Ignacio Madroñal
University of Buenos Aires
The debate between scientific realists and antirealists is a dispute that aims to determine which commitments we should endorse based on our best scientific theories. In general, realists acknowledge the existence of unobservable entities postulated by them, while antirealists do not. This leads them to the formulation of complex positions in the fields of scientific semantics, ontology, and epistemology.
Given the remarkable proliferation of proposals and the mixture of their commitments, one may wonder about the legitimacy of the distinction between scientific realism and antirealism. Currently, an approach introduced by van Fraassen (2002) enables the defense of this opposition, relying on the concept of epistemic stance. Stances are sets of epistemic policies that guide an agent in forming her belief system and evaluating the available evidence. Thus, despite the diversity of specific belief systems in the debate, we can identify two conflicting stances that fuel the discussion. While realists adopt a “metaphysical stance” that involves postulating unobservable entities to explain phenomena, antirealists defend an “empiricist stance” that requires forming beliefs based on strictly observable criteria.
According to van Fraassen, adopting a stance is rational as long as it aligns with the values of the agent advocating it and does not lead to self-refuting belief systems. This, together with the fact that each stance allows for a unique evaluation of the available evidence, seems to promote a form of relativism in the debate. There is no higher instance than the stances themselves to evaluate the litigants’ proposals. Consequently, we would have multiple realist and antirealist scientific ontologies that, despite being in open contradiction, should be tolerated simultaneously.
However, Chakravartty (2017) rejects this consequence, indicating that stances do not necessarily lead to relativism, but rather to pluralism when forming a scientific ontology. The aim of this paper is to offer a fresh interpretation of this assertion. I argue that a scientific ontology project should be openly collaborative. Contradictions, which are enabled by relativism, only arise when assuming that its content can be unilaterally determined by a stance. On the contrary, I argue that stances provide two clear avenues for shaping a common (albeit contestable) ontology for realists and antirealists. On the one hand, there are shared commitments in their stances related to the nature of science that enable the direct formation of some beliefs that can coexist in a single ontology. On the other hand, following the example of various scientific investigations in which joint results are achieved through the coordination of conflicting methodological perspectives, I suggest that a convergence in certain shared beliefs, sanctioned in a coordinated manner by the divergent epistemic politics of the rival stances, is also possible.
Chair: Isa Kooiman
Time: September 13th, 11:20 – 11:50
Location: SR 1.004, online
SOPhiA 2026 