Ladyman & Ross's Philosophy of Physics: Ontology (5)

These pieces are primarily commentaries on the 'Ontic Structural Realism and the Philosophy of Physics' chapter of James Ladyman and Don Ross's book Every Thing Must Go. There are also a handful of references to – and quotes from – other parts of that book.

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Ladyman and Ross (L & R) offer a list of four statements which they believe summarise the position of “standard metaphysics”.

Take (i).

(i) “There are individuals in spacetime whose existence is independent of each other. Facts about the identity and diversity of these individuals are determined independently of their relations to each other.”

The problem is how to take the word “independent” in the above. One can accept individuals and also believe they that they aren't independent of other individuals. That is, the existence of individuated objects and their lack of independence aren't mutually exclusive. What's more, one can accept the “identity and diversity of these individuals” and also deny that such “individuals are determined independently of their relations to each other”. In other words, I don't see why a commitment to individuals necessarily means that one also accepts their complete independence from all other individuals (or from events, processes, conditions, states, etc.).

In addition, it's simply false that metaphysicians have accepted all that's claimed in (i). Randomly, take the various monists in history and philosophers like Bradley and A.N. Whitehead. They certainly didn't believe that individuals are “independent of each other”.

What about L & R's second statement? They say that “standard metaphysicians assume” the following:

(ii) “Each has some properties that are intrinsic to it.”

Here again what was said about claim (i) partly goes for claim (ii) as well. Throughout the history of Western metaphysics there have been metaphysicians who would now be classed as anti-essentialists. Indeed we could go back to Heraclitus to find anti-essentialists (or at least to find proto anti-essentialists).In addition, we had the medieval nominalists. Come the 20^th century, there have been many anti-essentialist metaphysicians and philosophers.

What do essentialists believe? That an individual “has some properties that are intrinsic to it”. In addition, some of the ontologists who've (broadly speaking) accepted the bundle theory of individuals could also be classed as anti-essentialists. (In that they would have denied the statement that each individual must have at least some intrinsic properties.)

Discernibility and Individuality

One method for distinguishing two objects is basically Quine's reworking of Leibniz. Quine called it “absolute discernibility”. L & R express his position this way:

“Quine called two objects... absolutely discernible if there exists a formula in one variable which is true of one object and not the other.”

This is a reworking of Leibniz (with the addition of references to “formulas”) thus:

(x) (y) (F) (x = y ⊃. F (x) ≡ F (y).)

One way a and b can be deemed to be “absolutely discernible” is if they “occupy different positions in space and time”.

Now for “relatively discernible”.

According to L & R,

“[m]oments in time are relatively discernible since any two always satisfy the ‘earlier than’ relation in one order only”.

This clearly makes a moment in time relational in nature. Or at least its relatively discernible nature is accounted for by its relational nature (i.e., ‘earlier than’, 'later than', etc.).

What's just been said about time is similar to what's also said about space (as well as the “mathematical objects” which measure it). L & R write:

“An example of mathematical objects which are not absolutely discernible but are relatively discernible include the points of a one-dimensional space with an ordering relation...”

More precisely,

“... for any such pair of points x and y, if they are not the same point then either x > y or x < y but not both.”

Here there's a fusion of points in space with moments in time. Thus x and y are absolutely discernible because x is before (or “earlier than”) y or x is after (or “later than”) than y. In other words, x can't be both earlier than and later than y (as well as vice versa) at one and the same time.

Now let's take L & R's definitions of discernibility and individuality. They write:

“The former epistemic notion concerns what enables us to tell that one thing is different from another. The latter metaphysical notion concerns whatever it is in virtue of that two things are different from one another, adding the restriction that one thing is identical with itself and not with anything else.”

At first glance these definitions come across as two different ways of saying the same thing. Clearly the second definition (“whatever it is in virtue of that two things are different from one another”) is ontological in character and the former (“what enables us to tell that one thing is different from another”) is, as L & R say, epistemic. However, don't the two definitions fuse? That is, in order to know “whatever it is in virtue of that two things are different from one another” (an ontological fact) one would need to employ the epistemic tools which “enable us to tell that one thing is different from another”. Thus the ontological question merges with the epistemological question (or vice versa).

