Talk:Reductionism
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Hi Lee, since you ask for feedback--where does the list of kinds of reductionism comes from? Philosophers refer to lots of different kinds of reductionism, especially in relation to the mental phenomena, value, biological phenomena, social phenomena, etc., but there isn't any such generally agreed upon list of "kinds of reductionism" that I am aware of. (That doesn't mean that such a list doesn't exist, but I'm skeptical.) It would be more helpful, instead, to elaborate some particular theory that is said to be an example of reductionism, or to elaborate some philosopher's general characterization of reductionism. (Philosophers obviously don't agree about what reductionism is with regard to any domain--my impression is that a lot of the debate over the merits of reductionism turns precisely on the question of what it is.) In particular, I don't immediately get the difference between methodological, scientific, and theoretical reductionism. It would help a lot if this terminology were attributed to actual philosophers. --Larry Sanger
I see at least two kinds of reductionism in science. One is reductionism as a method of research (maybe a more apt/less loaded term would be "analysis"?). The success of the method cannot be denied and the fact that reductionism works is a nontrivial statement about the world. The other is the result of elevating the research method to a worldview. Does a discussion of these ideas belong in this article, or somewhere else. Also, I don't think I can provide a lot of references for this. -- Miguel
Well, I'd say that reductionism is clearly a topic in philosophy. It's possibly also (I guess I don't know) a topic of philosophical reflection by scientists (in a tradition of theorizing separate from philosophical reflection about science by philosophers). If scientists do use the term "reductionism" in ways that are culturally important (as opposed to just occasionally making off-the-cuff remarks that reflect what they read when they were reading some philosophy of science written by philosophers), then the ideal encyclopedia article about reductionism would include information about how scientists use the term. (Whether that discussion belongs on scientific reductionism I don't know; that depends on whether scientists call the reductionism they champion "scientific reductionism," which I would doubt. Maybe the discussion would be better placed on reductionism in science or even scientists' views on reductionism. The reductionism article certainly should include a lot of information about how philosophers use the term.
As to whether you should put two name and describe two different senses of "reductionism" in the article, I would say that depends entirely upon whether you're making up words to describe phenomena (about the scientific community) you observe, or instead reporting how others have described such phenomena. If you're making up words, then you're essentially doing original research which (I would say) doesn't have a place in an encyclopedia. If you're reporting some distinction that you've read in textbooks, for example, that would be another matter entirely. In such a case, the ideal article would attribute the distinction to whatever seminal sources are responsible for making it. --Larry Sanger
I have a question for Lee, Larry, and others who have been working on this article. My question concerns the relationshionship between reductionism and explanation, rathe than types of reductionisms (although I might suggest that one type of reductionism may have more than one function). In short, I question whether the purpose of reduction is to "explain" things. I guess this really hinges on how you define explain, so perhaps I am simply asking that the contributers to this article explain what they mean by "explain."
In A Brief History of time Stephen Hawking defines a theory as a model of the universe or some part of the universe, and a set of rules that allow us to relate quantities in the model to our observations of the real world. Now, I imagine there are other good and maybe even more popular definitions of theory, but I think Hawking is well-enough known and admired that this definition is acceptable. In any event, I am introducing it not as an example of a definition of a theory, but as a case of reductionism for in describing theories as models, Hawking seems to be taking a generally reductionbism view.
But, my question is, do such reductions (as those theories of physics that he describes) really "explain" things? I do not think they do, at least not in the common sense of a prior action that determines a consequent action. On the contrary, it seems to me that all such models do is describe how certain kinds of events may determine other kinds of events. It seems to me that the real stregnth of such theories is not that they explain, but that they reveal that different events can all be described in the same language, i.e. that the orbit of the moon and an apple falling off a tree obey the same law of gravity. But this does not mee that the apple falls "because" of the theory of gravity; the theory of gravity merely describes the relationships of bodies with mass that allow us to predict future events. Is this realy "explanation?"
If it is "explanation," all I can say is, it is not explanation in the sense that I think most English speakers mean, and so the article should be clear about the meaning. SR
If "reductionism" generally is to be defined in terms of explanation, it can't be just causal explanation; it would also have to be explanation of meaning, or semantic explanation.
A more complete article on the subject would certainly make a big to do about how reduction might or might not be considered to be a variety of explanation. Often, reduction is portrayed as elimination; so, for example, if I try to reduce mental events to brain events, some people naturally react not as if I had tried to explain what mental events are (an ontological explanation) or how they occur (causal explanation), but tried to eliminate the need to talk about mental events at all, in favor of talk about brain events. --Larry Sanger
I'm removing the italicized portion of the following:
- Scientific reductionism has been used to describe all of the above ideas as they relate to science, but is most often used to describe the idea that all phenomena can be reduced to scientific explanations; that is, that all things are explainable.
This seems problematic, because it implies that there is no such thing as a "non-scientific explanation". Is that really what is meant?
