International Studies in the Philosophy of Science

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Have incommensurability and causal theory

of reference anything to do with actual
science?Incommensurability, no; causal theory,
yes

Arthur I. Miller

To cite this article: Arthur I. Miller (1991) Have incommensurability and causal theory
of reference anything to do with actual science?Incommensurability, no; causal
theory, yes, International Studies in the Philosophy of Science, 5:2, 97-108, DOI:
10.1080/02698599108573383

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02698599108573383

Published online: 09 Jun 2008.

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 INTERNATIONAL STUDIES IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE, VOL. 5, NO. 2,1991 97

Have incommensurability and causal

theory of reference anything to do with
actual science?incommensurability, no;
causal theory, yes

ARTHUR I. MILLER
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Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University College London,

Gower Street, London WC1E6BT, United Kingdom

Abstract I propose to support these replies with actual episodes in late nineteenth and
twentieth century physics. The historical record reveals that meaning does change but not in the
Kuhnian manner which is tied to descriptive theories of meaning. A necessary part of this
discussion is commentary on realist versus antirealist conceptions of science.

1. The structure of scientific revolutions

Let us remind ourselves of Thomas S. Kuhn's (1962) thesis.1 Most scientists work at
articulating an accepted theory or "paradigm". During this period "normal science" is
done. For example, theorists make the accepted paradigm better through more rigourous
formulations and by dealing with previously unsolved problems. Experimentalists study
predictions of the paradigm, while also gathering further data as grist for the paradigm's
mill. A central point in Kuhn's view is that there is no distinction between theory and
observation because all observation and measurements are theory laden, and so all data are
interpreted relative to the present paradigm. In the course of "puzzle solving" severe
puzzles of a theoretical or experimental sort may arise. For example, further investigation
might reveal inconsistencies in the paradigm, or new data are obtained which the paradigm
cannot explain and/or may fly in the face of the paradigm's very basis. Puzzles could
become severe enough to be considered "anomalies".
Owing to the relativism of Kuhn's view, the shift between paradigms can be explained
only in ways sociological and psychological. According to the sociological component, by
consensus leaders of the scientific community declare a "crisis" when, somehow or other, a
new paradigm is invented and a scientific revolution has occurred. The only part of the
psychological component to which Kuhn pays any detailed attention is the onset of the new
paradigm which he claims is accompanied by a "gestalt switch" because scientists view the
world about them relative to a new paradigm. Here Kuhn meant a literal and not just a
metaphorical gestalt switch. One historical litmus test for a scientific revolution is whether
there are changes in texts before and after the supposed paradigm change.
 98 ARTHUR I. MILLER

2. Incommensurability
According to Kuhn, physical magnitude terms (e.g. momentum and mass) and theoretical
entities (terms introduced by theory such as electric fields as they were considered by
Heinrich Hertz in 1892, the electron in H. A. Lorentz's 1892 electromagnetic theory and
quarks by everyone in 1963) take their meaning from a paradigm and have no common
measure between paradigms. Among the sequel papers in which Kuhn tries to further
qualify these proposals, he writes (1983): "The phrase 'no common measure' becomes 'no
common language'. The claim that two theories are incommensurable is then the claim that
there is no language, neutral or otherwise, into which both theories, conceived as sets of
sentences, can be translated without residue or loss". For example, the physical magnitude
term mass differs in meaning within the contexts of Newtonian mechanics and special
relativity because the concepts of space and time differ between the two theories. Even
more graphic is the difference between momentum in Newtonian physics where it is a
vector and in quantum mechanics where it is a non-commuting operator whose numerical
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values are matrix elements.