Black's Spheres, Substantivalism & Relationalism

We can say that because of the spatial differences between Max Black's two spheres (in his well-known thought experiment), sphere a and sphere b would only be classed as “weakly discernible” on L & R's picture.

L & R make Max Black's example more concrete (as well as scientific) by talking about fermions instead of spheres (which are a mile apart). According to L & R:

“Clearly, fermions in entangled states like the singlet state violate both absolute and relative discernibility...”

Fermions “in entangled states like the singlet state” aren't absolutely discernible because there are neither spatial nor temporal means to disentangle each fermion from other fermions. (Hence the technical term “entanglement”.) However, Max Black's two spheres are also spatially indiscernible in that they're in constant movement around a figure of eight. Thus sphere a would be continuously occupying a spacial point which had only just been occupied by sphere b – as well as vice versa. (The only way out of this would be to either literally or imaginatively freeze the movements of both spheres – though surely that's unacceptable.)

One problem which can be raised about objects (as well as about L & R's position on objects) can be expressed by stating two positions:

i) Objects have their intrinsic natures independently of the rest of the world.

ii) Objects can exist independently of the rest of the world.

This problem specifically arises in the context of “points of spacetime” rather than objects. (Although it may be said that they amount to the same thing.) In this case, L & R use the word “exist” (as in ii) above). This is also a product of two different positions: substantivalism and relationalism. Thus:

i) According to substantivalism the “points of the spacetime manifold exist independently of the material contents of the universe”.

ii) According to relationalism “spatio-temporal facts are about the relations between various elements of the material contents of spacetime”.

The idea that “points of the spacetime manifold exist independently of the material contents of the universe” sounds a little like David Lewis's take (1982) on intrinsic properties. Lewis wrote:

“A thing has its intrinsic properties in virtue of the way that thing itself, and nothing else, is.”

Lewis's position (if not the substantivalist position) can be taken to its most extreme in the following statement:

Object a would still have intrinsic property P if, after the world around it disappeared, a would still have P.

In L & R's rendition of substantivalism, it's said that an object or point in spacetime could “exist” regardless of everything else. Could there ever be “the way that a thing itself is” regardless of everything else? That is, can object a be the way that it is regardless of its relations to other properties/objects/events, its place in time and space and so on?

References

Black, Max. (1952) 'The Identity of Indiscernibles'.

Ladyman, James, Ross, Don. (2007) Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalised.
Lewis, David. (1982) 'Extrinsic Properties'.
Quine, W. V. O. (1976) 'Grades of Discriminability'.

Ladyman and Ross's Philosophy of Physics: Particles (4)

James Ladyman and Don Ross argue that particles can’t be individuated without reference to external and relational factors. (All particles are parts of package deals.) So, to them, this means that particles simply aren’t “things” at all.

This essay is a commentary on the ‘Ontic Structural Realism and the Philosophy of Physics’ chapter of James Ladyman and Don Ross’s book Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalised. (There are also a handful of references to — and quotes from — other parts of that book.)

The rather pompous term “ontic structural realism” basically refers to a realism about structures, not a realism about what the authors call “things” (i.e., things such as particles… or anything else other than structures).

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The philosophers James Ladyman and Don Ross’s philosophy of physics is primarily motivated by the findings and theories of quantum mechanics. Elements of their position can be traced back to — among others — the German philosopher Ernst Cassirer (who died in 1945).

Ladyman and Ross have much to say about Cassirer. For example, they wrote the following:

“OSR [ontic structural realism] agrees with Cassirer that the field is nothing but structure. We can’t describe its nature without recourse to the mathematical structure of field theory.”

Some readers may wonder what the words “nothing but structure” actually mean.

The usual assumption is that there can only be a structure if there are things (of some kind) that make up (or are part of) that structure. That said, this may be one of those everyday “intuitions” which the authors warn us against. Hopefully, Ladyman and Ross’s position on the nature of structure will become clear in the following. In addition, the phrase “[w]e can’t describe [a field’s] nature without recourse to the mathematical structure” is fairly commonplace — at least within physics — and has been since the late 19th century.

