Explain the work of the philosopher Hilary Lawson and the concepts of "non-realist metaphysics", the "openness" of the world and human "clos

If you’ve ever felt like the world is a giant puzzle where the pieces change shape the moment you touch them, you’re already standing on the edge of the rabbit hole. Lawson’s theory of **Closure** suggests that we aren't just observers; we are the ones drawing the lines. But if we are the authors of reality, how deep does that authorship go? ## 1. The Language Prison: Ludwig Wittgenstein What if the limits of your vocabulary are actually the walls of your world? Lawson’s "closures" are built out of language, and no one explored the boundaries of language better than [Ludwig Wittgenstein](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein). He famously argued that we get "bewitched" by our own words, mistaking the way we talk about things for the way things actually are. This connects to Lawson by showing that when we "close" the world with a word, we often forget that the word is just a tool, not the thing itself. > "The limits of my language mean the limits of my world." — Ludwig Wittgenstein, [Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5740) ## 2. The Paradigm Shift: Thomas Kuhn Scientific "truth" isn't a destination; it's just a temporary ceasefire between us and the unknown. Lawson says science is a history of navigating resistance. [Thomas Kuhn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Kuhn) took this further in his theory of **Paradigm Shifts**. He argued that scientists don't just "add" new facts; they occasionally throw away their old map (closure) and draw a completely new one because the "resistance" of the world becomes too hard to ignore. This explains why science feels like it's discovering truth, even though it's actually just swapping one useful lens for another. * **Source:** *The Structure of Scientific Revolutions*. It’s a must-read because it turns the idea of "objective scientific progress" on its head. ## 3. The Magic of Shared Illusions: The Social Construction of Reality Your bank account and your country’s borders are just shared hallucinations that provide "resistance" to your life. If closures are human-made, then society is just a collection of **Institutional Closures**. Thinkers like [John Searle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Searle) or Peter Berger explore how things like money only "work" because we collectively agree to close the openness of paper and metal in the same way. This adds a social dimension to Lawson’s work: we aren't just closing the world alone; we are trapped in each other’s closures. * **Source:** *The Construction of Social Reality* by John Searle. It explains how we "create" facts out of thin air through collective agreement. ## 4. Algorithmic Closures: The Ethics of AI What happens when we let machines decide how to "close" the world for us? In the modern world, Artificial Intelligence is the ultimate "closure" machine. It takes a massive, open sea of data and "closes" it into categories: "Spam," "Creditworthy," or "Suspicious." This is a perfect real-world application of Lawson’s theory. If an AI uses a "closure" that includes bias, the "resistance" it encounters isn't just a physics problem—it’s a human rights problem. * **Insight:** Exploring AI through Lawson’s lens shifts the debate from "Is the AI right?" to "Who is responsible for the closure the AI is using?" You can explore this further via [The Institute of Art and Ideas (IAI)](https://iai.tv/articles/the-delusion-of-the-digital-ai-and-the-post-realist-future-auid-2533).