Luciano Floridi’s informational structural realism takes a constructionist attitude towards the problems of epistemology and metaphysics, but the question of the nature of the semantical component of his view remains vexing. In this paper, I propose to dispense with the semantical component of ISR completely. I outline a Syntactical version of ISR. The unified entropy-based framework of information has been adopted as the groundwork of SISR. To establish its realist component, SISR should be able to dissolve the (...) latching problem. We have to be able to account for the informational structures–reality relationship in the absence of the standard semantical resources. The paper offers a pragmatic solution to the latching problem. I also take pains to account for the naturalistic plausibility of this solution by grounding it in the recent computational neuroscience of the predictive coding and the free energy principle. (shrink)

The paper surveys Floridi’s attempt for laying down informational structural realism. After considering a number of reactions to the pars destruens of Floridi’s attack on the digital ontology, I show that Floridi’s enterprise for enriching the ISR by borrowing elements from the ontic form of structural realism is blighted by a haunting inconsistency. ISR has been originally developed by Floridi as a restricted and level dependent form of structural realism which remains mainly bonded within (...) the borders of a Kantian perspective. I argue that this perspective doesn’t mesh nicely with the ontic interpretation that Floridi attached to the ISR. I substantiate this claim through the assessment of Floridi’s strategy for reconciling the epistemic and ontic forms of the SR, as well as by close examination of his use of method of levels of abstraction and his notion of semantic information. My proposal is that the ISR could be defended best against the mentioned and similar objections by being interpreted as an extension of the epistemic SR. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The debate between proponents and opponents of causal foundationalism has recently surfaced as a disparity between causal structuralism and causal anti-foundationalism in the structural realist camp. The paper outlines and dissolves the problem of disparity for structural realism. I follow John Collier to specify causation in terms of the transmission of information. Unlike them, I built upon the reverse quantum data-processing inequality to show how this approach models causation as a symmetric process at the level (...) of fundamental physics. I show how this suggestion reduces the disparity about causation to a problem of application to diverse contexts. (shrink)

This is the revised version of an invited keynote lecture delivered at the "1st Australian Computing and Philosophy Conference". The paper is divided into two parts. The first part defends an informational approach to structural realism. It does so in three steps. First, it is shown that, within the debate about structural realism, epistemic and ontic structural realism are reconcilable. It follows that a version of OSR is defensible from a structuralist-friendly position. Second, it (...) is argued that a version of OSR is also plausible, because not all relata are logically prior to relations. Third, it is shown that a version of OSR is also applicable to both sub-observable and observable entities, by developing its ontology of structural objects in terms of informational objects. The outcome is informational structural realism, a version of OSR supporting the ontological commitment to a view of the world as the totality of informational objects dynamically interacting with each other. The paper has been discussed by several colleagues and, in the second half, ten objections that have been moved to the proposal are answered in order to clarify it further. (shrink)

This paper aims to reconstruct a possible answer to the classical Newman’s objection which has been used countless times to argue against structural realism. The reconstruction starts from the new strand of structural realism – informational structural realism – authored by Luciano Floridi. Newman’s objection had previously stated that all propositions which comprise the mathematical structures are merely trivial truths and can be instantiated by multiple models. This paper examines whether informational structural (...) class='Hi'>realism can overcome this objection by analysing the previous attempts to answer this objection, attempts which either try to save the Ramseyfication of mathematical propositions or give up on it. The informational structural realism way is to attempt a third way, the neo-Kantian way inspired by the work of Ernst Cassirer, but also to change the formalism from a mathematical to an informational one. This paper shows how this original combination of neo-Kantianism, informational formalism and the method of levels of abstraction provide the tools to overcome Newman’s objection. (shrink)

In The Philosophy of Information, Luciano Floridi presents an ontological theory of Being qua Being, which he calls “Informational Structural Realism”, a theory which applies, he says, to every possible world. He identifies primordial information (“dedomena”) as the foundation of any structure in any possible world. The present essay examines Floridi’s defense of that theory, as well as his refutation of “Digital Ontology” (which some people might confuse with his own). Then, using Floridi’s ontology as a (...) starting point, the present essay adds quantum features to dedomena, yielding an ontological theory for our own universe, Quantum Informational Structural Realism, which provides a metaphysical interpretation of key quantum phenomena, and diminishes the “weirdness” or “spookiness” of quantum mechanics. (shrink)

Informational structural realism (ISR) offers a new way to understand the nature of the “structure” that structural realists claim our best scientific theories get right about the world. According to Luciano Floridi, who has given the most detailed formulation of ISR so far, this structure is composed of information representing binary differences. In this paper I assess whether ISR offers a good way to resolve the tension between the no miracle argument (often taken to support scientific (...) realism) and the pessimistic meta-induction (often taken to support antirealism). With regards to this important motivation for structural realism, I shall argue that ISR faces insurmountable difficulties. However, I agree that interpreting “structure” in terms of information can be profitable for the realist. Instead, I offer a new version of ISR that borrows from algorithmic information theory. As a result, a more realist version of ISR is provided. (shrink)

J. Ladyman, Ladyman and Ross refine J. Worral's structural realism, by developing an ontic structural realism which they argue is a consistently naturalistic means of characterizing the ontology of fundamental physics. I argue that elements of analytic metaphysics strengthen and refine their project of characterizing fundamental physics via OSR and by extension, their presentation of information-theoretic structural realism. I refine this point by situating M. Lange’s discussion of nomological modality qua natural necessity within (...) Ladyman and Ross’s discussion of ITSR. The logical hierarchy evinced in Lange’s ‘nomic stability’ further extends and refines Ladyman and Ross’s claims through the addition of nuanced modal distinctions in a systematic framework. (shrink)

