Professor James Ladyman

Research summary

I am interested in most areas of philosophy, but my work has primarily been in general philosophy of science and philosophy of physics. I have worked extensively on scientific realism, constructive empiricism and structural realism (I made the distinction in my 1998 paper between epistemic and ontic forms of structural realism and I have defended the latter). I also work on scientific representation, physicalism, the relationship between the special sciences and physics, naturalised metaphysics, the philosophy of information and computation, and the philosophy of mathematics. I am currently working with Stuart Presnell on the foundations and philosophy of Homotopy Type ...

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Biography

Philip Leverhulme Prize in Philosophy and Ethics 2005

Choice (American Library Association) Outstanding Academic Text Award for Understanding Philosophy of Science

I was co-editor (with Professor Alexander Bird) of The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, for which I was previously a deputy editor and assistant editor, (2004-2011).
I was Honorary Secretary of The British Society for the Philosophy of Science (2003-2007).

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Recent publications

• Ladyman, J & Wiesner, K, 2020, ‘What is a Complex System’. Yale University Press
• Ladyman, J & Presnell, S, 2019, ‘The Hole Argument and Homotopy Type Theory’. Foundations of Physics.

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View complete publications list in the University of Bristol publications system