Incommensurability can be criticized on several levels. As Dudley Shapere (1966)
writes, "Kuhn has committed the mistake of thinking that there are only two alternatives:
absolute identity or absolute difference" among scientists who hold a particular paradigm
or not. "Kuhn is thus forced by a purely conceptual point to ignore many important
differences between scientific activities classified as being ofthat same tradition, as well as
important continuities between successive traditions". Donald Davidson (1974) has put it
even more pungently: "The dominant metaphor of conceptual relativism, that of differing
points of view, seems to betray an underlying paradox. Different points of view make sense,
but only if there is a common coordinate system on which to plot them; yet the existence of
a common system belies the claim of dramatic incomparability".
In fact, we may ask whether in science there really is incommensurability? If so, is not
incommensurability self-contradictory because scientists work with so many different
theories simultaneously? It will not do as Kuhn sometimes writes, that scientists can
be bilingual (and I suppose bicultural, too) (see, Kuhn, 1989). In historical studies
incommensurability has made us aware that lexicon differences can affect scientific world
views. (Linguists such as Benjamin Whorf (1964) knew this a long time ago.) For example,
in Aristotelean science one must be wary of Aristotle's lexicon about, say, motion. But one
can learn Aristotle's Greek and, to a very good approximation, place oneself in his era.
There can occur historical situations in which there is true incommensurability. For
example, consider a newly-discovered stone tablet carbon dated 5,000 BC from a civil-
ization whose language and customs are no longer completely understood: what do the
markings and pictures on the tablet mean? If we take a guess based on some sort of rough
translation apparatus, then are we interpreting the symbols and pictures like they were
7,000 years ago?2 Similarly there is Norwood Russell Hanson's famous example of
Copernicus and Ptolemy sitting on a hilltop watching the sunwell, do what? Is it
unimaginable that in the big laboratory in the sky Copernicus could not teach Kepler about
the new astronomy? Perhaps Copernicus would use a dictionary for translating terms
between their theories (see, too, Davidson, 1974).
While incommensurability highlights the sharp distinction between terms in different
theories, it tells us nothing about how these distinctions came to be which, in my opinion, is
the key problem because it goes right to the heart of how new knowledge is created from
already existing concepts or words or meanings. This problem requires an integrative
approach that includes cognitive science (Miller, 1991). According to Kuhn there is no
problem here because terms and the things to which they refer are paradigm-relative.
 INCOMMENSURABILITY AND CAUSAL THEORY 99

Consequently, a term designating an entity as basic as the electron differs from paradigm to
paradigm: the electron in Lorentz's electromagnetic theory is not the same as the ones in
Bohr's atomic theory, quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics. Electrons just
do not exist out there independent of the scientist as knower.3 This brings us to the topic of
realism.

3. Realism
In what follows by realism I mean that the correctness or truth of a scientific theory asserts
that it can explain data within its domain of applicability and so we believe that each of its
statements are true and that the entities postulated by these statements actually exist
whether or not the entities are directly measurable. Realists believe that science can teach
us something about the unobservable and that theoretical terms can achieve a reality status.
The problem of the reality of unobservable entities became especially acute at the end
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of the nineteenth century when physicists began to deal with submicroscopic systems, like
electrons, whose properties could be analyzed only with help from physical theories.
Measurement by indirect means with instruments replaced direct observation with the
senses.
Generally physicists are confronted with data to which they apply a rule of inference
aptly referred to by Gilbert Harman (1965) as "inference to the best explanation"4:
[O]ne infers, from the fact that a certain hypothesis would explain the evidence, to the
truth of that hypothesis. In general, there will be several hypotheses which might
explain the evidence, so one must be able to reject all such alternative hypotheses
before one is warranted in making the inference. Thus one infers, from the premise
that a given hypothesis would provide a 'better' explanation for the evidence than
would any other hypothesis, to the conclusion that the given hypothesis is true.
Since the "given hypothesis is true", then the entities proposed by it actually exist.
Let us illustrate this point with an actual historical case. During March-April 1897,
J. J. Thomson in Cambridge and Walter Kaufmann in Gttingen possessed essentially
identical sets of data on the properties of cathode rays in applied electric and magnetic
fields. In fact, Kaufmann's data were better. For analysis of these data both men used the
Maxwell-Lorentz theory based on electrons assumed to be theoretical entities. Thomson
(1897) inferred to the best explanation that cathode rays are comprised of negatively
charged particles emitted from the heated cathode "because it has a great advantage over
the aetherial theory [that cathode rays are charged aetherial vibrations],since it is definite
and its consequences can be predicted". Kaufmann (1897) inferred that cathode rays are
charged aethereal vibrations because the "hypothesis accepting that cathode rays are
emitted particles is not sufficient for a satisfactory clarification" of these data. In October
1897 Kaufmann became convinced of Thomson's inference, but by then it was too late.
Thomson had already taken the accolades for discovering the electron which, conse-
quently, was a theoretical entity no more. Simplicity and plausibility had been Thomson's
guide. The antirealism of Hertz, among others, had been Kaufmann's guide.5
The input of extra-scientific criteria into the inferences by Thomson and Kaufmann is
typical of actual scientific research and is captured by a realist view which allows that the
choice of best inference is affected by "which hypothesis is simpler, which is more
plausible, which explains more, which is less ad hoc" (Harman, 1965).6
Physicists like Kaufmahn, Lorentz and Thomson assumed that language and its
attendant visual images from the world of sense perceptions could be extrapolated into the
 100 ARTHUR I. MILLER

