It's almost like the remarkable fact that many things turn out to be turing complete systems that you might not expect (that is, able to perform any operation that any other computer can perform, albiet more slowly). Board games, Chomsky's generative grammar, bacteria (in a sense). Natural languages, programming languages, odd combinations of logical operators.
Any number of things can serve as a basic vocabulary to postulate entities, and do so in a textured way that matches some parts of underlying physical reality.
It's tempting to look at this and make the tragic jump into anti-realism because of the interchangeability of so many forms of representation. But I think as long as you have a combination of pragmatic attitude, treat knowledge claims as provisional and converging on truth, there's a cash value to descriptions that makes them legitimately truth tracking regardless of how they're formed.
Any number of things can serve as a basic vocabulary to postulate entities, and do so in a textured way that matches some parts of underlying physical reality.
It's tempting to look at this and make the tragic jump into anti-realism because of the interchangeability of so many forms of representation. But I think as long as you have a combination of pragmatic attitude, treat knowledge claims as provisional and converging on truth, there's a cash value to descriptions that makes them legitimately truth tracking regardless of how they're formed.