What Ladyman and Ross say about Ernst Cassirer’s position on objects (or “things”) is almost exactly the same as their own position on objects. Indeed it was also quantum mechanics which provided Cassirer himself with the motivation to reject (what Ladyman and Ross call) “individual objects”. Ladyman and Ross write:

“Ernst Cassirer rejected the Aristotelian idea of individual substances on the basis of physics, and argued that the metaphysical view of the ‘material point’ as an individual object cannot be sustained in the context of field theory. He offers a structuralist conception of the field.”

It may seem odd that, at least within the context of 20th-century physics, an “Aristotelian idea” is being discussed at all. Not only that: we also have the technical philosophical term individual substance too. That said, these are the words of two philosophers of physics, not the words of two physicists.

One can firstly ask whether or not a commitment to the existence of objects (or things) is also automatically a commitment to “individual substances”; as well as to intrinsic (or essential) properties. After all, the bundle theory (among other theories) rejects the notion of substance; though not that of an individual.

We can also ask whether or not these positions are equally applicable to objects in the “classical” (or macro) world. Let’s put it this way. Cassirer’s, Ladyman’s and Ross’s positions are far more acceptable when applied the the quantum world than when applied to the classical world. More precisely, all this is far easier to swallow in the (to use Ladyman and Ross’s words) “context of field theory” than it is in relation to human persons, cups or trees.

Essential and Intrinsic Properties?

It does seem strange (if only intuitively strange) that all “quantum elementary particles of a given type” are deemed to “have the same mass, size, and shape (if any), charge, and so on”. As it is, mass, size and charge are (essentially) seen as intrinsic properties. In fact it’s hard to imagine elementary particles having other (i.e., inessential) properties. After all, we’re not talking about classical objects here. So one can also easily imagine a natural kind having essential properties; though, when it comes to a particular member of that kind, having contingent properties too.

Can we also imagine an elementary particle having contingent properties?

If such particles don’t have such contingent properties (due to the nature of the micro-world), then it may literally be the case that the set {mass, size, charge} is all there is to them. Thus essentialism of some kind may be an easier option to uphold for particles than it is for classical objects such as lions or even a given sample of water.

That said, Ladyman and Ross do cite examples of what can be taken as a particle’s accidental properties. They cite “velocity or position at a particular time”. Indeed, in commonsense terms, it can be doubted that anyone would take the position or velocity of a particle at a particular time as being anything other than an “accidental” property. (Could it be that physicists could take a particular velocity — or at least mean velocity — of a type of particle to be essential to it?)

From what’s just be said, it’s therefore no surprise that different particles of the same type can be seen as what Ladyman and Ross call “indistinguishable”. However, particles may still have properties which aren’t intrinsic. That is, they may have properties which are relational or extrinsic.

Ladyman and Ross cite “spatio-temporal or other state-dependent properties” as examples.

In terms of spatio-temporal properties.

Does that mean that particles are even more likelier candidates for being four-dimensional objects than classical objects (see ‘Four-dimensionalism’)?

As for state-dependent properties .

That must mean that the nature of a particle must necessarily depend on the parallel (or corresponding) nature of the “state” (or system) to which it belongs.

Individuals?

Ladyman and Ross give a very concrete example of the physics which underlies the problematic nature of seeing elementary particles as single entities.

Firstly, they put the position of classical physics:

“[C]lassical physics assumed a principle of impenetrability, according to which no two particles could occupy the same spatio-temporal location. Hence, classical particles were thought to be distinguishable in virtue of each one having a trajectory in spacetime distinct from every other one.”

Clearly, in quantum mechanics, many — or all — the assumptions in the classical picture above are rejected. (At the least, on some interpretations of quantum mechanics all these assumptions are rejected.)

Firstly, the “principle of impenetrability” is either questioned or rejected.

On the classical picture, if particles are impenetrable, then that means that “no two particles could occupy the same spatio-temporal location”. On the other hand, if particles are penetrable (or if the notion of penetrability does make sense), then one can conclude that two particles “could occupy the same spatio-temporal location”.

Thus one can immediately ask the following question:

If two particles occupy the same spatiotemporal location, then is it correct to talk about two particles in the first place?

In consequence, the second part of the classical picture is either rejected or questioned. That second part (which follows from the first) is that

“classical particles were thought to be distinguishable in virtue of each one having a trajectory in spacetime distinct from every other one”.

