Scientific Realism/Anti-Realism Debate: Roy Bhaskar’s Position

The debate between scientific realism and anti-realism has long revolved around scientific theories.Realists contend that scientific theories are true or approximately true.In contrast, anti-realists posit that scientific theories are shaped as mere instruments that help to predict and categorize observable phenomena.As such, anti-realists find no truth value in scientific theories and only accept their empirical adequacy.Roy Bhaskar, as a critical realist, believes in the existence of the unobservable entities and considers them knowable.Furthermore, because he considers knowledge fallible, he maintains that theories arising from social activities may or may not be true.The purpose of this article is to clarify the position that Bhaskar takes in the debate between scientific realism and anti-realism.Before addressing this central purpose, the article first tries to find out whether Bhaskar is indeed a realist in three metaphysical, epistemic Organon F 32 (3) 2025: 300-322 and semantic dimensions.The study argues that his alternative position on the truth/falsity of theories would detach him from the antirealist camp, and he is not an anti-realist in terms of any of the three dimensions mentioned above.Of course, Bhaskar draws what could be called a "delicate border" between his realist approach and that of realists who attribute the approximate truth of a theory to its success.