On Worrall's Structural Realism

Abstract

Structural realism is the newest developing trend of scientific realism debate in the philosophical realm in America and Britain, which is proposed by John Worrall from London School of Economics. It is presented on the basis of two arguments concerning scientific realism that pull in distinctively contrary directions: the "no miracle" argument (NMA) and the "pessimistic (meta-) induction" (PMI). From structural realism it is implied that, scientific theories could reveal the structure of the unobservable world through its own mathematical structure; the mathematical equation has been retained in the changes of theories, and this mathematical continuity formed the continuity of the development of scientific theories; while, the continuity of the development of scientific theories in mature science is at levels higher than the purely empirical ones, but it does not extend to the fully interpreted top theoretical levels; at last, the continuity of mathematical structure expresses the real relations between entities, but we know nothing except this.