Clearly, if the penetrability argument is true and two particles may occupy the same location, then each particle can’t be seen to have its own trajectory in spacetime. In other words, it will share that trajectory with other particles.

This has the result that the Leibnizian picture breaks down in the case of quantum mechanics. Or as Ladyman and Ross put it:

“Thus for everyday objects and for classical particles, the principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles is true [].”

It can now be shown that the notion of a field plays an important part in Ladyman and Ross’s philosophy.

Particles as Package Deals

The central argument is that fields and particles are intimately connected. Indeed they’re so strongly connected that a distinction between the two hardly seems warranted.

Firstly, there’s the problem of distinguishing a particle from the state it (as it were) belongs to. Thus, in an example given by Ladyman and Ross, we can interpret a given field/particle situation in two ways:

1) A two-particle state.

2) A single state in which two “two particles [are] interchanged”.

Since it’s difficult to decipher whether it’s a two-particle state or a single state in which two particles are interchanged, Ladyman and Ross adopt the “alternative metaphysical picture” which “abandons the idea that quantum particles are individuals”. Thus all we have are states. This means that the “positing individuals plus states that are forever inaccessible to them” is deemed (by Ladyman and Ross) to be “ontologically profligate”.

Ladyman and Ross back up the idea that states are more important than individuals (what’s more, that there are no individuals) by referring to David Bohm’s theory. In that theory we have the following:

“The dynamics of the theory are such that the properties, like mass, charge, and so on, normally associated with particles are in fact inherent in the quantum field and not in the particles.”

All this means that mass, charge, etc. are properties of states, not of individual particles. However, doesn’t this position (or reality) have the consequence that a field takes over the role of an individual (or of a collection of individuals) in any metaphysics of the quantum world? Indeed doesn’t that also mean that everything that was said about particles can now be said about fields?

On Bohm’s picture ( if not Ladyman and Ross’s), “[i] t seems that the particles only have position”. Yes; surely it must be a particle (not a field) which has a position. Indeed particles also have trajectories which account for their different positions at different times.

To Bohm, “trajectories are enough to individuate particles”. It’s prima facie strange how trajectories can individuate. Unless that means that each type of particle has a specific type of trajectory. Thus the type of trajectory will tell us which type of particle is involved in that trajectory.

Ladyman and Ross spot a problem with Bohm’s position. That problem is summed up in this way:

If all we have is trajectory (as with structure), then why not dispense with particles (as individuals at least) altogether?

This is how Ladyman and Ross explain their stance on Bohm’s theory:

“We may be happy that trajectories are enough to individuate particles in Bohm theory, but what will distinguish an ‘empty’ trajectory from an ‘occupied’ one?”

Here again Ladyman and Ross are basically saying that if all we’ve got are trajectories (which is part of the structure?), then let’s stick with trajectories and eliminate particles (as individuals) altogether.

Ladyman and Ross go into more detail on this by arguing that

“[s]ince none of the physical properties ascribed to the particle will actually inhere in points of the trajectory, giving content to the claim that there is actually a ‘particle’ there would seem to require some notion of the raw stuff of the particle; in other words haecceities seem to be needed for the individuality of particles of Bohm theory too”.

Of course most physicists would have no time for a term like “haecceities”, but if Ladyman and Ross’s physics is correct, then what they say makes sense. Positing particles seems to run free of Occam’s razor. In other words, Bohm was (to mix two metaphors) filling the universe’s already-existing ontological slums with yet more superfluous entities .

One way of interpreting this position is by citing two different positions. Thus:

1) The positing of particles as individuals which exist in and of themselves.

2) The positing of particles as part of package deals which include fields, states, trajectories, etc.

Then there’s Ladyman and Ross’s position.

3) If there are never particles in splendid isolation (apart from fields, etc.), then why see particles as individuals in the first place?

Ladyman and Ross are a little more precise as to why they endorse 3) above. They make the metaphysical point that “haecceities seem to be needed for the individuality of particles of Bohm’s theory too” (see ‘Haecceity’). In other words, in order for particles to exist as individuals (as well as to be taken as existing as individuals), such particles will require what Ladyman and Ross call “individual essences” in order to be individuated. However, if the nature of a particle necessarily involves fields, states, other particles, trajectories, etc., then it’s very hard (or impossible) to make sense of the idea that it could have an individual essence.