Also, is it part of "scientific reductionism" to deny the reality of that which cannot be reduced to science? If so, maybe this should be clarified here. --Ryguasu
I'm curious: Daniel Dennett talks about "greedy reductionism". Does anyone talk about "greedy holism"? If I were to define that term, it would mean something along the lines of "understanding the whole has nothing whatsoever to do with understanding its parts." Although it would probably be hard to find someone who would actually espouse such an extreme position, I think one could certainly accuse some people (perhaps even mainstream sociology) of having strong tendencies in that direction. --Ryguasu 16:45 Jan 24, 2003 (UTC)
Reply to Ryguasu (above)
Some people use the word emergence when they make claims such as: "understanding the whole has nothing whatsoever to do with understanding its parts," particularly in a context such as, "you cannot explain consciousness by reductionism because consciousness is emergent."
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy gives a good summary of use of the term "emergent" within philosophy.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/properties-emergent/
If you compare the Stanford Encyclopedia entry to the Wikipedia entry for emergence, you will see that the Wikipedia version is too simplistic.
I am surprised that there is no entry yet for holism. I have always had a problem with the term "holism" because it seems to get hijacked by people who have an anti-reductionism agenda.
For example: "Holism, stands in stark opposition to the method of reductionism, which holds that analysis, dissection, and strict definition are the tools for understanding reality. Holism asserts that phenomena can never be fully understood in isolation; it asserts that reductionism can only give us a partial view of anything it dissects."
http://www.neat.tas.edu.au/HENT/glossary.htm I usually like to tell people that I take a holistic approach to my reductionism. I see nothing paradoxical about this. We reduce complex systems to their componenents then we must construct a holistic view of how the components interact to produce the whole system. I think holism and reductionism should go hand-in-hand not be viewed as being in "stark opposition". I have similar problems with the term "emergent" which I have discussed here:
http://www.geocities.com/ResearchTriangle/System/8870/books/AScott2.html JWSchmidt 04:08 Mar 1, 2003 (UTC)
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I have a question regarding the article - why on earth should you throw Stephen Gould out of a window ??
- A classic line, I actually laughed aloud when I read that 131.170.90.3 05:46, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
Steven Weinberg wrote an essay called 'two cheers for reductionism'. Perhaps worth mentioning?
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[edit] Reductionism and emergence
I'm a bit confused about the "emergence disproving reductionism" part. Maybe some summary on the notion would help? I mean, certainly it isn't argued that emergence is where something is more than the sum of its parts. Does anyone really believe that? It would make *much* more sense for someone to argue that if simpler parts inexplicably result in a more advanced whole than is predicted then the simpler parts' values were miscalculated. Of course, this is just my opinion, but certainly there aren't scientists, (supposedly) the fonts of all that is logical and sound, who would believe otherwise? Where are the sources to this claim?
[edit] Reply
Generally, people who speak about emergence do mean that there are systems for which the complete correct knowledge about the parts does not offer complete correct knowledge about the system, and some of these people are scientists, or mathematicians. The analysis of complex systems is to do with this. Complex systems are said (although afaik not yet proven) to be impossible to understand analytically. In other words, one can't work, by maths, from the description of the rules of a complex system, a script on how it will behave. Cellular automata with very simple rules and turing-complete behaviour make a good case. Eulen 13:43, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
[Update, just saw this:]
"I usually like to tell people that I take a holistic approach to my reductionism. I see nothing paradoxical about this. We reduce complex systems to their componenents then we must construct a holistic view of how the components interact to produce the whole system. I think holism and reductionism should go hand-in-hand not be viewed as being in "stark opposition"." It is indeed true that people can have varying levels of reductionism, and they can reduce systems to certain levels where holistic approaches are then taken. However, if absolute reductionism is not taken, it could be posited that the "best" semi-reductionist method would be to reduce the system of components, or "forms" as I like to call them, to a level of holism where these forms are defined by how they are most logically and naturally perceived. The logicality and naturalness could only be determined if the holistic concepts of "logicality" and "naturalness" were defined, of course, but presumably definitions that satisfy the basal needs of the terms, such as "that which coincides with the natural order of nature" for "logicality", could be found. As you may have noticed, this method of defining the concept of "logicality" is, paradoxically, based on "logicality". But despite being paradoxical, it still works.
ps. sorry about the excessive updates, i'm getting used to this discussion thing.
Should some examples of arguments against reductionism (or links to such arguments) be included? Multiple realizability etc.? (Anon)
Holism advocates that complex systems may possess collective properties which differ from the cumilative sum of individual component properties. The idea is that you cannot produce the whole system through constructing a model based on how individual components behave and interact, and that you can only understand the whole through observing the whole. In this respect, holism contrasts with reductionism. This is especially true of living systems. An example of this is Gaia theory, which brings to light the self-organising properties of the ecosphere, properties which only become apparent when the system is viewed as a whole.
