I guess I can agree with you that Weinberg's arguments aren't any better when construed as scientific arguments than they are when construed as philosophical arguments. His lack of so much as a cursory acquaintance with the relevant literature on reduction and emergence, either in physics, specifically, or in science, generally (e.g. in chemistry, biology, social sciences and cognitive sciences) also puts him at a severe disadvantage compared with his numerous colleagues who both are well acquainted with this literature, and who also (some of them) actively contribute to it. — Pierre-Normand
Either there is such a naturalism and people opposed to naturalism in general are all incapable of reasoning or there is none. I am inclined to conclude the former. — Frederick KOH
But at that level you either do borderline science or inconclusive philosophy. — Frederick KOH
Just because a philosopher has a good scientific understanding doesn't necessarily makes her produce "inconclusive philosophy". Also, just because a scientist is well acquainted with philosophy doesn't make her produce "borderline science". Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Hillary Putnam, Werner Heisenberg, James Jerome Gibson, Ernst Mayr and George Ellis are cases in point. — Pierre-Normand
I guess I can agree with you that Weinberg's arguments aren't any better when construed as scientific arguments than they are when construed as philosophical arguments. His lack of so much as a cursory acquaintance with the relevant literature on reduction and emergence, either in physics, specifically, or in science, generally (e.g. in chemistry, biology, social sciences and cognitive sciences) also puts him at a severe disadvantage compared with his numerous colleagues who both are well acquainted with this literature, and who also (some of them) actively contribute to it. — Pierre-Normand
Suppose we have an empirically adequate theory at a certain level. Does an "emergentist" have any theory to determine whether that theory is autonomous or admits further reduction? — Frederick KOH
Suppose we have an empirically adequate theory at a certain level. Does an "emergentist" have any theory to determine whether that theory is autonomous or admits further reduction? — Frederick KOH
It's borderline and inconclusive irrespective of the people involved. — Frederick KOH
That some of the features of the theory that are explanatory fruitful do not admit of further reduction isn't a claim of ignorance. It is a positive claim that can be demonstrated conclusively and without appeal to any sort of magic. What is shown is that this explanatory relevant feature of the system is common to several other systems with heterogeneous material constitutions owing simply to them belonging to an equivalence class: sharing formal/functional features that directly ground those laws. (This is what is being referred to as multiple realizability). That is, it is only from those high level formal/functional features (and also, in many cases, some contingent features of the history of the system and of its normal boundary conditions) that the high/level laws, norms, principles or regularities can be derived and explained.
George Ellis, in his recent books and many articles, provides countless examples of emergent laws in physics, biology, computer science and cognitive science. There also exist an abundant literature pertaining to emergence and top-down causation in chemistry. One paper that I read recently (authored by a professor of chemistry) provides an example of a class of chemical networks where the concentration of a reactant is fixed insensitively to the concentrations of the other reactants in the network provided only that the individual reactions satisfy a specific structural/topological relationship. And that it must be so derives from a mathematical theorem (recently proven) regarding the structure of such networks. I'll dig up the reference if you want. — Pierre-Normand
Suppose we have an empirically adequate theory at a certain level. Does an "emergentist" have any theory todetermine whether that theory is autonomous or admits further reduction? — Frederick KOH
They produced insightful philosophical works and made genuine scientific discoveries irrespective of your stubborn denials. — Pierre-Normand
A theory that explains sets of phenomena in their own terms, without analysing them into their constituent entities such as gluons, quarks or superstrings, is a theory at the appropriate level of emergence whose fundamental objects are autonomous. — tom
That some of the features of the theory that are explanatory fruitful do not admit of further reduction isn't a claim of ignorance. It is a positive claim that can be demonstrated conclusively and without appeal to any sort of magic. — Pierre-Normand
Indeed, explanatory autonomy is the key. — Pierre-Normand
Before reduction is attempted, is there a way to tell if the theory was autonomous? — Frederick KOH
Yes, there is. I just explained it in a long message moments ago. The autonomy is demonstrated through deriving it directly from high level structural features (and normal boundary conditions, etc.) of the systems belonging to an equivalence class that abstracts away from most determinate (thought irrelevant to the derivation of the high level laws) features of material constitution. In that case, to attempt a reduction of the high level laws just is pointless. It's akin to seeking your keys under the lamp post, just because there is more light there, and in spite of the fact that you know for a fact that you've lost your keys further down the street in the shadows! — Pierre-Normand
In that case, to attempt a reduction of the high level laws just is pointless. — Pierre-Normand
Using your way to describe autonomy, is it then still possible to also reduce the same explained phenomena into lower level structures? — Frederick KOH
No, it is not possible. That's because it is proven that the high level features shared by systems that belong to the relevant equivalence class fully explained by the existence of the high level laws (since the latter can be causally/deductively derived from the former), on the one hand, and since those higher-level laws are completely insensitive to any other low level features of material constitution that aren't merely deducible from the system's belonging to the relevant equivalence class. Hence, the availability of any bottom-up (and hence reductive) explanation is positively ruled out. — Pierre-Normand
Pointless is not impossible. — Frederick KOH
It is pointless because it is impossible. It is also pointless because, even if, per impossibile, such a reductive explanation were to be achieved, it would be redundant with the formal explanation at the emergent level. — Pierre-Normand
I suspect this autonomy is the autonomy that computer designs at the logical level have. It just happens that economics and technology has determined they be implemented using semiconductor technology. But the design does not depend on it.
Is this a correct paraphrase? — Frederick KOH
But there is another error of reductionism, which maybe even deeper: the misconception that our theories form a hierarchy. — tom
Do the following have these non-reductive features
1) Protein production
2) Plant conversion of sunlight into starches
3) Macroscopic properties of gasses. — Frederick KOH
As for me, I lack the consitution to deal with the kind of thing you're doing. I'm not sure you're even aware what you're doing. — csalisbury
This locality suggests that no single metaphysical account of hierarchy for causal relations to obtain within emerges from the epistemology of scientific explanation. Instead, a pluralist perspective is recommended—many different kinds of top-down causation (explanation) can exist alongside many different kinds of bottom-up causation (explanation). — Pierre-Normand
That would be a relevant example. We may say that the software laws govern how the computers behave, at the relevant functional level that gives meaning to significant input/output structures. The lower levels of hardware implementation enable rather than govern what the software does (as characterized at the relevant symbolic level). — Pierre-Normand
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