To sum up. A specific particle is always part of a package deal. Indeed all particles simply can’t be individuated without reference to external, extrinsic or relational factors. Thus particles simply aren’t individuals (or things) at all.

Ladyman and Ross's Philosophy of Physics: Structuralism (3)

 

These pieces are primarily commentaries on the 'Ontic Structural Realism and the Philosophy of Physics' chapter of James Ladyman and Don Ross's book Every Thing Must Go. There are also a handful of references to – and quotes from – other parts of that book.

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It's not as if Ladyman & Ross (L & R) are unaware of the obvious ripostes to their position of ontic structural realism.

For example, they quote Anjan Chakravartty (1999) saying

“‘one cannot intelligibly subscribe to the reality of relations unless one is also committed to the fact that some things are related’”.

L & R elaborate on Chakravartty's position by saying:

“... the question is, how can you have structure without (non-structural) objects, or, in particular, how can we talk about a group without talking about the elements of a group?”

And then to seal the position, L & R write (about themselves):

“Even many of those sympathetic to the OSR of French and Ladyman have objected that they cannot make sense of the idea of relations without relata...”

Mathematical Structuralism

Strangely enough (at least to me), the position of ontic structural realism is expressed at its purest and simplest when L & R discuss Bertrand Russell's philosophy of mathematics.

L & R express Russell's position on mathematical structuralism in the following manner:

“... many philosophers have followed Russell in arguing that it is incoherent to suppose there could be individuals which don’t possess any intrinsic properties, but whose individuality is conferred by their relations to other individuals.”

Indeed that passage can be rewritten to make it more germane to L & R's ontic structural realism. Thus:

It is incoherent to suppose there could be individuals (e.g., particles, etc.) which don’t possess any intrinsic properties, but whose individuality is conferred by their relations to other individuals, structures, fields, states, etc.

Thus we can ask the following question:

Does a number gain its identity from its place in a structure or does it have its place in a structure because of its (prior) identity?

Similarly we can ask:

Does an object/entity (e.g. a particle) gain its identity from its place in a structure or does it have its place in a structure because of its (prior) identity?

Indeed L & R state that Paul Benacerraf believed that

“an object with only a structural character could be identified with any object in the appropriate place in any exemplary structure and could not therefore be an individual”.

In other words, Benacerraf seems to have taken the position cited earlier. Namely, an object/individual has its place in a structure because of its (prior) identity. That is, an object/individual doesn't gain its (entire) identity from its place in a structure.

To elaborate on Benacerraf's position. It can be said that if structure is everything (or, at the least, if an object gains its identity from its place in a structure), then any object can take a place in a structure. Indeed any object can take specific place X in a given structure if the individuality or identity of an object is passed onto it (as it were) by the structure it's a part of.

The problem with this (or perhaps any) form of structuralism, however, is summed up by L & R who state that “individuals are nothing over and above the nexus of relations in which they stand”. However, L & R do preface that by saying that it – only!? - applies to “individuals in the context of quantum mechanics”.

Ladyman continues by saying that “the identity or difference of places in a structure is not to be accounted for by anything other than the structure itself”. Not only that: the mathematical structuralism just discussed “provides evidence for this view”.

Things are Structures

Despite everything, L & R often state that they don't deny the existence of entities or individuals per se. Nonetheless, it's hard to make sense of L & R's claim that “there are objects in our metaphysics” and then go on to state that

“but they have been purged of their intrinsic natures, identity, and individuality, and they are not metaphysically fundamental”.

In other words, if you take away “intrinsic natures, identity, and individuality” what's left of objects after all that's been taken away? Structure or relations? But what does that mean?

In any case, L & R see individuals as “abstractions from modal structure”. By “modal structure” L & R mean

“the relationships among phenomena events, and processes) that pertain to necessity, possibility, potentiality, and probability”.

… Yes, you've pre-empted me. It can too easily be said that structures involve individuals and relations involve relata. At a prima facie level we can also ask: In what way do “abstractions” involve themselves in modal realities? Well, mathematics itself involves necessity, possibility and probability. And if structures are inherently mathematical, then structures have modal properties. All that may be true. Though what about modality as applied to the concrete world of objects, events, conditions, etc.? What about metaphysical modality as understood by philosophers like Saul Kripke, David Lewis, D.M. Armstrong and so on?