In this paper, inspired by the late twentieth century developments in philosophy of science, I propose an ontological scheme to accommodate the scientifically-informed anti-substantivalist views of the self. I call the position structural realist theory of the self. More specifically, I argue that SRS provides a middle ground for bringing a metaphysical reconciliation between the two recurring, and apparently competing forms of such anti-substantivalist views, i.e., eliminativism and pluralism. The notion of the structural self, as the underpinning pattern (...) that is the subject of the ontological commitments in SRS, is not as cumbersome as the orthodox substantivalist notion, and yet accounts for the relation of the different aspects and elements of the self by integrating them structurally into a central unifying pattern of selfhood. I use the experimental studies of Northoff et al. about the processing of the self-related stimuli in the cortical midline structure of the brain, to argue that the underlying pattern of the selfhood could be sought at the level of information processing. I also add a programmatic suggestion about how the different situated, experiential and extended aspects of the selfhood could be structurally incorporated into this underlying pattern. (shrink)

Some Anglophone legal theorists look to analytic philosophy for core presuppositions. For example, the epistemological theories of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Willard Quine shape the theories of Dennis Patterson and Brian Leiter, respectively. These epistemologies are anti-foundational since they reject the kind of certain grounding that is exemplified in Cartesian philosophy. And, they are coherentist in that they seek to legitimate truth-claims by reference to entire linguistic systems. While these theories are insightful, the current context of information and communication technologies (...) (ICT) has created new informational concepts and issues. As a result, the analytic epistemologies are increasingly challenged by alternative perspectives. One such alternative is Structural Realism (SR), which is influential among the natural sciences, and especially physics. “Informational Structural Realism,” (ISR) is a variant of SR that was introduced by Luciano Floridi. Unlike the coherentist theories, ISR promotes examination of the connections among types of information and informational structures. It is an important shift for legal theory today, since the challenges that the ICT presents have to do with pattern recognition across vast domains of diverse data. An informational jurisprudence is now required to understand the issues emerging from the ICT. (shrink)

I discuss the design of the method of entropic inference as a general framework for reasoning under conditions of uncertainty. The main contribution of this discussion is to emphasize the pragmatic elements in the derivation. More specifically: (1) Probability theory is designed as the uniquely natural tool for representing states of incomplete information. (2) An epistemic notion of information is defined in terms of its relation to the Bayesian beliefs of ideally rational agents. (3) The method of updating (...) from a prior to a posterior probability distribution is designed through an eliminative induction process that singles out the logarithmic relative entropy as the unique tool for inference. The resulting framework includes as special cases both MaxEnt and Bayes’ rule. It therefore unifies entropic and Bayesian methods into a single general inference scheme. I find that similar pragmatic elements are an integral part of Putnam’s internal realism, of Floridi’s informational structural realism, and also of van Fraasen’s empiricist structuralism. I conclude with the conjecture that their valuable insights can be incorporated into a single coherent doctrine—an informational pragmatic realism. (shrink)

Ontic structural realism is at its core the view that “structure is ontologically fundamental.” Informed from its inception by the scientific revolutions that punctuated the 20th century, its advocates often present the position as the perspective on ontology best befitting of modern physics. But the idea that structure is fundamental has proved difficult to articulate adequately, and what OSR's claimed naturalistic credentials consist in is hard to precisify as well. Nor is it clear that the position is actually (...) supported by our most fundamental physical theories. What is clear, however, is that structuralists have revealed a seam of material at the core of modern physics that is replete with implications for metaphysics. This article will survey some positions subsumed under the rubric of OSR, considering both their warrant and the interconnections that exist between them. It will be argued that the fundamental kind properties pose a challenge to ontic structuralism, because it seems that these properties do not supervene upon the relevant structures. But it will also be argued that the development of structuralist metaphysics will require both an engagement with the details of modern physical theories and the deployment of tools more typically developed in a priori metaphysics. As such, it seems armchair metaphysicians have not just a stake in whether OSR's claims may ultimately be shown to stand up, but a crucial role to play in getting them to the point where they can be subjected to scrutiny in the first place. (shrink)

ABSTRACTLadyman and Ross’s account of the metaphysical component of ontic structural realism was associated with a unificationist view of the connection between fundamental physics and special sciences. The aim of the present article is to assess the sense of unification that is at issue in Ladyman and Ross’s definition of metaphysics. Given the ontic core of Ladyman and Ross’s version of structural realism, it should be assumed that the unifying endeavour is worthwhile only if the connective (...) links that underpin unification are metaphysically significant. Ladyman and Ross employed information-theoretic notions, e.g. ‘projectibility’, to account for the significance of real patterns, which underpin unification. I build upon McAllister’s engagements with the same topic, to argue that these notions fail to accomplish this objective. (shrink)

J. Ladyman, Ladyman and Ross refine J. Worral's structural realism, by developing an ontic structural realism which they argue is a consistently naturalistic means of characterizing the ontology of fundamental physics. I argue that particular elements of M. Lange and M. Eklund strengthen and refine their project of characterizing fundamental physics via OSR and by extension, their presentation of information-theoretic structural realism. I demonstrate this point by situating M. Lange’s discussion of nomological modality (...) and natural necessity within Ladyman and Ross’s discussion of ITSR. The logical hierarchy evinced in Lange’s notion of ‘nomic stability’ further refines Ladyman and Ross’s claims through the addition of nuanced modal distinctions in a systematic framework. Moreover, I argue that what Lange considers are the ‘lawmakers’ serve as a de dicto rendition of some of Ladyman & Ross’s fundamental de re extensions and refinements of ‘real patterns’. (shrink)

