But there's other categories where the issue is less clear.

Some things you just know are real, tables and chairs being classic examples of things you know are real, but we could even question them. We're gonna be talking philosophy as well as science. We like to think that almost all episodes of Mindscape talk about reality in one way or another, but today we're gonna dig a little bit more deeply into what it means for something to be real. Structural Realism at the Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyĠ:00:00 Sean Carroll: Hello everyone, and welcome to the Mindscape Podcast, I'm your host, Sean Carroll and today we're going to talk about reality.His book Everything Must Go (co-authored with Don Ross) has become an influential work on the relationship between metaphysics and science. He has worked broadly within the philosophy of science, including issues of realism, empiricism, physicalism, complexity, and information. from the University of Leeds, and is currently a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Bristol. We talk about that, but also about a couple of other subjects in the broad area of philosophy of science: the history and current status of materialism/physicalism, and the nature of complex systems. He and his collaborators have been championing a view known as 'structural realism,' in which real things are those that reflect true, useful patterns in the underlying reality. Is love real? What about the number 5? This is clearly a job for a philosopher, and James Ladyman is one of the world's acknowledged experts.

Every Thing Must Go by James Ladyman