Why Structuralism Is Hard to Notice — A Practical Case for Hybrid Thinking, with Medicine as an Example

Abstract

Structuralism is a powerful lens for making invisible relations, differences, and functions visible. Yet in everyday life and in many disciplines, a realist grasp that focuses on visible “things” and “forms” tends to be prioritized, pushing structural understanding into the background. This article explores two questions:

• Why is structuralism “hard to notice”? What are its intellectual-historical and psychological backdrops?
• How should we use both perspectives in practical settings?

Our conclusion, argued through the concrete example of medicine (morphology × physiology), is that while we should distinguish realism and structuralism, the most efficient and robust way to act is to blend them from the outset—a hybrid mode of thinking. The goal is the intellectual shuttle of “separate to discern, mix to operate.”

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1. Introduction: The Wall You Hit When Trying to “See the Invisible”

When explaining structuralism, people long spoke of an “invisible structure.” That very invisibility—or our inattention to it—may be why structuralism took so long to gain a secure place in intellectual history and why, even today, it remains under-utilized in society.

Everything has both a realist face (as a thing that exists) and a structuralist face (as relations and workings). But unless we make a deliberate effort, our attention tilts strongly toward the former.

This essay clarifies what makes the structuralist dimension hard to see, then shows—using medical understanding of the human body—that instead of rigidly separating the two perspectives, it is often more practical to mix them on purpose.

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2. Why Is “Structure” Hard to See? — A Parallel Between Intellectual History and Cognitive Development

Why did structuralism arrive late historically, and why does mastering it require explicit learning? The reasons lie in cognitive tendencies and the developmental stages of scholarship itself.

Intellectual History and Individual Growth

Biology has a famous aphorism: “Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny.” Roughly, a single fertilized egg’s path to adulthood compresses the species’ evolutionary journey. A similar analogy may hold between the history of philosophy and an individual’s cognitive development.

• Philosophical History (Phylogeny): Philosophy begins with a naïve realism that treats the world as things. Through Plato’s Ideas and Aristotle’s hylomorphism, then the early-modern rationalism/empiricism divide, Kant pivots attention to the structures of cognition. After phenomenology, structuralism is finally consolidated in the 20th century (e.g., linguistics, anthropology). Thought rises from concrete things to abstract relations.
• Individual Cognitive Development (Ontogeny): In Piaget’s account, children move from the sensorimotor stage (responding to what’s right before them), through concrete operations, and only in adolescence attain formal operations—the capacity for logical and abstract thinking.

In short, the path from substance to structure that philosophy walked over millennia is retraced by each of us as we grow up. That is why structuralism, as an abstract habit of thought, rarely feels intuitive and typically requires intentional learning.

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3. In Practice, Mixing Is Faster — Medicine as the Prime Example

Unless you’re working at the cutting edge of theory, strictly separating realism and structuralism is often counter-productive. A hybrid approach is far more useful. Medicine is the clearest example.

Medical training approaches the body through two lenses: morphology and function—a living hybrid of realism and structuralism.

Morphology × Function (Minimal Matrix)

Lens	Morphology (Realist Approach)	Function (Structuralist Approach)
Core question	What is there?	How does it work?
Representative subjects	Anatomy, Pathology, Histology	Physiology, Biochemistry, Pharmacology
Object of attention	Organs, tissues, cells — form/structures as things	Metabolism, signaling, control — systems/relations
Typical interventions	Cut, suture, connect, remove	Regulate, inhibit, stimulate

In the clinic, morphological abnormalities (e.g., a tumor) and functional abnormalities (e.g., dysregulated hormone secretion) are examined separately yet integrated for final diagnosis and treatment planning. This is precisely the “separate to discern, mix to operate” workflow we advocate.

Applications: Reading the Body via Morphology and Function

Circulatory system: pump & plumbing vs. homeostatic system

• Morphology: The heart as a pump; arteries, veins, and capillaries as the physical plumbing—real objects studied in anatomy.
• Function: The system’s purpose is homeostasis of the extracellular milieu (O₂/CO₂, electrolytes, pH). ECG works because myocardial excitation and conduction obey electromagnetic laws—a structural (law-guided) pattern.

Kidney: filter assembly vs. chemical control system of life

• Morphology: Glomeruli and the continuous nephron (tubules) as an exquisite filtering apparatus.
• Function: Beyond excreting waste, the kidney precisely regulates electrolytes (Na⁺/K⁺), osmolality, and pH through reabsorption and secretion. Dialysis is an artificial replacement of function.

GI tract & skin: physical boundaries vs. the grand immune system

• Morphology: A tube from mouth to anus; the skin’s sheet—physical boundaries between inside and outside. (Topologically, the lumen of the gut is “outside” the body.)
• Function: They are frontline immune systems, distinguishing self from non-self. Nutrients are admitted as “self,” pathogens excluded as “other”—an information-processing relation at the core.

Muscle & fat: motor organ and storehouse vs. hubs in a metabolic network

• Morphology: Muscle as the motor organ and protein reservoir; fat as an energy store.
• Function: Both are now known to be major metabolic/endocrine organs. Myokines and adipokines exchange information with other organs, forming a distributed metabolic network.

Thus, understanding the human body requires more than visible form; only by grasping the workings and systems behind it does understanding become possible. Skilled clinicians tacitly shuttle between these two views.

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4. Conclusion: The “Ambidextrous Intelligence” We Need Now

Three lines to summarize:

1. People are drawn to form while relations remain hard to see—hence structuralism is not intuitive.
2. The maturation of intellectual history and its tools (mathematics, information technology) enabled the discovery and spread of structuralism.
3. The practical optimum is to separate to discern, mix to operate. Medicine’s morphology × function is the best textbook.

In philosophy, structuralism has often been wielded as a weapon to overcome realism. But in fact, the two are not enemies; they are independent, orthogonal perspectives.

Relying only on a realist view or only on a structuralist analysis sometimes has its place—especially when plumbing a specialty to its depths. Yet to navigate an increasingly complex world and solve real problems, we will need an ambidextrous intelligence that freely combines and switches between both.

Just as medicine understands the human body, we too can hold fast to the “shape” of things while reading the relations and systems at work behind them. This hybrid way of thinking is poised to become a potent tool for living in—and making sense of—our time.