Conceiving of the Middle Ground

As I wrote about in my Hopeful Midwife posts, there has existed two fundamental views about our ability to interpret the universe. Either the universe has properties independent of our perception, or the only way in which we can extract meaning from the universe is via an artificially constructed context. Either there's transcendent meaning or its all freeplay. This debate occurs even in the sciences, perhaps especially in quantum physics. On the one hand you have folks like Einstein, who even in the face of the indeterminacy of quantum physics insisted that we simply don't know enough; that "God doesn't play dice." On the other hand physicists like Bohr insist that "quantum systems have meaning only in the context of the particular experiments performed on them." A recent article in the New Scientist talks about Tim Palmer's work with fractals, and how his work might unify these two sides of the aisle by presenting a kind of middle-ground which satisfies both parties.

I find it interesting that you could read this article with "finding meaning in literature" in mind, perhaps replacing Einstein's camp with those that seek better readings in texts, and Bohr's camp with postmodernists who revel in freeplay. Does Critical Realism offer the middle ground to meaning in literature that fractals offer to quantum physics???