Dave Lull recently drew my attention to this post by Gordon McCabe, in which Gordon comments on Stuart Kauffman's article "Breaking the Galilean Spell," which I linked to in this post of mine.
According to Gordon, Kauffman "fails to distinguish between ontological reductionism and epistemological reductionism," the difference being that the former "merely proposes that the parts of a system, and the way in which those parts are organised and interact, uniquely determine the higher-level states and properties of the system," while the latter "proposes that we can always explain and predict the higher-level states and properties of a system from the parts of the system and the way in which those parts are organised and interact."
In particular, though, "ontological reductionism proposes that what ultimately exists are the objects studied in physics, whether they be particles and forces, or whatever," in contrast to epistemological reductionism, which "proposes that the theories and laws of any branch of science are derivable from those of physics."
"Epistemological reductionism is false," Gordon says, because of "conceptual differences between theories, and simple limitations in the tractability of equations when dealing with systems containing billions of particles." But "this is consistent," Gordon says, "with the truth of ontological reductionism."
I confess I find some of this perplexing. As Gordon reminds us at the outset, "Ontology pertains to what actually exists and happens, epistemology pertains to what we know, or can know, about what exists and happens." That being the case, doesn't it follow that ontological propositions are subject to epistemological scrutiny, including the proposition that "ontological reductionism is true"?
Granting, however, for the sake of argument, that it is true, that "what ultimately exists are the objects studied in physics," would it not follow that "the theories and laws ... derivable from physics" are the only theories and laws that validly pertain to what ultimately exists? And would that not constitute an epistemological reductionism corollary to ontological reductionism? And might that not be what Kauffman is objecting to?
This brings me to what Gordon's post initially got me thinking about: Bach's B-minor Mass and Tuscan white bean soup.
Last Friday, I made a sort of Tuscan white bean soup. I say " a sort of" because, while I like to look at recipes - and have been to Tuscany and eaten the genuine article - I am not given to following them too precisely. I regard them the way a musician regards a score, as something to which you must bring knowledge, experience, skill and taste - and make your own. No soup - nor any performance of a piece of music - should ever be quite the same twice. So, like any sound cook - and I learned to cook from my mother and grandmother - I rarely use measuring cups and spoons. I use my eye, my fingers, the palm of my hand, the feel of the soup as I stir it, and - of course - my nose and my tongue. I know exactly what Eugene Ormandy meant when he said that the Philadelphia sound "is me." This wasn't egoism. It was simply a matter of fact. I could say the same about the flavor of my white bean soup.
Anyway, while I was making the soup, I kept thinking, from time to time, about Gordon's post. One thought I had was that one problem with ontological reductionism was that it reduced everything to ingredients. I suspect that a physical analysis of my soup and of another employing the same ingredients would come out much the same - but that the two soups might well not taste at all the same. And there's where Bach's B-minor Mass came in. The pure physics of the B-minor Mass can't be all that different - if at all different - from, say, Mozart's C-minor Mass (or, for that matter, any other choral-instrumental work). Yet there is, in fact, a world of difference between the two (and between those and all the others).
There is also another problem - for me - with ontological reductionism, namely, that it grants ultimate reality only to the elementary constituents of reality. This seems to me to be a variation on the idea that the most genuine form of something is its initial form, that the point of departure is somehow more fundamentally real than the destination - which is obviously absurd.
The Schoolmen defined the essence of a thing as that which makes it what it is. But what makes a particular thing what it is in particular is precisely what it does not have in common with anything else. I do not experience myself in terms of genes, biochemical processes, or wave and particle interactions, and I would submit that my experience of myself serves as a direct connection to ultimate reality, whatever that may be.
The ultimate reality of Michelangelo's David is not the marble from which it was carved, but the statue itself. And the ultimate reality of my bean soup is the soup. The ultimate reality of anything is not what it is made from, but what it is. Our point of entry to ultimate reality is located right where we encounter it most immediately, not eons ago or deep within the atom. Therein lies the problem with reductionism, whether it be epistemological or ontological.
