Antireductionism is the position in

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

and

metaphysics Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...

that stands in contrast to

reductionism Reductionism is any of several related philosophical ideas regarding the associations between phenomena which can be described in terms of other simpler or more fundamental phenomena. It is also described as an intellectual and philosophical pos ...

(anti-holism) by advocating that not all properties of a system can be explained in terms of its constituent parts and their interactions.

General concepts

The opposite of reductionism is

holism Holism () is the idea that various systems (e.g. physical, biological, social) should be viewed as wholes, not merely as a collection of parts. The term "holism" was coined by Jan Smuts in his 1926 book ''Holism and Evolution''."holism, n." OED Onl ...

, a word coined by Jan Smuts in

Holism and Evolution ''Holism and Evolution'' is a 1926 book by South African statesman Jan Smuts, in which he coined the word "holism", although Smuts' meaning differs from the modern concept of holism. Smuts defined holism as the "fundamental factor operative towa ...

, that understanding a system can be done only as a whole. One form of antireductionism (epistemological) holds that we simply are not capable of understanding systems at the level of their most basic constituents, and so the program of reductionism must fail. The other kind of antireductionism (ontological) holds that such a complete explanation in terms of basic constituents is not possible even in principle for some systems.

Robert Laughlin Robert Betts Laughlin (born November 1, 1950) is the Anne T. and Robert Bass (businessman), Robert M. Bass Professor of Physics and Applied Physics at Stanford University. Along with Horst L. Störmer of Columbia University and Daniel C. Ts ...

, e.g. supports this view. Disciplines such as cybernetics and systems theory embrace a non-reductionist view of science, sometimes going as far as explaining phenomena at a given level of hierarchy in terms of phenomena at a higher level, in a sense, the opposite of a reductionist approach. Although breaking complex phenomena into parts is a key method in science, there are those complex phenomena (e.g. in physics, psychology, sociology, ecology) where the approach does not work. Antireductionism also arises in academic fields such as history, economics, anthropology, medicine, and biology as attempts to explain complex phenomena using reductionist models do not provide satisfactory insight.

Specific views

An example of antireductionism in psychology is Donald Davidson's proposed

ontology In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality. Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities exis ...

of what he calls 'events' and its use "to provide an antireductionist answer to the mind/matter debate ... nd to show that..the impossibility of intertranslating the two idioms by means of psychophysical laws blocks any analytically reductive relation between...the mental and the physical".

Karl Popper Sir Karl Raimund Popper (28 July 1902 – 17 September 1994) was an Austrian-British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the cl ...

was a famous proponent of antireductionism. In his essay ''Of clouds and clocks'', Popper classified phenomena into two types: "clock" phenomena with a mechanical basis and "cloud" phenomena which are indivisible and depend upon

emergence In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence occurs when an entity is observed to have properties its parts do not have on their own, properties or behaviors that emerge only when the parts interact in a wider whole. Emergence ...

for explanation. For example, Popper thought that a materialist explanation of consciousness is not possible. The view of

reductionists Reductionism is any of several related philosophical ideas regarding the associations between phenomena which can be described in terms of other simpler or more fundamental phenomena. It is also described as an intellectual and philosophical pos ...

about consciousness is explained by

Max Velmans Max Velmans (born 27 May 1942 in Amsterdam) is a British psychologist and Emeritus Professor of Psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London, principally known for the theory of consciousness called " reflexive monism". Reflexive monism bridges ...

Most reductionists accept that consciousness ''seems'' to be different from brain states (or functions) but claim that science will ''discover'' it to be nothing more than a state or function of the brain. In short, they mostly accept that brains states and conscious states are ''conceivably'' different, but deny that they are ''actually'' different (in the universe we happen to inhabit)Max Velmans; ''Understanding consciousness'', Note 26, page 262.

Velmans himself is not in agreement with this reductionist stance. Opposition to this ''mind = brain'' reductionism is found in many authors. An often mentioned issue is that science cannot explain the

hard problem of consciousness The hard problem of consciousness is the problem of explaining why and how humans have qualia or phenomenal experiences. This is in contrast to the "easy problems" of explaining the physical systems that give us and other animals the ability to d ...

, the subjective feelings called

qualia In philosophy of mind, qualia ( or ; singular form: quale) are defined as individual instances of subjective, conscious experience. The term ''qualia'' derives from the Latin neuter plural form (''qualia'') of the Latin adjective '' quālis'' () ...

. Another objection, whose explicit formulation is due to the physicist and philosopher

Thomas Kuhn Thomas Samuel Kuhn (; July 18, 1922 – June 17, 1996) was an American philosopher of science whose 1962 book ''The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'' was influential in both academic and popular circles, introducing the term '' paradigm ...

, is that science is not a self-contained entity, because the theories it uses are creations of the human mind, not inevitable results of experiment and observation, and the criteria for adoption of a particular theory are not definitive in selecting between alternatives, but require subjective input. Even the claim that science is based upon testability of its theories has been met with qualifications. According to

Alexander Rosenberg Alexander Rosenberg (who generally publishes as "Alex") is an American philosopher and novelist. He is the R. Taylor Cole Professor of Philosophy at Duke University, well known for contributions to philosophy of biology and philosophy of economic ...

and David Kaplan, the conflict between

physicalism In philosophy, physicalism is the metaphysical thesis that "everything is physical", that there is "nothing over and above" the physical, or that everything supervenes on the physical. Physicalism is a form of ontological monism—a "one substanc ...

and antireductionism can be resolved, that "both reductionists and antireductionists accept that given our

cognitive Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought, ...

interests and limitations, non-molecular explanations may not be improved, corrected or grounded in molecular ones". However, others find that the conflict between reductionism and antireductionism is "one of the central problems in the philosophy of psychology...an updated version of the old mind-body problem: how levels of theories in the behavioral and brain sciences relate to one another. Many contemporary philosophers of mind believe that cognitive-psychological theories are not reducible to neurological theories...most nonreductive

physicalist In philosophy, physicalism is the metaphysical thesis that "everything is physical", that there is "nothing over and above" the physical, or that everything supervenes on the physical. Physicalism is a form of ontological monism—a "one substance ...

s prefer the idea of a one-way dependence of the mental on the physical."

References

External links

* John Bickle
''Psychoneural Reduction: The New Wave''
Bradford Books, March 1998, . * Ingo Brigandt and Alan Love
"Reductionism in Biology"
in: ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. * Donald Davidson

OUP, 2001, {{ISBN, 0-19-924627-0 * Alex Rosenberg and D. M. Kapla

''Philosophy of Science'', Volume 72.1, January 2005, pp. 43–68] * Manfred Laubichler and

Günter Wagner Gunter or Günter may refer to: * Gunter rig, a type of rig used in sailing, especially in small boats * Gunter Annex, Alabama, a United States Air Force installation * Gunter, Texas, city in the United States People Surname * Chris Gunter ...

(2001
"How molecular is molecular developmental biology? A reply to Alex Rosenberg's Reductionism redux: computing the embryo"
''Biology and Philosophy'' 16: 53—68 * Bolender, John (1995
"Is multiple realizability compatible with antireductionism?"
''The Southern Journal of Philosophy'' XXXIII: pp. 129–142. * Monica Anderso
Reductionism Considered Harmful, h+ magazine, 2011
Holism Philosophy of science

General concepts

Specific views

See also

References

External links