submicroscopic world of the electron. And why not? Had not this sort of language and
imagery worked so well for Newtonian and Maxwellian physics?
Grover Maxwell (1962) aptly describes this extrapolation as necessarily denying any
distinction between observational and theoretical quantities in favour of a continuum
between the macroscopic and the submicroscopic:
there is, in principle, a continuous series beginning with looking through a vacuum
and containing these as members: looking through binoculars, looking through a low-
power microscope, looking through a high-power microscope, etc., in the order given.
The important consequence is that, so far, we are left without criteria which would
enable us to draw a nonarbitrary line between 'observation' and 'theory'.
Heinrich Hertz was among the first physicists to realize problems lurking in the assump-
tion central to the realism of continuous extrapolation. In his book Electric Waves (1892)
Hertz reviewed various representations of electrical phenomena available for a theory of
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electromagnetism. He wondered about the reality of fields vis--vis forces. After all do
not Maxwell's equations differ in semantic content from those of Newton's mechanics?
Maxwell's equations contain entities that are not open to direct measurement, such as
fields. Hertz realized the problem of the under-determination of physical theories which
he attempted to dodge by, for example, asserting that "Maxwell's theory is Maxwell's
equations".
What about electrons? Were they part of the problem of the under-determination of
physical theory? For positivists such as Ernst Mach the answer is yes. But this was not the
case after 1897 for Max Abraham, Ludwig Boltzmann and Lorentz, although they all
cautioned against interpreting the electron as an atom.
What happened to the reality status of the electron in 1905? Nothing. Historical
studies reveal that there was no paradigm change in 1905 with Albert Einstein's invention
of special relativity. It was not until 1911 that special relativity was finally disentangled
from Lorentz's theory of the electron.7 Although in 1911 Arnold Sommerfeld declared
special relativity to be a great achievement, and the majority of the physics community
agreed, there was no gestalt switch to any sort of relativity physics (see Miller, 1981).
Nor, strictly speaking, was there a paradigm change in 1913 with publication of Niels
Bohr's atomic theory. Was it not the case that during 1913-1925 classical mechanics and
electromagnetism were utilized in suitably violated forms to study atoms? Moreover,
physicists often discussed the electron within the failedpre-special relativity programme of
an electromagnetic world-picture and even referred to the ether. Before we move to what
actually happened in quantum mechanics let us probe the meaning of the term electron by
moving to the most presently viable view of how terms change their meanings in successive
scientific theories.

4. The causal theory of reference and the meaning of'meaning'

In the so-called traditional or descriptive theories of meaning, reference is determined by
sense.8 The referent of a term is the thing or substance in the world of which the term is true
(refers). The sense of a term is how to present its reference or how we understand what it is
to be that term. The referent of a proper noun is a single thing of which the proper noun
is true. The referent of a single term, like electron, can be a set of things of which the term is
true, like the set of all electrons in the world; in this case reference is sometimes called
extension. We construct extension from sense, assuming as well that sense = meaning.
 INCOMMENSURABILITY AND CAUSAL THEORY 101

Accordingly, in descriptive theories of meaning the sense or meaning of the term

electron is fixed by giving the conjunction of the electron's properties known at some time
in the history of science as an analytically predicated definition (or theory) of what it is to be
an electron. So if any one of the electron's properties is incorrect then we have the para-
doxical situation of having the extension of the term electron be the null set because the
term electron does not refer.
Let us take a concrete example. If I explain to someone (in, say, 1904) that the sense of
the term electron is given by the conjunction of the following predicates: (a) is a particle
with negative charge; (b) has a certain charge-to-mass ratio; (c) has a certain radius; and (d)
has a mass that varies with velocity in a way given by Max Abraham's theory of the
electronwhereas the extension of each of the predicates (properties) (a)-(d) is the same,
the meanings of the predicates differ. In 1904, properties (a)-(c) were accepted by every-
one, while property (d) is a prediction of Max Abraham's variant of the 1892 Maxwell-
Lorentz electromagnetic theory. As we all know, (d) was replaced by (d') has a mass that
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varies with velocity in a way given by Lorentz's theory of the electron.

