Abstract
Building on self-professed perspectival approaches to both scientific knowledge and causation, I explore the potentially radical suggestion that perspectivalism can be extended to account for a type of objectivity in science. Motivated by recent claims from quantum foundations that quantum mechanics must admit the possibility of observer-dependent facts, I develop the notion of ‘perspectival objectivity’, and suggest that an easier pill to swallow, philosophically speaking, than observer-dependency is perspective-dependency, allowing for a notion of observer-independence indexed to an agent perspective. Working through the case studies of colour perception and causal perspectivalism, I identify two places within which I claim perspectival objectivity is already employed, and make the connection to quantum mechanics through Bohr’s philosophy of quantum theory. I contend that perspectival objectivity can ensure, despite the possibility of perspective-dependent scientific facts, the objectivity of scientific inquiry.
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Notes
Bong et al. propose an experimental arrangement to test their theorem, wherein “a photon’s path is deemed an observer”, and this experiment has been completed, and Bong et al.’s result verified, by Proietti et al. (2019). However, it is controversial whether a photon can be deemed an observer is such a way. This issue is beyond the scope of the present work.
Often, this sort of delineation is largely a pragmatic decision made by scientific agents during the modelling process that is dependent upon the utility it might serve for scientific purposes (that is, prediction or information gathering).
And these variables within a limited range of values, too: only a limited range of frequencies of electromagnetic radiation; a limited range of frequencies of pressure waves in the air; a limited range of pressures on our skin; and a limited set of molecular compounds on the membranes and receptors in our nose and tongue.
There is a term employed in probability theory to describe probabilities that are a function of both the worldly circumstances and a (potentially hypothetical) agent’s knowledge of those circumstances: an ‘objective epistemic’ probability is epistemic since it is a measure of an agent’s degree of reasonableness of belief, and it is objective because it is independent of the beliefs of any particular agent (Achinstein 2001, p.170). An objective epistemic probability is thus agent-independent indexed to an epistemic perspective. I take such probabilities to express a similar sentiment to perspectival objectivity.
There are other types of perspectives that do not support necessary intersubjective agreement across observers. For instance, the regular theoretical and paradigmatic practices of a scientific agent provide a framework within which physical phenomena can be modelled and interpreted (Massimi 2018b), or particular personal proclivities may also provide such an interpretational framework, but these sources of perspectivalism in science are not necessarily shared intersubjectively amongst scientific agents.
I follow here the analysis of Barad (2007), who uses these considerations of Bohr’s quantum picture to develop her own so-called ‘onto-epistemological’ position: agential realism. There are notable similarities between agential realism and perspectival objectivity, not least the incorporation of agent-centric elements to ontology and objectivity, respectively. One key difference, however, is that agential realism rejects the anthropocentrism of Bohr’s quantum philosophy. Perspectival objectivity differs in emphasising the role of the human agent in our scientific practice. Whereas Barad (2007) distances her view from the anthropocentric features of Bohr’s view, I take these to be expressions of perspectival objectivity.
I take this to be what Barad (2007, p.339) is getting at with the notion of ‘agential separability’, whereby separability of some phenomenon into object and measuring device is relative to the specific phenomenon.
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Acknowledgements
For useful discussion and comments I would like to thank Eric Cavalcanti, Ana Creţu, Simon Friederich, Sean Gryb, Karim Thébault, two anonymous referees, and the audience at the Quantum Maiwar workshop held at the University of Queensland in 2018.
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This article belongs to the Topical Collection: Perspectivism in science: metaphysical and epistemological reflections
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This work is supported by the University of Queensland and the Australian Government through the Australian Research Council (DE170100808).
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Evans, P.W. Perspectival objectivity. Euro Jnl Phil Sci 10, 19 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-020-00286-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-020-00286-w