Structural realism is arguably one of the most influential movements to have emerged in philosophy of science in the last decade or so. Advocates of this movement attempt to answer epistemological and/or ontological questions concerning science by arguing that the key to all such questions is the mathematical formalism of a theory. This is so, according to structural realists, because the mathematical formalism encodes all and only what is important about a theory’s target domain, namely its structure. (...) Almost without exception, discussions of structural realism centre on the natural sciences and in particular on modern physics. Given that a number of other sciences are less – indeed in some cases much less – mathematised than modern physics, does structural realism have anything informative to say about them? In this talk, I take up the task of articulating what structural realists ought to say about the social sciences if they are to consider themselves as offering a coherent philosophy for the whole of science. (shrink)

There are realist and antirealist interpretations of the free energy principle (FEP). This paper aims to chart out a structural realist interpretation of FEP. To do so, it draws on Worrall’s (Dialectica 43(1–2): 99–124, 1989) proposal. The general insight of Worrall’s paper is that there is progress at the level of the structure of theories rather than their content. To enact Worrall’s strategy in the context of FEP, this paper will focus on characterising the formal continuity between fundamental equations (...) of thermodynamics—such as Boltzmann’s equation and Gibbs’s equation—on the one hand, and Friston’s characterisation of FEP on the other. Lack of a universal consensus on the physical character of entities that feature in thermodynamics, information theory and FEP notwithstanding, I argue that there is structural continuity and unity at the level of mathematical equations that regiment entropy, information and free energy. The existence of such structural continuity and unity provides grounds for structural realism about FEP. (shrink)

This work explores issues with the eliminativist formulation of ontic structural realism. An ontology that totally eliminates objects is found lacking by arguing, first, that the theoretical frameworks used to support the best arguments against an object-oriented ontology (quantum mechanics, relativity theory, quantum field theory) can be seen in every case as physical models of empty worlds, and therefore do not represent all the information that comes from science, and in particular from fundamental physics, which also includes (...) information about local interactions between objects. Secondly, by giving a critical assessment of the role of symmetries in these fundamental physical theories; and, lastly, by warning about unfounded metaphysical assumptions. An argument is made for a moderate form of structural realism instead, one in which objects play the fundamental role of representing symmetries and bearing their conserved charges, and of participating in the network of interactions observed in the world. (shrink)

Inspired by Ronald Giere’s cognitive approach to scientific models, Cognitive Structural Realism has presented a naturalist account of scientific representation. CSR characterises the structure of theories in terms of cognitive structures. These are informational structures embodied in the brains of scientists. CSR accounts for scientific representation in terms of the dynamical relationship between the organism and its environment. The proposal has been criticised on account of its negligence of social aspects of scientific practice. The present paper aims to (...) chart out a reply to the objection. It shows that cognitive structures do not need to be put inside the brains of single individuals. Cognitive structures are redefined as extended structures in distributed cognitive systems under Free Energy Principle. (shrink)

This paper takes up a suggestion made by Floridi that the digital revolution is bringing about a profound change in our metaphysics. The paper aims to bring some older views from philosophy of mathematics to bear on this problem. The older views are concerned principally with mathematical realism—that is the claim that mathematical entities such as numbers exist. The new context for the discussion is informational realism, where the problem shifts to the question of the reality of (...) class='Hi'>information. Mathematical realism is perhaps a special case of informational realism. The older views concerned with mathematical realism are the various theories of World 3. The concept of World 3 was introduced by Frege, whose position was close to Plato’s original views. Popper developed the theory of World 3 in a different direction which is characterised as ‘constructive Platonism’. But how is World 3 constructed? This is explored by means of two analogies: the analogy with money, and the analogy with meaning, as explicated by the later Wittgenstein. This leads to the development of an account of informational realism as constructive Aristoteliansim. Finally, this version of informational realism is compared with the informational structural realism which Floridi develops in his 2008 and 2009 papers in Synthese. Similarities and differences between the two positions are noted. (shrink)

What is the ultimate nature of reality? This paper defends an answer in terms of informational realism (IR). It does so in three stages. First, it is shown that, within the debate about structural realism (SR), epistemic (ESR) and ontic (OSR) structural realism are reconcilable by using the methodology of the levels of abstractions. It follows that OSR is defensible from a structuralist-friendly position. Second, it is argued that OSR is also plausible, because not all (...) related objects are logically prior to all relational structures. The relation of difference is at least as fundamental as (because constitutive of) any relata. Third, it is suggested that an ontology of structural objects for OSR can reasonably be developed in terms of informational objects, and that Object Oriented Programming provides a flexible and powerful methodology with which to clarify and make precise the concept of “informational object”. The outcome is informational realism, the view that the world is the totality of informational objects dynamically interacting with each other.. (shrink)

According to 'Ontic Structural Realism' (OSR), physical objects—qua metaphysical entities—should be reconceptualised, or, more strongly, eliminated in favour of the relevant structures. In this paper I shall attempt to articulate the relationship between these putative objects and structures in terms of certain accounts of metaphysical dependence currently available. This will allow me to articulate the differences between the different forms of OSR and to argue in favour of the 'eliminativist' version. A useful context is provided by Floridi's account (...) of the relationship between 'ontic' and 'epistemic' structural realisms and I shall conclude with some brief remarks on possible extensions of OSR into other scientific domains. (shrink)

