TY - JOUR
T1 - Quantization as a Guide to Ontic Structure
AU - Thébault, Karim P Y
PY - 2016/3/1
Y1 - 2016/3/1
N2 - The ontic structural realist stance is motivated by a desire to do philosophical justice to the success of science, whilst withstanding the metaphysical undermining generated by the various species of ontological underdetermination. Weare, however, as yet in want of general principles to provide a scaffold for the explicit construction of structural ontologies. Here we will attempt to bridge this gap by utilizing the formal procedure of quantization as a guide to ontic structure of modern physical theory. The example of non-relativistic particle mechanics will be considered and, for that case, it will be shown that a viable candidate for an ontic structural realism framework can be constituted in terms of the combination of a state-space with Poisson bracket structure, and a set of observables, with Lie algebra structure.
AB - The ontic structural realist stance is motivated by a desire to do philosophical justice to the success of science, whilst withstanding the metaphysical undermining generated by the various species of ontological underdetermination. Weare, however, as yet in want of general principles to provide a scaffold for the explicit construction of structural ontologies. Here we will attempt to bridge this gap by utilizing the formal procedure of quantization as a guide to ontic structure of modern physical theory. The example of non-relativistic particle mechanics will be considered and, for that case, it will be shown that a viable candidate for an ontic structural realism framework can be constituted in terms of the combination of a state-space with Poisson bracket structure, and a set of observables, with Lie algebra structure.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84959881927&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/10575/
U2 - 10.1093/bjps/axu023
DO - 10.1093/bjps/axu023
M3 - Article (Academic Journal)
AN - SCOPUS:84959881927
SN - 0007-0882
VL - 67
SP - 89
EP - 114
JO - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science
JF - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science
IS - 1
ER -