Is the electron that Abraham dealt with the same as Lorentz's? Are terms such as
electron dependent on a theory or paradigm for their meaning? Clearly the descriptive
theory of meaning is the proper vehicle for incommensurable paradigm shifts. A realist view
requires lifting terms referring to entities like the electron out of any specific scientific
theory. For this purpose, among others, Hilary Putnam invented the causal theory of
reference, which is closely related to Saul Kripke's theory for referring proper nouns (1971 ).
In Putnam's causal theory of reference a natural-kind term, like electron, requires a
theory to probe its essence or underlying structure. A goal of science is discovering essences
of natural kinds. According to Putnam ( 1975a) the referent of a natural-kind term is fixed by
an "introducing event" or "dubbing".9 The referent is a certain sort of substance. For
example, we can say that Benjamin Franklin pointed to electricity (provided an ostensive
definition) as a substance capable of certain kinds of effects such as flowing from clouds to
produce lightning and along metal kite strings. Since Franklin other uses of the term
electricity have arisen, but they all have in common the same referent, namely, something
that flows in certain ways. Through further scientific investigations other properties are
added to the referent but the natural-kind term electricity can always be related by a causal
chain back to Franklin's introducing event. Things that have the same-kind relations to the
referent comprise the natural-kind term's extension. How does one determine whether a
thing is a member of the extension of a natural-kind? How is extension related to meaning?
The introducing event can be either an ostensive definition or a description that is
based on what Putnam (1975a) calls "markers" and "stereotypes" which help determine
the meaning of a term. An ostensive definition is inappropriate for the electron (you cannot
point to an electron itself), rather markers and stereotypes are needed.
Instead of the case in traditional theories of meaning, Putnam likens meaning to a
vector with four components, where extension is one of the components, as follows (taking
the term electron as an example):
1. Syntactic markers are grammatical: electron is a count noun.
2. Semantic markers indicate the sort of entities to which the word in question
applies: electron is a natural-kind term.
3. Stereotypes are often approximate descriptions of natural-kind terms that nor-
mally suffice for recognition. A stereotype need not even be completely correct. So, for
example, if someone should ask you to describe a tiger (which is a natural-kind term) you
might give the stereotype of an animal that is a feline, has stripes, and lives in the jungle.
Except tigers without stripes have been found. Be that as it may, you still have the general
 102 ARTHUR I. MILLER

idea of what a tiger is. The notion of stereotype is a major contribution by Putnam to the
theory of meaning: the electron has the stereotypes (a)-(c) denoted above, and (d) or (d')
depending on the theory under consideration in 1904.
4. Extension is the set of things of which the term is true: the set of all electrons in the
world.
Putnam (1975a) adroitly argues that "meaning ain't in the head", that is, the meaning
of a term is not fixed by someone's psychological state.10 Rather, Putnam writes, " it is only
the sociolinguistic state of the collective linguistic body to which the speaker belongs that
fixes the extension". The meaning of a term is determined through a "division of linguistic
labor" or, perhaps better put, cognitive labour. For example, we must turn to an expert to
perform complicated tests in order to determine as precisely as possible the essence and so
the extension or reference of natural-kind terms like tiger, gold and electron. The meaning
of a term is given by the syntactic marker, semantic marker, extension, and particularly the
stereotype. "Meaning determines extension by constructionso to speak" (Putnam,
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1975a), but not with analytically predicated stereotypes like in descriptive theories of
meaning.11
The "introducing event" or "dubbing" for the electron occurred in 1891 when J.
Johnstone Stoney coined the term electron. Stoney described the electron as a substance
with a fundamental unit of charge e that could be used in Faraday's law of electrolysis.
Stoney based his description of the electron on such previous experimental work as
Michael Faraday's and theoretical work of Hermann von Helmholtz, chief among others.
In 1892 Lorentz reformulated Hertz's version of Maxwell's electromagnetic theory into a
framework based on the hypothesis that macroscopic electric and magnetic fields result
from submicroscopic particles that Lorentz called "ions" (see, Miller, 1981). In 1897 J. J.
Thomson discovered Lorentz's ions and measured their charge-to-mass ratio. Following
Stoney these ions were subsequently called electrons.12 By 1904 the properties (a)-(c) of
electrons were accepted by everyone. Property (d) was accepted only by followers of
Abraham. In 1904 Lorentz offered an alternative theory of the electron which predicted
(d'). (d) and (d') are stereotypes of the electron.13
In summary thus far: Putnam renders natural-kind terms trans-theoretical by lifting
them out of theories. Fixing the reference of a term by an introducing act enables the term
to be used in different theories because as more characteristics or stereotypes of a natural
kind accrue each component of meaning becomes enlarged, while reference remains fixed.
Assumptions (d) and (d') were attempts at discovering essences of the electron, that is,
the electron's hidden structure or characteristics which determine the members of its
extension. These proposals of Abraham and Lorentz were not analytic, rather they were
issues to be settled by scientific research. If it turned out that the electron is a particle that
can be described by the properties (a)-(d'), call it eLorentz, then any particle possessing these
properties is necessarily eLorentz. Consequently, the statement that the electron is the entity
described by Lorentz's theory is a necessary a posteriori synthetic proposition. That such a
statement could exist at all is one of the amazing results of the new theory of meaning (see
Putnam, 1975a). There is no possible theory in which an electron is not eLorentz. Said
otherwise, the predicates " . . . is electron" and " . . . is eLorent2" have the same extension
(are co-extensive) and the same reference in every possible theory, in agreement with
essentialism. What if this turns out not to be the case?
As we know, further scientific research revealed that Lorentz's list of stereotypes was
not completely correct. Yet in order to get science off the ground at all we must assume that
the dubber and subsequent researchers were doing the best they can and would accept
reasonable modifications. Putnam (1974,1978) calls this belief "The Principle of Benefit of
 INCOMMENSURABILITY AND CAUSAL THEORY 103