This thesis offers a naturalist revision of Alain Badiou’s philosophy. This goal is pursued through an encounter of Badiou’s mathematical ontology and theory of truth with contemporary trends in philosophy of mathematics and philosophy of science. I take issue with Badiou’s inability to elucidate the link between the empirical and the ontological, and his residual reliance on a Heideggerian project of fundamental ontology, which undermines his own immanentist principles. I will argue for both a bottom-up naturalisation of Badiou’s philosophical approach (...) to mathematics and a top-down naturalisation. Articulating my particular understanding of what realism and naturalism should commit us to, I propose a creative fusion of Badiou’s attention to metamathematical results with a structural-informational metaphysics, proposing a ‘matherialism’ uniting the more daring speculative insights of the former with the naturalist and empiricist commitments motivating the latter. (shrink)

Probabilistic realism and syntactical positivism were two among outdated theories that Feigl criticised on account of their semantical poverty. In this paper, I argue that a refined version of probabilistic realism, which relies on what Feigl specified as the pragmatic description of the symbolic behaviour of scientists’ estimations and foresight, is defendable. This version of statistical realism does not need to make the plausibility of realist thesis dependent on the conventional acceptance of a constructed semantic metalanguage. I (...) shall rely on the Prediction Error Minimisation theory to support my probabilistic version of realism with a scientifically-informed and naturalistically plausible statistical account of the theories-world relationship which has a pragmatic ring to it. (shrink)

Since special relativity and quantum mechanics, information has become a central concept in our description and understanding of physical reality. This statement may be construed in different ways, depending on the meaning we attach to the concept of information, and on our ontological commitments. One distinction is between mind-independent ‘Shannon information’ and a traditional conception of information, connected with meaning and knowledge. Another, orthogonal, distinction is between information considered as a fundamental physical entity, and an (...) ontological agnosticism where physics is about our information of the world rather than about the world itself. Combinations of these lead to various possibilities. I argue that adopting mind-independent information as ontologically fundamental is a hitherto undefended position with important advantages. This position appears similar to Floridi’s informational structural realism, but is fundamentally different. Rather than ‘epistemically indistinguishable differences’, it requires a robust conception of information as consisting of readable and interpretable messages. (shrink)

Recently the terms “codes” and “information” as used in the context of molecular biology have been the subject of much discussion. Here I propose that a variety of structural realism can assist us in rethinking the concepts of DNA codes and information apart from semantic criteria. Using the genetic code as a theoretical backdrop, a necessary distinction is made between codes qua symbolic representations and information qua structure that accords with data. Structural attractors are (...) also shown to be entailed by the mapping relation that any DNA code is a part of (as the domain). In this framework, these attractors are higher-order informational structures that obviate any “DNA-centric” reductionism. In addition to the implications that are discussed, this approach validates the array of coding systems now recognized in molecular biology. (shrink)

Abstract: According to Luciano Floridi (2008) , informational structural realism provides a framework to reconcile the two main versions of realism about structure: the epistemic formulation (according to which all we can know is structure) and the ontic version (according to which structure is all there is). The reconciliation is achieved by introducing suitable levels of abstraction and by articulating a conception of structural objects in information-theoretic terms. In this essay, I argue that the proposed (...) reconciliation works at the expense of realism. I then propose an alternative framework, in terms of partial structures, that offers a way of combining information and structure in a realist setting while still preserving the distinctive features of the two formulations of structural realism. Suitably interpreted, the proposed framework also makes room for an empiricist form of informational structuralism (structural empiricism). Pluralism then emerges. (shrink)

Since molecules are inaccessible to immediate observation, our conception of the molecule is brought about by transdiction which entails invention of various transcendental ideas. In organic chemistry we think that molecules consist of atoms, bonds, functional groups, etc. This is, however, not the unique description of the molecule as is shown by quantum mechanical calculations, for example. Then, what description represents the real molecule? Before asking this question, we have to consider what the real molecule is in the first place. (...) Constructive realism distinguishes our cognitive world and the world just given, and claims that we should accept the former as reality. Understanding our cognitive world is possible only through construction of micro-worlds. Atoms, bonds, functional groups, etc., are micro-worlds which make sense in a theoretical framework of organic chemistry. In this study we translate a micro-world to an affordance and paraphrase it as a context-relative dispositional attribute of an {agent-world} complex. Then, we can understand that it is what we take as molecular structure, not what might be out there to be found, that we should accept as reality. Excluding metaphysical fictions from scientific arguments, constructive realism makes science a meaningful activity. Constructive realism claims that, for getting knowledge of the world, we have to integrate information into our own linguistic frame, i.e., to translate it. Strangification is a technique of intentionally taking an accepted proposition out of one scientific system and putting it into a completely different context. As is the case with translation, strangification brings about deeper understanding of philosophical as well as scientific grounds on which the proposition system holds. We apply this method to molecular structure and reveal that it is an ingenious model to describe molecular behavior in multi-molecular systems with strong interactions between molecules. Information provided by strangification is essential to claim the legitimacy of a proposition system. As far as strangification is properly applied, relativism is irrelevant to constructive realism. (shrink)

In this paper, I present an informational approach to the nature of personal identity. In “Plato and the problem of the chariot”, I use Plato’s famous metaphor of the chariot to introduce a specific problem regarding the nature of the self as an informational multiagent system: what keeps the self together as a whole and coherent unity? In “Egology and its two branches” and “Egology as synchronic individualisation”, I outline two branches of the theory of the self: one concerning the (...) individualisation of the self as an entity, the other concerning the identification of such entity. I argue that both presuppose an informational approach, defend the view that the individualisation of the self is logically prior to its identification , and suggest that such individualisation can be provided in informational terms. Hence, in “A reconciling hypothesis: the three membranes model”, I offer an informational individualisation of the self, based on a tripartite model, which can help to solve the problem of the chariot. Once this model of the self is outlined, in “ICTs as technologies of the self” I use it to show how ICTs may be interpreted as technologies of the self. In “The logic of realisation”, I introduce the concept of “realization” (Aristotle’s anagnorisis ) and support the rather Spinozian view according to which, from the perspective of informational structural realism, selves are the final stage in the development of informational structures. The final “Conclusion: from the egology to the ecology of the self” briefly concludes the article with a reference to the purposeful shaping of the self, in a shift from egology to ecology. (shrink)