L & R quote John Stachel saying that entities “'inherit [individuality] from the structure of relations in which they are enmeshed'”. However, saying that is a long way from saying that individuals don't exist. Even the very use of the word “inherit” means that things are doing the inheriting.

Now is it that L & R reject this position and simply deny ontological status to individuals: full stop? Or is the position that entities inherit their individuality from the “structure of relations in which they are enmeshed” as far as they need to go? Thus it's not that L & R are elimitivists about objects. It's simply that they have a radical take on objects. A take which claims that entities gain their individuality from structure. That is, before individuals are “enmeshed” in structures, they have no intrinsic natures.

Can we go so far as to say that before objects are enmeshed in structures, they don't exist? Thus it's not just the nature of entities we're talking about: it's also their existence. Do entities spring into being only when they're enmeshed in structures? This position would go against the claim, for example, of David Lewis that objects have intrinsic natures regardless of the rest of the world.

So now we still have the following positions:

i) Objects gain their natures from the structures they belong to.

ii) Objects come into existence in structures.

How is i) different from saying that entities are structures? In other words, the temporal and grammatical construction of i) may seem to imply that we have an entity at time t₁ and at t₂ it gains its nature from the structure it's embedded in. However, if ii) is correct, than that entity comes into existence in the structure. It doesn't only gain its nature from a structure – it comes into existence in the structure in which it's embedded.

Such abstract metaphysics is made concrete when L & R take the example of fermions. They cite the position that

“that fermions are not self-subsistent because they are the individuals that they are only given the relations that obtain among them”.

What's more, “[t]here is nothing to ground their individuality other than the relations into which they enter”. And, according to L & R, even Albert Einstein once claimed that particles don't have their own “being thus”.

Reference

Ladyman, James, Ross, Don. (2007) Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalised.

 

Ladyman and Ross's Philosophy of Physics: Noumena (1)

 

These pieces are primarily commentaries on the 'Ontic Structural Realism and the Philosophy of Physics' chapter of James Ladyman and Don Ross's book Every Thing Must Go. There are also a handful of references to – and quotes from – other parts of that book.

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Ladyman and Ross (L & R) refer to Kant a few times in Every Thing Must Go. Strangely enough, one time they do so is in response to the various philosophers who've seen “strong affinities” between their own work and Kant's. Nonetheless, L & R tell us “how [their] general account differs from that of Kant”. That fundamental difference is also the main purpose of this short piece.

Every Noumenon Must Go

We can go back to John Locke to see that it may be permanently impossible for us to ascertain the true nature of objects or things (i.e., his “something, I know not what”). In An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke writes:

“…it is impossible for us to know, that this or that quality or Idea has a necessary connexion with a real Essence, of which we have no Idea at all, whatever Species that supposed real Essence may be imagined to constitute.” [IV.vi.5]

That's also partly why Bishop Berkeley turned towards empirical idealism and away from scientific materialism and the scepticism it engendered. In his Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous, Berkeley wrote:

“.... the whole issue can be allowed to rest on a single question: is it possible to conceive of a sensible object existing independently of any perceiver? The challenge seems easy enough at first. All I have to do is think of something so remote—a tree in the middle of the forest, perhaps—that no one presently has it in mind. But if I conceive of this thing, then it is present in my mind as I think of it, so it is not truly independent of all perception.” [Dialogue 1]

 

Thus Kant brought noumena into the debate. Again, the problem of noumena caused various philosophers to embrace (Kantian) transcendental idealism once again – and so did many 19th-century scientists (e.g., Mach, Helmholtz, Boltzmann, Hertz, early Einstein, etc.).

If we come up to date, L & R quote Frank Jackson saying that “we know next to nothing about the intrinsic nature of the world”. Indeed we “know only its causal cum relational nature”.

One way out of this impasse (of noumena and the consequent embracing of idealism) is to become some kind of structuralist. Thus L & R cites Peter Unger arguing that “our knowledge of the world is purely structural”. What's more, Peter Unger also argues that

“things in themselves [i.e., noumena]... are idle wheels in metaphysics and the PPC imposes a moratorium on such purely speculative philosophical toys”.