Doubt". But might it be the case that there is "no convergence" in scientific knowledge? As
Putnam writes (1978): "just as no term used in the science of more than fifty (or whatever)
years ago referred, so it will turn out that no term used now (except maybe observation terms,
if there are such) refers." (italics in original) Scientists accept the principle of reasonable
doubt because is it not so that science is ultimately a belief system? And to most scientists
any antirealistic view is unacceptable. This essentially is the crux of Putnam's argument in
Meaning and the Moral Sciences (1978).
We may consider that progress from one theory to another constitutes entre into the
possible worlds described by these theories, where a possible world is a counterfactual
situation that is consistent with logic. A subject-predicate sentence is true of a possible
world if the referent of the subject is in the extension of the predicate in that world. So, for
example, whereas logically there is a possible world in which Abraham's theory of the
electron is valid, scientific research indicates that in this world the extension of the
predicate (d) is the null set. The special theory of relativity is invalid in the logically (or
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metaphysically) possible world of Abraham's theory.

The epistemological criterion to restrict the number of possible worlds describable by a
scientific theory is that the expert dubber's statement that "this" substance is water or
"this" substance is an electron be accepted as fixed or rigid and so natural-kind terms
become "rigid designators", using Kripke's terminology (for example, Kripke, 1971,1980
and Putnam, 1975a, where he refers to rigid designators with the term "indexicality"). Let
a rigid designator x be defined in one's actual world. To spread x into another world one
begins with one's own world.14 A possible world is one in which x remains a rigid desig-
nator, but may be further explicated by adding stereotypes.15 For our purposes this settles
the issue of trans-world identity.
To make all of this formalism workable for cases of actual science we can start by
assuming that rigid designators are spread into other worlds by correspondence principles
(Miller, 1991).

6. A scenario of a supposed scientific revolution: Quantum mechanics

(a) The scenario la Kuhn
In 1913 Bohr's atomic theory became the paradigm for atomic physics. The atom was
depicted as a minuscule solar system. From 1913 through mid-1925 scientists practised
normal science on it with techniques from classical mechanics suitably adapted. By 1923
puzzles began to appear and certain of them led to drastic reformulation of the theory. For
example, 1923 data on dispersion led to the harmonic oscillator representation of atomic
electrons and so to a lack of visualization for atoms. Other data like the splitting of spectral
lines in weak magnetic fields (the Zeeman effect) required imposing on Bohr's theory
auxiliary hypotheses and mechanical models that had no theoretical foundation. The
theoretical problem of deducing the stationary states of three-body systems was never
solved and was considered ominous since its appearance in 1922. The problem of account-
ing for the splitting of spectral lines in external crossed electric and magnetic fields was
another unresolved problem. By early 1925 no further progress was made in the Bohr
theory and these puzzles became anomalies.
The leaders of the scientific community, Bohr and Born principally, declared a crisis.
Then, as Heisenberg recalled many years later, in June 1925, "it came to me like a flash,
thus I saw it, the energy [of the harmonic oscillator] was constant in time".16 Heisenberg
"saw" this after much travail attempting to reinterpret the harmonic oscillator represen-
tation of atomic electrons. After this Heisenberg "saw" atomic physics in a new gestalt or
 104 ARTHUR I. MILLER

theory in which dynamical quantities obeyed a weird mathematics, which he did not
understand at the time. Actually he had rediscovered matrices with their non-commutative
properties. Heisenberg's gestalt switch occurred in mid-June 1925. By Fall 1925 everyone
had thrown away books and papers that discussed the old Bohr theory.
What occurred in June 1925 can be depicted with the aid of a mathematical step
function. Before mid-June 1925 there was a paradigm of the Bohr atomic theory. In mid-
1925 there was a discontinuous change (step function) from Bohr's atomic physics to
quantum mechanics which became the new paradigm on which normal science would be
practised. Terms such as momentum and position became incommensurable between
these theories.