The work of Luciano Floridi lies at the interface of philosophy, information science and technology, and ethics, an intersection whose existence and significance he was one of the first to establish. His closely related concepts of a philosophy of information (PI), informational structural realism, information logic (IL), and information ethics (IE) provide a new ontological perspective from which moral concerns can be addressed, especially but not limited to those arising in connection with the new (...) information and communication technologies. In this paper, I relate Floridi's approach to another novel perspective, namely, that of an extension of logic to complex real processes, including those of information production and transfer. This non-propositional, non-truth-functional logic (logic in reality (LIR)) is grounded in the fundamental dualism (dynamic opposition) inherent in energy and accordingly present at all levels of reality. The LIR description of the dynamics of processes and their evolution is relevant to what Floridi refers to as the possible non-linguistic aspects of information. It suggests answers to some of Floridi's “outstanding problems” in PI related to the ontological status of information and how it is used in cognition. Floridi's IL retains the formal structure of the doxastic and epistemic logics from which he correctly distinguishes it and is the basis for his conceptual PI. However, LIR fulfills Floridi's implied requirement that logic be regarded as a natural phenomenon dealing with other natural phenomena, recovering its original philosophical function. LIR provides a logical foundation for discussion of ethical questions based on kinds of information that complements IL. Both are reconsiderations of logic that, as Marijuan suggests, may be necessary for the advancement of information technology in an ethical direction (cf. also Brenner). IE focuses on entities as constituted by information in an overall strategy that generalizes the concept of moral agents. LIR and its related ontology naturalize critical aspects of Floridi's theses, especially, the moral value of being as such and a non-separable joint responsibility of individuals and groups. I compare IE to other current approaches to ethics and information technology (e.g., phenomenological and social constructivist). Ethical information is defined “ecologically” in process terms as reality in a physical space (cf. Floridi), with an intentional “valence,” positive and negative, in the morally valued interaction between producer and receiver. LIR is neither topic-neutral nor context independent and can support an ethics involving apparently contradictory perspectives (e.g., internalist and externalist). Ethics involves practical reasoning, and unlike standard logics, LIR supports Magnani's approach to abductive reasoning in rational moral decision making. The basis of moral responsibility and the consequent behavior of individuals involved in information and communications technologies is the same logical–metaphysical principle of dynamic opposition instantiated at other levels of reality. The way moral responsibilities are actively accepted (or not) by individuals supervenes on their primitive psychological structure, which in turn reflects an evolutionary development grounded in the fundamental dualism of the physical world. The paper concludes with some suggestions of areas of philosophical research, such as causality, identity, and the ontological turn, where convergence of the Floridi and LIR approaches might be envisaged. Their overall motivation is the same, namely, the development of strategies for reinforcing and increasing ethical sensitivity wherever possible. The ethical information concept outlined in the paper supports the function of IE, assigned to it by Floridi, of potentially determining what is right and what is wrong. (shrink)

Integrated Information Theory (IIT) is currently one of the most influential scientific theories of consciousness. Here, we focus specifically on a metaphysical aspect of the theory’s most recent version (IIT 4.0), what we may call its idealistic ontology, and its tension with a kind of realism about the external world that IIT also endorses. IIT 4.0 openly rejects the mainstream view that consciousness is generated by the brain, positing instead that consciousness is ontologically primary while the physical domain (...) is just “operational”. However, this philosophical position is presently underdeveloped and is not rigorously formulated in IIT, potentially leading to many misinterpretations and undermining its overall explanatory power. In the present paper we aim to address this issue. We argue that IIT’s idealistic ontology should be understood as a specific combination of phenomenal primitivism, reductionism regarding Φ-structures and complexes, and eliminativism about non-conscious physical entities. Having clarified this, we then focus on the problematic tension between IIT’s idealistic ontology and its simultaneous endorsement of realism, according to which there is some kind of external reality independent of our minds. After refuting three potential solutions to this theoretical tension, we propose the most plausible alternative: understanding IIT’s realism as an assertion of the existence of other experiences beyond one’s own, what we call a non-solipsistic idealist realism. We end with concluding remarks and future research avenues. (shrink)

An Aristotelian Philosophy of Mathematics breaks the impasse between Platonist and nominalist views of mathematics. Neither a study of abstract objects nor a mere language or logic, mathematics is a science of real aspects of the world as much as biology is. For the first time, a philosophy of mathematics puts applied mathematics at the centre. Quantitative aspects of the world such as ratios of heights, and structural ones such as symmetry and continuity, are parts of the physical world (...) and are objects of mathematics. Though some mathematical structures such as infinities may be too big to be realized in fact, all of them are capable of being realized. Informed by the author's background in both philosophy and mathematics, but keeping to simple examples, the book shows how infant perception of patterns is extended by visualization and proof to the vast edifice of modern pure and applied mathematical knowledge. (shrink)

