. Because ‘real’ is not a property the difference is easily understood in the two sentences: “the dollar in my pocket is round” and “the dollar in my pocket is real”. Whereas the first states a property of the dollar, the second merely claims the existence of the dollar.
The Reality of Invisible Entities
Finally, then, Schlick maintains that the objectivity of observable entities is “the same as that of protons and energies” because these objects exist entirely independent of our subjective minds. Specific states-of-affairs allow us to always observe mountains, and for the scientist to always “observe” invisible entities. A scientist can say, “during this experiment a proton produced this effect,” and by repeated experiments and conditions he can verify his initial data for himself and others. Because of repeated experiments regarding “invisible things”, Schlick maintains that we’ve come to consider them as real as any other object of experience.
References
Moritz Schlick, “Positivism and Realism”, in The Philosophy of Science, ed. Richard Boyd, Phillip Gasper, and J.D. Trout, pp.37-55. (MIT Press: Cambridge: 1991)
Moritz Schlick
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