?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Adc&rft.title=Process+Structural+Realism%2C+Instance+Ontology%2C+and+Societal+Order&rft.creator=Earley%2C+Joseph&rft.subject=Biology&rft.subject=Chemistry&rft.subject=Realism%2FAnti-realism&rft.description=Whitehead%E2%80%99s+cosmology+centers+on+the+self-creation+of+actual+occasions+that+perish+as+they+come+to+be%2C+but+somehow+do+combine+to+constitute+societies+that+are+persistent+agents+and%2For+patients.+%E2%80%9CInstance+Ontology%E2%80%9D+developed+by+D.W.+Mertz+concerns+unification+of+relata+into+facts+of+relatedness+by+specific+intensions.+These+two+conceptual+systems+are+similar+in+that+they+both+avoid+the+substance-property+distinction%3A+they+differ+in+their+understanding+of+how+basic+units+combine+to+constitute+complex+unities.+%E2%80%9CProcess+Structural+Realism%E2%80%9D+(PSR)+draws+from+both+of+these+approaches+in+developing+an+account+of+how+combinations+of+processes+may+produce+ontologically+significant+coherences.+When+a+group+of+processes+achieves+such+closure+that+a+set+of+states+recurs+continually%2C+the+effects+of+that+coherence+differ+from+what+would+occur+in+the+absence+of+that+closure.+Such+altered+effectiveness+is+an+attribute+of+the+system+as+a+whole%2C+and+would+have+consequences.+This+indicates+that+the+network+of+processes%2C+as+a+unit%2C+has+ontological+significance.+The+closed+network+of+processes%2C+together+with+the+conditions+that+prevail%2C+constitute+the+form+of+definiteness+of+the+coherence.+That+form+continues+to+obtain+as+long+as+the+coherence+persists.+Constituents+contribute+to%2C+rather+than+share%2C+that+characteristic.+Aspects+of+some+recent+research+in+systems+biology%2C+microeconomics%2C+and+social+psychology+illustrate+the+application+of+PSR.&rft.date=2008-12&rft.type=Other&rft.type=NonPeerReviewed&rft.format=application%2Fpdf&rft.identifier=http%3A%2F%2Fphilsci-archive.pitt.edu%2F1839%2F1%2FEarley_PSR_revised2.pdf&rft.identifier=Earley%2C+Joseph+(2008)+Process+Structural+Realism%2C+Instance+Ontology%2C+and+Societal+Order.+UNSPECIFIED.&rft.relation=http%3A%2F%2Fphilsci-archive.pitt.edu%2F1839%2