This book investigates the interplay between two new and influential subdisciplines in the philosophy of science and philosophy: contemporary scientific metaphysics and the philosophy of information. Scientific metaphysics embodies various scientific realisms and has a partial intellectual heritage in some forms of neo-positivism, but is far more attuned than the latter to statistical science, theory defeasibility, scale variability, and pluralist ontological and explanatory commitments, and is averse to a-priori conceptual analysis. The philosophy of information is the combination of (...) what has been called the informational turn in philosophy and ontology, with the informational turn in logic. The book explores the intersecting theoretical commitments and metaphysical basis of both. It applies scientific metaphysics to the philosophy of information, and also correspondingly proposes a new informational interpretation of scientific metaphysics. These are applied to numerous outstanding ontological, philosophical, and theoretical problems in the philosophy of information, scientific realism, cognitive science, theories of semantic information, and informational logic. The book investigates known and new problems, and advances debates and insights in the philosophy of information. It will be of interest to philosophers of information and science, metaphysicians, and cognitive scientists. (shrink)

The paper argues that digital ontology (the ultimate nature of reality is digital, and the universe is a computational system equivalent to a Turing Machine) should be carefully distinguished from informational ontology (the ultimate nature of reality is structural), in order to abandon the former and retain only the latter as a promising line of research. Digital vs. analogue is a Boolean dichotomy typical of our computational paradigm, but digital and analogue are only “modes of presentation” of Being (to (...) paraphrase Kant), that is, ways in which reality is experienced or conceptualised by an epistemic agent at a given level of abstraction. A preferable alternative is provided by an informational approach to structural realism, according to which knowledge of the world is knowledge of its structures. The most reasonable ontological commitment turns out to be in favour of an interpretation of reality as the totality of structures dynamically interacting with each other. The paper is the first part (the pars destruens) of a two-part piece of research. The pars construens, entitled “A Defence of Informational Structural Realism”, is developed in a separate article, also published in this journal. (shrink)

I will analyse Floridi’s rejection of digital ontologies and his positive proposal for an informational structural realism. I intend to show that ISR is still fundamentally a digital ontology, albeit with some different metaphysical commitments to those that Floridi rejects. I will argue that even though Floridi deploys the method of levels of abstraction adapted from computer science, and has established a Kantian transcendentalist conception of both information and structure, ISR still reduces to a discretised binary, and (...) therefore digital, ontology. The digital ontologies that Floridi rejects are John Wheeler’s “It from Bit” conception and computational metaphysics. They’re rejected predominantly on the basis that they rely upon a false dichotomy between digital discrete and continuous metaphysics. ISR involves a Kantian transcendentalist conception of de re relations that is intended to avoid this false dichotomy. However, I’ll argue that the binary, discrete, digital component of digital ontology is retained in ISR, and therefore ISR is still a digital ontology since its conception of information reduces to binary discrete de re relations. As such, ISR comes down on one side of the rejected ontic dichotomy of digital metaphysics, and so an informational metaphysics that is not a digital ontology is still a promissory note in the philosophy of information. (shrink)

In this paper we make a simple theoretical point using a practical issue as an example. The simple theoretical point is that robustness is not 'all or nothing': in asking whether a system is robust one has to ask 'robust with respect to what property?' and 'robust over what set of changes in the system?' The practical issue used to illustrate the point is an examination of degrees of linkage between sub-networks and a pointed contrast in robustness and fragility between (...) the dynamics of (1) contact infection and (2) information transfer or belief change. Time to infection across linked sub-networks, it turns out, is fairly robust with regard to the degree of linkage between them. Time to infection is fragile and sensitive, however, with regard to the type of sub-network involved: total, ring, small world, random, or scale-free. Aspects of robustness and fragility are reversed where it is belief updating with reinforcement rather than infection that is at issue. In information dynamics, the pattern of time to consensus is robust across changes in network type but remarkably fragile with respect to degree of linkage between sub-networks. These results have important implications for public health interventions in realistic social networks, particularly with an eye to ethnic and socio-economic sub-communities, and in social networks with sub-communities changing in structure or linkage. (shrink)

We use the primitive ontology framework of Allori et al. to analyze the quantum information-theoretic interpretation of Bub and Pitowsky. There are interesting parallels between the two approaches, which differentiate them both from the more standard realist interpretations of quantum theory. Where they differ, however, is in terms of their commitments to an underlying ontology on which the manifest image of the world supervenes. Employing the primitive ontology framework in this way makes perspicuous the differences between the quantum (...) class='Hi'>information-theoretic interpretation, and the various realist interpretations of quantum theory. It also allows us to identify a sense in which the commitments of quantum information-theoretic interpretation are underspecified. Several possible ways of completing the interpretation are presented, and it is suggested that the most likely strategy would leave the information-theoretic interpretation such that it would fail to qualify as a theory, according to the primitive ontology approach. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that, according to a particular physicalist conception of information, information is both alethically neutral or non-alethic, and is intrinsically semantic. The conception of information presented is physicalist and reductionist, and is contrary to most current pluralist and non-reductionist philosophical opinion about the nature of information. The ontology assumed for this conception of information is based upon physicalist non-eliminative ontic structural realism. However, the argument of primary interest is that (...) information so construed is intrinsically semantic on a reductionist and non-alethic basis where semantic content is constituted by indication along causal pathways. Similar arguments have been presented by philosophers with respect to representation. I suggest the conception of information that I present is correct by the lights of the best applied mathematical and scientific theories of information. If so, there is no need for any separate theory of semantic information. Thus I present a theory of intrinsically semantic information which also constitutes an informational theory of truth where truth reduces to information. In the last section I discuss weakly and strongly semantic information, and reject them in favour of alethically neutral intrinsically semantic information. (shrink)