Kantianism

A semi-Kantian position (needlessly Kantian, according to L & R) is also offered by Mauro Dorato (as quoted by L & R). Dorato writes:

“the concept of unobservable entities that are involved in the structural relations always has some conventional element, and the reality of the entities is constituted by, or derived from, more and more relations in which they are involved.”

I wrote semi-Kantian because that passage begins in a Kantian manner and ends with a structuralism of some kind. The Kantian bit is the following clause:

“... the concept of unobservable entities that are involved in the structural relations always has some conventional element.”

However, the passage ends with these words:

“... the reality of the entities is constituted by, or derived from, more and more relations in which they are involved.”

L & R would simply say: Get rid of these “unobservable entities”. After all, from what Dorato has said it can be concluded that all we've really got are relations and structure. Or in more detail:

Relations don't constitute entities and neither are entities derived from relations. Relations constitute (more) relations and (more) relations are derived from prior relations. It's relations all the way down folks.

To be crude, it can be said that Ladyman and Ross believe that all non-structural realists are to some extent Kantians. Or, at the least, they make the same Kantian mistake.

L & R specifically pick out what they call the “epistemic structural realist” as a Kantian (or quasi-Kantian).

So why 'Kantian'? L & R write:

“... an epistemic structural realist may insist in a Kantian spirit... there being such objects is a necessary condition for our empirical knowledge of the world.”

This is a good description of the noumenal grounding of Kant's metaphysics and indeed his epistemology. You can sum it up with a simple Kantian question:

If there are no noumenal objects (which ground our representations, etc.), then what's it all about?

Even if our representations, models, "posited objects", etc. don't somehow mirror - or simply represent - objects (or if we didn't have the noumenal grounding in the first place), then surely we have precisely nothing. Or as L & R put it (almost quoting Kant word-for-word):

“...there being such objects is a necessary condition for our empirical knowledge of the world.”

So, again, we may not mirror nature or objects; though we must capture something. Then again, how can we represent - let alone mirror - something as strange as Kantian noumena? How would that work?

This is when L & R say: Yes, we capture structure. That won't quite work because the Kantians and quasi-Kantians think they're capturing (if not mirroring) determinate objects. L & R clearly don't think that. That's why L & R appear to make what can be seen as the obvious conclusion. They write:

“.... we shall argue that in the light of contemporary physics... that talk of unknowable intrinsic natures and individuals is idle and has no justified place in metaphysics. This is the sense in which our view is eliminative...”

One can conclude, after reading L & R, that because we can't get at objects in their pristine metaphysically-realist state (we can't mirror objects), then, if that's a necessary truth, we may as well say that “structure is all there is”. This ties in nicely with L & R's position in which Kantian noumena may as well drop out of the picture (as was the case, to some extent, with Bishop Berkeley). Or, as Wittgenstein once put it (though about something else), an object or noumenon is “a wheel that can be turned though nothing else moves with it is not part of the mechanism”[§271].

To put the case very simply, there are two positions which one can adopt here:

i) There are objects (or noumena), though we can never access them as they are “in themselves”.

 

ii) If we can't access objects as they are in themselves, then why not drop such objects completely from the picture?

It can be said that ii) follows from i); though it can't be said, strictly speaking, to follow logically from i).

References

Berkeley, George. (1713)Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous

Kant, Emmanuel. (1787) Critique of Pure Reason
Ladyman, James, Ross, Don. (2007) Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalised
Lock, John. (1690) An Essay Concerning Human Understanding

Derrida's Others

i) Introduction

ii) Derrida's Non-Conceptual Concepts

iii) Derrida's Language Game?

Deconstruction and/or post-structuralism attempted to “liberate the Other”. The problem is that there's an indefinite number of Others. And many Others are also at mutual odds with each other.

Whatever the case is, surely only a shared language - the language that deconstruction rejected or deconstructed - can liberate the Other. As Thomas A. McCarthy once put it:

“Deconstruction can hardly give voice to the excluded other. The wholesale character of its critique of logocentrism deprives it of any language in which to do so.”

That's why deconstruction couldn't even hint at anything directly political (rather than tangentially political) in any traditional sense. Hence the ineffable, obscure and pretentious prose. 