(b) What actually happened

The historical record tells a different story (for details see Miller, 1986,1991).
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In late 1924 Werner Heisenberg found that the last remaining vestige of hope for
Bohr's theory, namely, the harmonic oscillator representation, was questionable even for
the "simple" hydrogen atom. Heisenberg realized that nevertheless the harmonic oscil-
lator representation in conjunction with new forms of the correspondence principle were
pathways out of the impasse. He pursued this tack into mid-June 1925 when supposedly
the solution came to him "like a flash". Indeed, almost like with prior consultation among
themselves, some of the pioneers of quantum mechanics have fondly recalled their dis-
coveries in this manner, blocking out memories of struggles that constitute the fine struc-
ture of the transition between the old and new atomic theories. These testimonials, replete
with selective forgetting, are grist for Kuhn's scenario in which a crisis is "terminated not
by deliberation and interpretation but by a sudden and unstructured event like a Gestalt
switch [where] scientists then often speak of the 'scales falling form the eyes' or of the
'lightning flash' that 'inundates' a previously obscure puzzle, enabling its components to
be seen in a new way that for the first time permits solution". (Kuhn, 1962).n
Do archival sources and primary literature of 1925-1927 not reveal that Bohr, Born
and Heisenberg, amongst others, longed for the old visualizations from the world of sense
perceptions (referred to as Anschauungen)} In fall of 1925 Heisenberg writes (see Born,
1926): "In the further development of the theory an important task will lie in the closer
investigation of the nature of this correspondence between classical and quantum mech-
anics and in the manner in which symbolic quantum geometry goes over into intuitive
classical geometry [anschaulich klassiche Geometrie]." He continues by suggesting that the
inability of the new quantum mechanics to solve the Zeeman effect is due perhaps to an as
yet unknown "intimate connection between the innermost and outermost orbits". The
visualization of the atom as a minuscule quantized solar system had returned.
Did not Erwin Schrdinger invent the wave mechanics in March 1926 specifically to
bring back the classical Anschauungen only suitably changed into a wave picture of matter?
In March (1926) he wrote that he "felt discouraged not to say repelled, by the methods of
the transcendental algebra, which appeared very difficult to me and by lack of visualiz-
ability". He continues that although there may exist "things" that cannot be compre-
hended by our "forms of thought" and hence do not have a space-and-time description,
"from the philosophic point of view" Schrdinger was sure that the "structure of the
atom" did not belong to this set of things. Did not Heisenberg write in November 1926 to
Wolfgang Pauli (Pauli, 1979), "What the words 'wave' or 'corpuscle' mean we know not
any longer?", referring here to his monumental struggles along with Bohr to interpret the
new quantum mechanics. This and other passages from Heisenberg's correspondence and
 INCOMMENSURABILITY AND CAUSAL THEORY 105

published papers reveal that the interpretation problem was one of language, of extra-
polating words from the world of sense perceptions into the atomic realm where their
depictive and descriptive content differed. Bohr had recognized this language problem in
his seminal (1913) paper where he identified it as the key problem in atomic physics. He
recognized as well that the only way to move between the world of sense perceptions
described by Newton's mechanics and the atomic world was via the correspondence
principle.18
Was not the intent of Bohr's 1927 principle of complementarity to designate restric-
tions on the Anschauungen from classical mechanics, that is, to relegate them to restrictive
metaphors? And finally we recall the role of correspondence principles themselves which
are the pathways between theories that enable connections to be made between kinematical
quantities from quantum mechanics to classical mechanics.
What the quantum mechanics has accomplished is to add to the stereotypes of the
natural-kind term electron, that is, enlarged the term's meaning, while leaving its reference
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fixed in the electron of Stoney and Thomson. Consequently, when even the not too fine
structure of scientific advance is explored change turns out to be gradual.