Must we appeal to the notion of knowledge, in the subjective sense typically discussed by epistemologists, in the philosophy of science? Many scientific realists appear to think so, in so far as they assert that we can achieve knowledge of unobservable things, and of theories concerning them. As a natural result, perhaps, this has recently led Bird to suggest that scientific progress should be understood in terms of knowledge, rather than merely truth. But I would instead suggest that making scientific (...) progress consists in acquiring useful information. I will argue for this by pointing out the scientific importance of collecting information that is not and will not ever be believed, is false, and is truly believed without being justifiably believed. I will also say something about the different ways that ‘useful’ may be understood, with special reference to the property of truth and its role in positions such as constructive empiricism and structural realism. My own view is that even fictions may be both useful and informative; and this gels nicely with some recent work, e.g. by Frigg, on scientific models. (shrink)

Ontic Structural Realism, as pivotal position in philosophy of science and metaphysics, defends the idea that the world is ultimately constituted of real physical structures. French (2014) regards physical symmetries as the foundational structure of a world without objects. On the other hand, Ladyman and Ross (2007) hold that the world is essentially made of non-redundant informational structure. I argue in this paper that these two positions are by no means incompatible, for instance by interpreting French’s physical symmetries (...) as real structures both encompassing and compressing every piece of information (Kolmogorov complexity) within the world. (shrink)

More often than not, recently popular structuralist interpretations of physical theories leave the central concept of a structure insufficiently precisified. The incipient causal sets approach to quantum gravity offers a paradigmatic case of a physical theory predestined to be interpreted in structuralist terms. It is shown how employing structuralism lends itself to a natural interpretation of the physical meaning of causal set theory. Conversely, the conceptually exceptionally clear case of causal sets is used as a foil to illustrate how a (...) mathematically informed rigorous conceptualization of structure serves to identify structures in physical theories. Furthermore, a number of technical issues infesting structuralist interpretations of physical theories such as difficulties with grounding the identity of the places of highly symmetrical physical structures in their relational profile and what may resolve these difficulties can be vividly illustrated with causal sets. (shrink)

The majority of the world’s cultures encourage or require members to enter alternative states of consciousness while involved in religious rituals. The question is, why? This paper suggests an explanation for the culturally prescribed ASC from the view of Fisher information. It argues from the position, first put forward by Emile Durkheim in his magnum opus, The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, that all religions are grounded in reality. It suggests that many of the structural elements of (...) cultural cosmologies are similar and that the ritual induction of ASC may help to bring individual experience into greater accord with a pan-human eidetic cosmology, and thus with certain invariant attributes of reality. The necessity of this process is demonstrated by recourse to Fisher information. The paper shows how experiences generated during alternative states of consciousness may help to maintain a minimal level of realism in the interests of adaptation to what is in other respects a transcendental reality. (shrink)

This article opens with a brief analysis of key features of the Mexican semi-authoritarian regime. It then moves to a discussion of the critical realist positions and features that inform the strategic-relational approach. Attention is paid to social interactions and causal relations that enable the SRA to trace patterns of punctuated evolution and to highlight the processes of transformation. Since ideal types serve to highlight key characteristics in specifc phenomena, processes and actors, some features of ideal types of the state (...) and of the transition from one type to another are also discussed. In particular, attention is paid to the Keynesian welfare national state and to the Schumpeterian workfare post-national regime ideal types elaborated by Jessop. For it is contended that the specific features of these ideal types could be of great help in broadening the debate on economic restructuring and political reforms in countries such as Mexico. Moreover, the SRA approach provides an insight into the endogenous features of social change and stresses the importance of networking for a strategic agenda as well. For the never-static dynamics of the processes of change the role of situated agents in context is fundamental, as it injects intentionality and acknowledges the contingency of the conditions that surround them. (shrink)

Recently, an information-theoretic structural realist theory of the self and consciousness has been put forward (Beni, M. D. 2019. Structuring the Self, Series New Directions in Philosophy and Cognitive Science. Palgrave Macmillan). The theory is presented as a form of panpsychism. I argue against this interpretation and show that Beni’s structuralist theory runs into the hard problem of consciousness, in a similar way as the Integrated Information theory of consciousness. Since both of these theories are structuralist and (...) based on the notion of information, I propose to use a solution that has been employed for Integrated Information Theory, namely introducing the distinction between extrinsic and intrinsic structure and dynamics (intrinsic information and intrinsic structure). Making these metaphysical enhancements to Beni’s structuralist theory of consciousness will give the theory a better chance of overcoming the hard problem. In terms of the metaphysics of consciousness, it takes us beyond physicalism. I then suggest that the information-theoretic structuralist theory of consciousness should, instead of panpsychism and physicalism, be combined with neutral monist ontology which is a better fit. These reworkings could lead to an improved naturalistic account of consciousness – the neutral-structuralist theory of consciousness and the self. (shrink)

This paper outlines an account of political realism as a form of ideology critique. Our focus is a defence of the normative edge of this critical-theoretic project against the common charge that there is a problematic trade-off between a theory’s groundedness in facts about the political status quo and its ability to consistently envisage radical departures from the status quo. To overcome that problem we combine insights from three distant corners of the philosophical landscape: theories of legitimacy by Bernard (...) Williams and other realists, Frankfurt School-inspired Critical Theory, and recent analytic epistemological and metaphysical theories of cognitive bias, ideology, and social construction. The upshot is a novel account of realism as empirically-informed diagnosis- critique of social and political phenomena. This view rejects a sharp divide between descriptive and normative theory, and so is an alternative to the anti- empiricism of some approaches to Critical Theory as well as to the complacency towards existing power structures found within liberal realism, let alone mainstream normative political philosophy, liberal or otherwise. (shrink)