Reductionism should link to systemic thinking. See the work of Peter Senge and Gregory Bateson for further reference. This ideology draws attention to the idea that reductionism, i.e. the isolation and analysis of individual components, gives limited insight into the way in which components relate and interact both with each other and with the systems in which they participate. Furthermore, surely the sentence "But it cannot be understand from such principles as elementary particle physics or superstring theory." should read "But it cannot be understood from such principles as elementary particle physics or superstring theory." Alzclarke 23:44, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Materialism is reductionism but no vice verca
I removed this:
"In short, it is philosophical materialism taken to its logical consequences."
You can be a reductionist without materialism, e.g. a radical empiricsist would claim that all states of affairs, objectcs, things, etc. are reducible to sense-data, regardless of truthvalues necessary for materialism.
Then there is phenomenological reductionism, and Marxist historical materialism is reductionism but a materialism of quite different sort.
(M)
[edit] False dichotomy
The first of these are commonly accepted but the last step is controversial and therefore the frontier of reductionism: evolutionary -psychology and -sociology vs. those who claim people have a soul or another quality that separates them from the material world.
This seems to imply that either you subscribe to evolutionary psychology and sociology or you believe in a soul or some other supernatural phenomenon. There are many intelligent materialists who are deeply critical of evolutionary psychology and sociology - the late Stephen Jay Gould (unceremoniously defenestrated in another passage of the article) was one. Spiritual explanations are only one kind of counter to reductionist thought, and not in my view the most obvious or important. Breffni--134.226.1.194 00:17, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
Why throw Jay Gould out of the window? Surely it's just rude unless you explain why it's relevant. 131.111.8.98 12:50, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Religion
The religious stance hadn't been mentioned,so it can't be a "redescription". These additions are not anti-reductionist, just a framing of the debate. Plz use Talk....
- Fine. Your edit is suffciently general and concise as to be hard to object to. My only concern is that, on Wikiepdia, one mention of a particular religious view or something that invokes things beyond the physical in a vague manner in philosphy of science articles almost always leads to an overhwleming assault from people with eccentric, pseudoscientific theories (often their own), New Age postmodern gobbdledygook which no one can understand, and so on. I will leave it alone and hope that the page doesn't fall apart into nonsense. But beware that there are literally millions of people who come across the philosophy pages and think they vcn now get their chance to disprove reductionism (or what have you) becasue the e.g. L. Ron Hubbard said that there exist "indescribable essences of the mainifest being which invoke the six-dimenisal Kalabi Yau space of unknowable noumenal objects, etc.." --Lacatosias 09:23, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
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- I share your concerns but actually feel having a blanket mention of "beyond visible nature" sentiments may lead to less non-philosophic intrusion rather than more. Hopefully people will see there's at least a general description of thier objections and go merrily on thier way. Besides, though a reductionist myself, I take the religious impulse seriously and believe it should get its due in articles like this. But "its due" should almost always be a short, purely non-sectarian statement. JDG 13:12, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
[edit] "Items"
I find the use of the word "item" synonymously with "thing" to be stultified, distracting, and often strictly erroneous. Where things (particulars, articles, instances, etc.) appear among similar things, as in a class (category, list, itemization, etc.), it may be appropriate, depending on one's intention, to identify them as items. But without such an intention or context, "item" is a poor choice of wording. Instead of carrying the broad connotation needed in many of the statements in this discussion, it seems to imply the indication of a specific member of a (presumably finite and known) group. (--Marshall Price, d021317c, October 6, 2006, 10:25 am, EDT)
By coincidence, I just discovered, by way of "Arts and Letters Daily" (www.aldaily.com), an article by the former director of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Burton Richter, in which he uses "reductionist" not as identifying a theory, but as a "trend" and "direction" on paths to understanding. He distinguishes it from "what appear to me to be empty concepts like naturalness, the anthropic principle, and the landscape" (of theorizing, I think). The article appeared in the October 2006 issue of "Physics Today", and is available as a PDF download. I found it inspired, inspiring, and brilliantly written. It reveals a few crucial facts about the history of theoretical physics which had escaped me before, the learning of which has been quite rewarding. (As an aside, I wonder whether the technology and practice of putting a piano together, regulating it, and tuning it, should be considered constituent parts of the piano.) (--Marshall Price, d021317c, October 6, 2006, 12:20 pm, EDT)
[edit] Methodological reductionism
Methodological reductionism is the idea that explanations of things, such as scientific explanations, ought to be continually reduced to the very simplest entities possible (but no simpler). Occam's Razor forms the basis of this type of reductionism.
As far as I can ascertain this is incorrect. Occam's Razor is a preference for simplicity when dealing with "equivalent" theories. I can not see any direct bearing this has on Methodological Reductionism, which is the view that "An understanding of a complex system is best sought at the level of the structure and behavior of its component parts." [1] However, Methodological Reductionism redirects to Occam's Razor. I have thus not edited the article yet, pending further discussion. --Nappyrash 10:53, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
I have edited the entry for Methodical Reductionism, I think it is now more accurate. Nappyrash 03:33, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