This is McCarthy again:

“It is [] merely by accident that his writings contain little analysis of political institutions and arrangements, historical circumstances and tendencies, or social groups and social movements, and no constructions of right and good, justice and fairness, legitimacy and legality?”

Isn’t it the case that ‘legality’, ‘legitimacy’, ‘fairness’, ‘justice’ - and nearly all the other concepts and words referred to by McCarthy - are examples of transcendental signifieds in Jacques Derrida’s book (or "text")? Thus, Derrida's only interest in words/concepts (or at least his interest in political and philosophical positions) was to violently deconstruct them. If he hadn't done that, then his whole enterprise would have self-destructed (if not deconstructed) itself.

So perhaps all this is the reason why Derrida only started to wax lyrically about Marx very late in his life. 

For example, he wrote his Specters of Marx in 1993 – some 40 years or more after he first started writing philosophy. Yes, this was Derrida's “political turn”.

Derrida's Non-Conceptual Concepts

Let's go into a little detail here with the example of justice.

If Derrida had created a new concept of JUSTICE (that's if one can have a new version of an old concept), then that would have been just another “centre” or “sign substitution”. (Or at least it would have been to Derrida himself.)

Even if a new concept for an old word were created, it would still be parasitical on the old concept (i.e., otherwise it wouldn't be a new concept for an old word).

That's why, for example, Marx wasn't just a “Left Hegelian”: he was still also a Hegelian. That's why “neo-Aristotelians” were/are still Aristotelians. And even an anti-Christian like Nietzsche was infected (as it were) by - and parasitical upon - Christianity itself.

So perhaps the very notion of a new version of an old concept doesn't make sense. It may be better to call it a variation on an old concept (or an elaboration on it); rather than an equivalent. If we want a strict equivalent (or just any equivalent), then why not stick with the old concept?

An alternative to an old concept, however, is a different thing entirely. This might have been what Derrida was trying to do. If that were the case, then he could hardly have used words like ‘fairness’, ‘right’, ‘legitimacy’ or any of the other words referred to by McCarthy above. However, if Derrida created an entirely new conceptual vocabulary (or a Wittgensteinian private language), then this would explain the difficulty in reading his work. Thus, either he wasn't using traditional concepts at all; or he was creating new concepts - en masse. Alternatively, perhaps Derrida used old words and applied new concepts to them. In that case, complications would multiply indefinitely.

All this made Derrida's philosophy suspect and problematic when he used old words for alternative or new concepts. How would we know (as new readers) that this is what Derrida is actually doing? And if Derrida never gave definitions of his alternative concepts (which used old words), then we'd still be in the darkest of dark places.

Indeed, Derrida couldn't even use the concept CONCEPT because that too belongs to the forbidden vocabulary of (as he often put it) “traditional Western metaphysics”. Of course, it may not even be possible to reject the concept CONCEPT and still do philosophy - or even write or speak at all (as the late Wittgenstein might have put it). Thus, this was surely a rhetorical claim on Derrida’s part.

For a start, one must already have concepts to reject the concept CONCEPT. However, Derrida might have replied that he did indeed have the concept CONCEPT. However, it was his job to reject or deconstruct it. Thus, perhaps what he wrote is so far removed from traditional philosophy (of whichever kind) that he didn't even need the concept CONCEPT (or any other concept for that matter).

Derrida's Language Game?

How far removed from philosophy - and indeed traditional language - can one be and still make sense and say something? Again, I can hear a Derridean reply: I'm not saying anything! This wouldn't be so far removed from Wittgenstein (in certain moods) and Heidegger who emphasised the point of pointlessness or the need to escape from traditional kinds of thinking. There's still a problem. What does non-statemental and non-conceptual philosophy look like? Is the answer simple? It looks like Derrida’s philosophy and prose.

“Writing” (a term Derrida often used) itself needs to be overcome, rejected or deconstructed. The very thing that is WRITING is highly suspect and related to (amongst other things) “violence”. That's if we can call violence violence, it it, if...

References

Derrida, Jacques. (1973). Speech and Phenomena and Other Essays on Husserl's Theory of Signs.

McCarthy, Thomas A. (1991) Ideals and Illusions: On Reconstruction and Deconstruction in Contemporary Critical Theory.