Scientific realists claim we can justifiably believe that science is getting at the truth. But they have long faced historical challenges: various episodes across history appear to demonstrate that even strongly supported scientific theories can be overturned and left behind. In response, realists have developed new positions and arguments. As a result of specific challenges from the history of science, and realist responses, we find ourselves with an ever increasing data-set bearing on the (possible) relationship between science and truth. The (...) present volume introduces new historical cases impacting the debate, and advances the discussion of cases that have only very recently been introduced. At the same time, shifts in philosophical positions affect the very kind of case study that is relevant. Thus the historical work must proceed hand in hand with philosophical analysis of the different positions and arguments in play. It is with this in mind that the volume is divided into two sections, entitled “Historical cases for the debate,” and “Contemporary scientific realism”. All sides agree that historical cases are informative with regard to how, or whether, science connects with truth. Defying proclamations as early as the 1980s announcing the death knell of the scientific realism debate, here is that rare thing: a philosophical debate making steady and definite progress. Moreover, the progress it is making concerns one of humanity’s most profound and important questions: the relationship between science and truth, or, put more boldly, the epistemic relation between humankind and the reality in which we find ourselves. (shrink)

Ever since the hard problem of consciousness (Chalmers, 1996, 1995) first entered the scene in the debate over consciousness many have taken it to show the limitations of a scientific or naturalist explanation of consciousness. The hard problem is the problem of explaining why there is any experience associated with certain physical processes, that is, why there is anything it is like associated with such physical processes? The character of one’s experience doesn’t seem to be entailed by physical processes and (...) so an explanation which can overcome such a worry must (1) explain how physical processes give rise to experience (explain the entailment), (2) give an explanation which doesn’t rely on such physical processes, or (3) show why the hard problem is misguided in some sense. Recently, a rather ambitious and novel theory of consciousness has entered the scene – Integrated Information Theory (IIT) of Consciousness (Oizumi et al., 2014; Tononi, 2008; Tononi et al., 2016) – and proposes that consciousness is the result of a specific type of information processing, what those developing the theory call integrated information. The central aim of this dissertation is to philosophically investigate IIT and see whether it has the ability to overcome the hard problem and related worries. I then aim to use this philosophical investigation to answer a set of related questions which guide this dissertation, which are the following: Is it possible to give an information-theoretic explanation of consciousness? What would the nature of such an explanation be and would it result in a novel metaphysics of consciousness? In this dissertation, I begin in chapter one by first setting up the hard problem and related arguments against the backdrop of IIT (Mindt, 2017). I show that given a certain understanding of structural and dynamical properties IIT fails to overcome the hard problem of consciousness. I go on in chapter two to argue that a deflationary account of causation is the best view for IIT to overcome the causal exclusion problem (Baxendale and Mindt, 2018). In chapter three, I explain IIT’s account of how the qualitative character of our experience arises (qualia) and what view of intentionality (the directedness of our mental states) IIT advocates. I then move on in chapter four to show why the hard problem mischaracterizes structural and dynamical properties and misses important nuances that may shed light on giving a naturalized explanation of consciousness. In the last and fifth chapter, I outline a sketch of a novel metaphysics of consciousness that takes the conjunction of Neutral Monism and Information-Theoretic Structural Realism to give what I call Information-Theoretic Neutral-Structuralism. (shrink)

The objective of this thesis is to present a naturalised metaphysics of information, or to naturalise information, by way of deploying a scientific metaphysics according to which contingency is privileged and a-priori conceptual analysis is excluded (or at least greatly diminished) in favour of contingent and defeasible metaphysics. The ontology of information is established according to the premises and mandate of the scientific metaphysics by inference to the best explanation, and in accordance with the idea that the (...) primacy of physics constraint accommodates defeasibility of theorising in physics. This metametaphysical approach is used to establish a field ontology as a basis for an informational structural realism. This is in turn, in combination with information theory and specifically mathematical and algorithmic theories of information, becomes the foundation of what will be called a source ontology, according to which the world is the totality of information sources. Information sources are to be understood as causally induced configurations of structure that are, or else reduce to and/or supervene upon, bounded (including distributed and non-contiguous) regions of the heterogeneous quantum field (all quantum fields combined) and fluctuating vacuum, all in accordance with the above-mentioned quantum field-ontic informational structural realism (FOSIR.) Arguments are presented for realism, physicalism, and reductionism about information on the basis of the stated contingent scientific metaphysics. In terms of philosophical argumentation, realism about information is argued for primarily by way of an indispensability argument that defers to the practice of scientists and regards concepts of information as just as indispensable in their theories as contingent representations of structure. Physicalism and reductionism about information are adduced by way of the identity thesis that identifies the substance of the structure of ontic structural realism as identical to selections of structure existing in re to combined heterogeneous quantum fields, and to the total heterogeneous quantum field comprised of all such fields. Adjunctly, an informational statement of physicalism is arrived at, and a theory of semantic information is proposed, according to which information is intrinsically semantic and alethically neutral. (shrink)

This article endeavors to identify the strongest versions of the two primary arguments against epistemic scientific realism: the historical argument—generally dubbed “the pessimistic meta-induction”—and the argument from underdetermination. It is shown that, contrary to the literature, both can be understood as historically informed but logically validmodus tollensarguments. After specifying the question relevant to underdetermination and showing why empirical equivalence is unnecessary, two types of competitors to contemporary scientific theories are identified, both of which are informed by science itself. With (...) the content and structure of the two nonrealist arguments clarified, novel relations between them are uncovered, revealing the severity of their collective threat against epistemic realism and its “no-miracles” argument. The final section proposes, however, that the realist’s axiological tenet “science seeks truth” is not blocked. An attempt is made to indicate the promise for a nonepistemic, purely axiological scientific realism—here dubbed “Socratic scientific realism.”. (shrink)