Vikings or Normans? The Radicalism of Naturalized Metaphysics

AbstractThe paper investigates the extent to which naturalized metaphysics, as proposed and characterized by Ladyman and Ross (2007.Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalized. Oxford: Oxford University Press) among others, suggests a radical break with the conceptual space of pre-naturalized metaphysics. The investigation compares Ladyman and Ross’s methodology for metaphysics with that recently advocated by Steven French (2014.The Structure of the World: Metaphysics and Representation. Oxford: Oxford University Press). The comparison promises to be revealing because French shares Ladyman and Ross’s commitment to build a new metaphysics on the basis of a particular thesis developed in the philosophy of science literature, ontic structural realism (OSR). Thus differences between Ladyman and Ross’s and French’s approaches to metaphysics can be exhibited cleanly, without having to be pried apart from different respective views about the ontology implied by scientific theory and practice.