"Objectivist" Physical Science Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 66-7):

As long as science and scientific observers dealt with physical objects and natural forces independent of the minds of the observers, a grand set of theories within a group of compatible sciences could afford to ignore the psychological intricacies of scientific observers. While their sensations and perceptions went into the performance of their experiments and into intersubjective exchanges with their colleagues, these sensations and perceptions were strictly excluded from their theoretical and formal explanations. Aside from a few difficulties at the boundaries of the very small (in quantum measurement) or of the very fast or large (in relativity theory), the scientific observers' participation appeared to be from a God's-eye view. An "objectivist" picture of nature developed that distinguished things from each other by "classical categories": categories defined by singly necessary and jointly sufficient conditions. These were then mapped onto the physical world in an unambiguous fashion by incorporating experimental data into far-reaching physical theories.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, physical objects and natural forces are meanings (realised as wordings) construed of experience.  As meanings, they are material phenomena that can be construed either as that over which consciousness ranges, or as agents that impinge on consciousness.  In this sense, physical objects and natural forces are entirely dependent on minds.  By the same token, theoretical and formal explanations are also meanings construed of experience: projections of consciousness (metaphenomena).  The mapping of categories onto the physical world is the reconstrual of first-order phenomena (the physical world) as second-order metaphenomena (categories).