# Postulated theoretical entities vs. technological real entities: remarks on Hacking and Giere

Fabrice Pataut

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Fabrice Pataut. Postulated theoretical entities vs. technological real entities: remarks on Hacking and Giere. 9th Latin American and Caribbean Conference of Social Sciences, Arizona State University, Oct 2022, Villahermosa, Mexico. hal-03826769

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Submitted on 27 Oct 2022

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POSTULATED THEORETICAL ENTITIES vs. TECHNOLOGICAL REAL
ENTITIES : REMARKS ON HACKING AND GIERE

Fabrice Pataut

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
UMR 8011 Sciences, Normes, Démocratie, Paris

Hacking (Hacking 1983) and Giere (Giere 1988) have argued that the successful technological use of a theoretical entity gives evidence that the entity exists and is not a mere theoretical construct. Electrons, quantum dots, nanocrystals exist in this sense, as natural entities with natural properties in a mind- language- and theory-independent natural world.

How good is their argument? I shall argue that the pragmatic warrants Hacking and Giere appeal to in favour of their existence and independence claims may very well yield a notion of technological construct which turns out to be as controversial as the notion of theoretical construct they wish to avoid, and perhaps even as dubious as that of sociological construct (under a rather unfair construal of their argument).

I shall develop two points in response to Hacking and Giere.

1. Despite the fact that Hacking and Giere advocate a structural and technological model of scientific theories, the argument in favour of the existence and independence claims may be expressed within the framework of the so-called ‘statement view’ typical of, say, logical empiricism, a view they both wish to reject.

2. The constructive realism they advocate relies on a notion of technological verification which needs to be refined. Without substantial restrictions on the notion, it remains open to familiar arguments, most notably those proposed by Church (Church 1948-1949) and van Fraassen against verificationism simpliciter (van Fraassen 1980).

I shall finally briefly comment on van Fraassen’s constructive empiricism in contrast to
Hacking and Giere’s constructive realism.

MINIMAL BIBLIOGRAPHY

Church (A.), 1948-1949, “Review of Alfred Jules Ayer’s *Language, Truth and Logic*, 2nd Edition”, *Journal of Symbolic Logic*, vol. 13-14, n°1, pp. 52-53.

van Fraassen (B. C.), 1980, *The Scientific Image*, Clarendon Press, Oxford.

Giere (R. N.), 1988, *Explaining Science: the Cognitive Approach*, Chicago UP, Chicagor, Ill.

Hacking (I.), 1983, *Representing and Intervening*, Cambridge UP, Cambridge, Mass.