Introduction

For as long as realists and instrumentalists have disagreed, partisans of both sides have pointed in argument to the actions and sayings of scientists. Realists in particular have often drawn comfort from the literal understanding given even to very theoretical propositions by many of those who are paid to deploy them. The scientists' realism, according to the realist, is not an idle commitment: a literal understanding of past and present theories and concepts underwrites their employment in the construction of new theories. The theme of this book is philosophy and technology, and here's the connection: new theories point out—and explain—new phenomena. So realism, claim the realists, is at the heart of science's achievement of what Bacon, that early philosopher of technology, identified as science's aim: new knowledge offering new powers.

How does this become an argument for realism? Scientific realism enters the story twice: (tacitly) adopted by scientists, it motivates scientific practice, while the success of the practice might support realism as a philosophical view of science. To fill the story in, we need to know what the realist view is, and an account of how a scientist who accepts it would behave differently from one who does not. But there are many ways to be a realist about science, of which the following is a representative sample: (Aims) Science aims to provide literally true stories about the world, to be a process of discovery and of explanation rather than one of construction and of saving the phenomena.