Conclusion
Historical studies have shown that Kuhn's structure of scientific revolutions is relevant at
best sub speciae aeternitatus as a convenient schematic of gross historical features or in
discussing matters sociological. Incommensurability describes science as a tower of Babel,
which is far from the case because scientists work simultaneously with many different
theories. In may own research in the history of nineteenth- and twentieth-century physics
I have found neither any evidence for Kuhnian scientific revolutions nor any use for
Kuhnian terminology (Miller, 1981,1986,1991).
Continuity is the main characteristic of scientific advance, which can be folded
into causal theory of reference by taking trans-world journeys to be accomplished with
correspondence principles which carry the scientist between theories describing possible
worlds (Miller, 1991). I should like here to further underscore the relation between
correspondence principles and trans-theoretical journeys.
Take, for example, the correspondence principle in non-relativistic quantum mech-
anics. When Planck's constant h is set equal to zero, momentum and position commute, as
they should classically. Bohr took great pains to point out that this limit cannot be taken too
cavalierly because the fine structure constant e2/hc which sets the scale of atoms must
retain its value (see Miller, 1986). Consequently, the limit A->0 means also taking the
limit c-oo. Returning to the non-quantum world means returning to the world of non-
relativistic physics, as well. Epistemologically speaking do such possible worlds actually
exist?
Not really, but it is essential that we can do physics as if these worlds actually exist.
Where would Galileo be without the two-body problem? For want of a better word, and to
avoid the anthropic principle, happily we live in a part of the universe where corre-
spondence principles are operable. They allow us to deal in our physics with worlds whose
descriptions approach (hopefully faster than asymptotically) a description (theory) of the
world in which we actually live. And that's realism!

Acknowledgment
It is a pleasure to acknowledge conversations with Jeremy Butterfield and Donald Gillies.
 106 ARTHUR I. MILLER

Notes
[1] The literature is virtually voluminous. For a survey until 1981 see Hacking (1981). See, too, Kuhn's papers
cited in the bibliography to this essay.
[2] This is Quine's problem of "radical translation" or translation from an alien language for which there is no
unique translation apparatus. Moreover, we must bear in mind the difference in the depictive content of
words so nicely brought out in the history of art (see, for example, Panofsky, 1962).
[3] Although we are confident about discussing the world of tables and chairs with a realist view, even here
certain attributes of tables and chairs, for example, their size, depend on implicit hypotheses about rigid
bodies, congruence, and whether light rays travel in straight lines, among others. We know as well that the
reality status of such taken-for-granted physical magnitude terms as temperature turn out not to be straight-
forward. The equations of thermodynamics contain the symbol T for temperature. Consider the question
What is the temperature T of the coffee in the cup over there? Assume we know enough information to
calculate the temperature T. In order to check our result (prediction) we make a measurement by inserting a
thermometer into the cup. But is what we measure really the temperature of the coffee in the cup? No. What
we measure is some quantity that depends on the thermal conductivities of the coffee and thermometer and
also the initial temperature of the thermometer. However, in classical physics we can set up the measure-
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ment in such a way as to convince ourselves that the thermometer does not alter the temperature of the coffee
in the cup in any appreciable way. That is because in classical physics we feel free to talk about limiting
situations in which we actually measure such quantities as the temperature of coffee in a cup. Clearly some
of these approximations are quite good, for example, we can neglect the effect of a thermometer while
measuring the temperature of a swimming pool. But this is beside the point, which is how we can discuss the
reality status of quantities that we cannot measure directly, such as temperature. This situation obtains for
the electromagnetic field quantities as well. As we know this problem is much more acute according to the
Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics and was a key point in understanding the quantum
theory of fields (Miller, 1990).
[4] Needless to say, Harman does not assume any dubious inductivism.
[5] See Miller (1981) for further analysis of this episode and of Kaufmann's subsequent experiments on the
mass of high-velocity electrons.
[6] In contrast, history of science is at odds with an antirealist view like van Fraassen's "constructive empiri-
cism". Van Fraassen (1980) writes: "Science aims to give us theories which are empirically adequate; and
acceptance of a theory involves as belief only that it is empirically adequate. This is the statement of the
anti-realist position I advocate; I shall call it constructive empiricism" (emphasis in original).
[7] Cartwright (1983) advocates a form of antirealism where theoretical entities like electrons can be real but
fundamental laws tell us nothing about them. This should be the case, she argues, because what one ought to
do is infer to the best cause rather than the best explanation. The best cause, for example, can be the electron.
So, for Cartwright an electron is an electron is an electron and there are no such things as Lorentz's electron,
Bohr's electron and the electron of quantum electrodynamics. But we are barred from understanding or
knowing their intrinsic properties because the "laws of physics lie".
Her contention is that the fundamental laws of physics lie because they can never be used in all
their glory. Rather, in laboratory situations physicists must turn to phenomenological theories cooked up
from fundamental theories. Her most detailed example is an extremely messy theoretical situation from
laser physics. Elsewhere she critiques approximation methods used regularly in quantum mechanics. To
the argument that she missed the point of scientific research, Cartwright replies, but look here I just gave
you some messy examples from real research. But can we not argue (believe) that presently assumed
fundamental scientific theories are themselves approximations to a class of more comprehensive theories?
Does it make any deep sense at all to write of a typical description of a hydrogen atom in a quantum
mechanics text that "neither are we given a Hamiltonian for real hydrogen atoms" (Cartwright, 1983)? In
view of the fact that we don't really know what the "real" Hamiltonian is for a "real" hydrogen atom, what
does this statement mean? After all what we do know is that in a first approximation we can consider the
hydrogen atom to be a system of two oppositely charged particles of different mass. This is a free hydrogen
atom, which is not a very useful system to consider. Yet even writing down this Hamiltonian in a non-
relativistic theory requires inclusion of the Thomas precession which is a relativistic effect. We imagine we
can put this "real" hydrogen atom into a "real" magnetic field (and can in practice do so). As a first
approximation to analysing this system we consider interaction of the external magnetic field with the
orbiting electron's angular momentum and spin. A higher approximation is the spin-spin interaction
between the spins of the electron and proton. We can treat the whole situation relativistically. Then we can
consider the problem from the viewpoint of quantum field theory, where we should really consider the
proton's virtual field to consist of particles in addition to light quanta like -mesons. What a mess! But at
 INCOMMENSURABILITY AND CAUSAL THEORY 107