In particular, though, "ontological reductionism proposes that what ultimately exists are the objects studied in physics, whether they be particles and forces, or whatever," in contrast to epistemological reductionism, which "proposes that the theories and laws of any branch of science are derivable from those of physics."
"Epistemological reductionism is false," Gordon says, because of "conceptual differences between theories, and simple limitations in the tractability of equations when dealing with systems containing billions of particles." But "this is consistent," Gordon says, "with the truth of ontological reductionism."
I confess I find some of this perplexing. As Gordon reminds us at the outset, "Ontology pertains to what actually exists and happens, epistemology pertains to what we know, or can know, about what exists and happens." That being the case, doesn't it follow that ontological propositions are subject to epistemological scrutiny, including the proposition that "ontological reductionism is true"?
Granting, however, for the sake of argument, that it is true, that "what ultimately exists are the objects studied in physics," would it not follow that "the theories and laws ... derivable from physics" are the only theories and laws that validly pertain to what ultimately exists? And would that not constitute an epistemological reductionism corollary to ontological reductionism? And might that not be what Kauffman is objecting to?
This brings me to what Gordon's post initially got me thinking about: Bach's B-minor Mass and Tuscan white bean soup.
Last Friday, I made a sort of Tuscan white bean soup. I say " a sort of" because, while I like to look at recipes - and have been to Tuscany and eaten the genuine article - I am not given to following them too precisely. I regard them the way a musician regards a score, as something to which you must bring knowledge, experience, skill and taste - and make your own. No soup - nor any performance of a piece of music - should ever be quite the same twice. So, like any sound cook - and I learned to cook from my mother and grandmother - I rarely use measuring cups and spoons. I use my eye, my fingers, the palm of my hand, the feel of the soup as I stir it, and - of course - my nose and my tongue. I know exactly what Eugene Ormandy meant when he said that the Philadelphia sound "is me." This wasn't egoism. It was simply a matter of fact. I could say the same about the flavor of my white bean soup.
Anyway, while I was making the soup, I kept thinking, from time to time, about Gordon's post. One thought I had was that one problem with ontological reductionism was that it reduced everything to ingredients. I suspect that a physical analysis of my soup and of another employing the same ingredients would come out much the same - but that the two soups might well not taste at all the same. And there's where Bach's B-minor Mass came in. The pure physics of the B-minor Mass can't be all that different - if at all different - from, say, Mozart's C-minor Mass (or, for that matter, any other choral-instrumental work). Yet there is, in fact, a world of difference between the two (and between those and all the others).
There is also another problem - for me - with ontological reductionism, namely, that it grants ultimate reality only to the elementary constituents of reality. This seems to me to be a variation on the idea that the most genuine form of something is its initial form, that the point of departure is somehow more fundamentally real than the destination - which is obviously absurd.
The Schoolmen defined the essence of a thing as that which makes it what it is. But what makes a particular thing what it is in particular is precisely what it does not have in common with anything else. I do not experience myself in terms of genes, biochemical processes, or wave and particle interactions, and I would submit that my experience of myself serves as a direct connection to ultimate reality, whatever that may be.
The ultimate reality of Michelangelo's David is not the marble from which it was carved, but the statue itself. And the ultimate reality of my bean soup is the soup. The ultimate reality of anything is not what it is made from, but what it is. Our point of entry to ultimate reality is located right where we encounter it most immediately, not eons ago or deep within the atom. Therein lies the problem with reductionism, whether it be epistemological or ontological.
The hell with ontology and other intangibles -- I want some of that soup!
ReplyDeleteThat's all the thanks I get for trying to be profound?
ReplyDeleteThe soup is a brothy soup, with roasted peppers, escarole, onions and some of Sonny D'Angelo's homemade sweet Italian sausage (take off the casing and roll it into little balls). A little bit a pinot grigio from San Gimingiano and a blend of herbs from the garden (rosemary, basil, mint, oregano and sage). The beans are simmered with a fesh bay leaf.