RE: [Fis] Realism

Dear John and colleagues,

[...]
> That said, I think that the evidence is that we construct our
> understanding of the world out of materials from both our
> mind and the world, so I fall into the category that is
> usually called constructive realist.

It seems to me that this division among mind and world begs the question
about the nature of the constructed world. Is it the result of our previous
constructions (and therefore contingent) or is it transcendental to these
constructions?

It is easier to see that "phlogiston" was never out there than to make the
case for "oxygen". I don't wish to say that "oxygen" is just a convention,
but perhaps it is only the result of a specific codification of the
discourse in chemistry and physics which makes it possible for us (minds) to
reflexively entertain the notion of "oxygen" as part of the organization of
our world. In terms of the divide between nature and culture, "nature" can
then be considered as a previous state of the cultural system of socially
constructed understanding.

In other words, the "mind" or a collective of "minds" are not the
appropriate units of analysis since they only reflect on the (scientific)
discourses which develop at the supra-individual level by reconstructing the
"world".

With best wishes,

Loet

  _____

Loet Leydesdorff
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-20- 525 3681
 <mailto:loet@leydesdorff.net> loet@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/

 <http://www.leydesdorff.net/knbecon> The Knowledge-Based Economy: Modeled,
Measured, and Simulated
 <http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1581126956>
The Self-Organization of the Knowledge-Based Society;
<http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1581126816>
The Challenge of Scientometrics

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Received on Tue Jul 4 09:33:07 2006