each stage we do have viable theories to do calculations. And that is what science is: Fundamental laws that
are gradually better approximations with which we can actually get at things like "real" electrons and "real"
hydrogen atoms. For other criticisms of Cartwright's (1983) see, too, Harr (1986,1988).
[8] Among the many useful discussions of these theories and the causal theory of reference are Hacking (1983),
Kripke (1980), Papineau (1979), Putnam (1970, 1973, 1975a) and Schwartz (1977). For critiques of the
causal theory see Hacking (1983), Mellor (1977), Newton-Smith (1981), Papineau (1979) and Shapere
(1982).
[9] Throughout this analysis of meaning, Putnam dispenses with the term "sense" because it can be "made no
more precise than the vague... notion of 'concept' " (1975a). This is one of his criticisms against descriptive
theory of meaning.
[10] The only knowledge of natural-kind terms that most people have are stereotypes. But stereotypes alone do
not determine meaning. Meaning is determined by a four component entity of which extension is only one
component. Consequently, " 'meanings' just ain't in the head?" (Putnam, 1975a).
[11] Through scientific research it can turn out that members of the extension of a natural-kind term differ. For
example, Putnam (1975a) gives the case of the term jade which applies to two minerals jadeite and nephrite
which have the same textural properties but turn out to have different microstructures. Or, it may be the
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case that there are no hidden structures which determine decisively whether an entity is a member of a
natural kind. In this case " 'hidden structure' becomes irrelevant, and superficial characteristics become the
decisive ones" (Putnam, 1975a). This situation does not apply to electrons.
[12] Dubbing is not always straightforward, for example, not until 1901 were the emissions from radioactive
nuclei that had been "dubbed" -rays identified as high-velocity electrons.
[13] Since properties (a)-(c) and (d) (d') are competing theories, then are not these two descriptions also
competing paradigms of the electron? This situation disagrees with Kuhn's view in which paradigms cannot
compete because they are incommensurable.
[14] Mellor (1977) rightly emphasizes that when discussing possible worlds one ought to keep the "reference of a
term clearly distinguished from its extension". He goes on to give an example where two predicates have the
same reference but different extensions, in disagreement with essentialism. For this purpose Mellor turns to
the well-known scientific fiction example of Kripke and Putnam of the predicates " . . . is water" and " . . . is
H2O". But such a predicament is not possible for an actual scientific example concerning elementary
particles, especially so for electrons which according to current physics are truly elementary particles
because they have no internal structure.
[15] Putnam's (1975a) method to transfer a rigid designator x (in this case water) between worlds is:
(For every world W) (For every x in W) (x is water) (x is water if x bears sameL to the entity referred
to as 'this' in the actual world W1).
[16] Quoted from a letter of "many years later" of Heisenberg to B. van der Waerden (1967).
[17] Einstein, on the other hand, never made such statements regarding his inventions of the special and general
theories of relativity. Consequently, it is not surprising that Kuhn does not mention these creations in his
book.
[18] In his atomic theory Bohr's correspondence principle goes like this: in the limit of large quantum numbers
where the atomic electron is in a planetary orbit very far from the atom's nucleus, the characteristics of the
light emitted by the electron in transition down to the next lower orbit is very nearly the same as if the
electron were rotating about the atom's nucleus, which are the characteristics of light predicted by classical
electromagnetic theory.

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