11
votes
Is philosophy computation?
If philosophy is mathematics and mathematics is computation, can I conclude that philosophy is computation?
Yes.
So is philosophy merely computation?
No because philosophy isn't mathematics and ...
- 1,808
10
votes
What are the relations between supervenience, grounding and emergence in philosophy of science?
Apparently, "grounding" is a new word of choice in metaphysical debates, there was a philosophical Conference on Grounding and Emergence held in Glasgow last May. This is a reaction to fading hopes of ...
- 42.5k
8
votes
What are the missing pieces that prevents us from deriving the laws of chemistry from physics?
I find this implicit disdain towards emergent properties as 'not really explained' puzzling. I think it relates to a misconception about the ontology of emergent properties. See these discussions:
...
- 20.5k
6
votes
Is reductionism in conflict with our sense of awe and wonder?
In his "Lecture on Ethics" Wittgenstein makes some similar points about wonder and miracles, first defining miracles:
Let me first consider, again, our first experience of wondering at the ...
- 1,956
5
votes
Accepted
Does rejecting reductionism absolutely imply that you accept the existence of emergent properties?
Not necessarily.
Substance dualism (interactionism) is a second possibility which does not accept emergentism.
- 1,066
5
votes
Are we lost in the details?
Fragmentation is another word for specialisation, and specialisation is a feature of the two main areas of activity in which the most effort is invested in developing new ideas, namely business and ...
- 13.2k
4
votes
Accepted
Under metaphysical naturalism, does everything boil down to Physics?
Yes*
According to metaphysical naturalism, all matter and their interactions are ultimately a result of the interactions of their material parts (down to atomic particles and such).
Even for most who ...
- 5,414
3
votes
Is reductionism in conflict with our sense of awe and wonder?
SCIENCE AND THE AESTHETIC ATTITUDE ARE DIFFERENT ...
In aesthetic contemplation one considers an object - a natural object or an artefact - in detachment from all practical or explanatory motivations ...
- 35.4k
3
votes
Is reductionism in conflict with our sense of awe and wonder?
You are talking not about science but the faith of determinism.
In the deterministic mindset, everything is made up merely of the physical interaction of objects, which can be subjected to experiments,...
- 548
3
votes
Accepted
What is it called when two theories ultimately become one theory in science?
In the physics world, such an event is called unification. Here are some examples:
Maxwell's equations unified all the various experimentally-derived laws of electromagnetics into one set of four ...
- 7,772
3
votes
Under metaphysical naturalism, does everything boil down to Physics?
No, because of emergence. Saying other sciences are reducible to physics, is like saying literature is reducible to the alphabet.
What did emerge, Earth biology, didn't have to be that way, & the ...
- 20.5k
3
votes
Under metaphysical naturalism, does everything boil down to Physics?
Under metaphysical naturalism, does everything boil down to Physics?
TLDR
Depending on one's definition 'boil down', not yes, not no, but partially so!
Explanation
You have one answer that says other ...
- 22.8k
3
votes
Are we lost in the details?
Your questions are quite broad, but I'll answer to the general spirit of the inquiry.
Are we lost in the details?... Is this fragmentation of meaning now an obstacle into going forward? Are we in ...
- 22.8k
3
votes
Are we lost in the details?
What do you imagine a "big picture" to look like?
We can start by asserting that every part of those ancient "respective characteristics, properties and personalities" was entirely ...
- 1,730
2
votes
What are the problems with reductionism?
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare is reducible to the same set of letters, spaces and punctuation marks as The Complete Tweets of Paris Hilton. No understanding of those fundamental letters ...
- 27.1k
2
votes
Accepted
Reductionism and Parmenides
There are chemical processes in the fruit, a bit crudely it's just atoms “moving around”
If you really want to keep a strict separation of Being and Non-Being, movement is also contradictory. For the ...
- 104
2
votes
Is Antireductionism a scientific position?
The mistake is to see explantory layers as incompatible or competing.
In evolution theory, it has been understood for a long time that the gene is the fundamental level of selection, and kin-...
- 20.5k
2
votes
Is philosophy computation?
The key question here is “Can a computer think for us?” This can be reformulated as “Will strong AI ever be realized?” Or, “Can human understanding be reduced to a program running on a Turing machine?...
- 19.2k
2
votes
Does it make sense to say that consciousness does not exist or there is no such thing?
Those who deny consciousness, generally do so in the name of a science/empirical epistemological framework. This is a self-contradictory view.
In science, and it parent methodological naturalism, ...
- 10.5k
2
votes
Is the concept of emergence sufficient in blocking reductionism?
It depends how much goes into the emergent properties as regards the kind of causal power (if any) they possess. I'm going to take part of an argument from J. Kim. It doesn't represent his full view ...
- 35.4k
2
votes
How can complex material systems emerge in ways that allow them to transcend fundamental material structures?
There are multiple approaches to emergence, and I consider this to be the most valid, also agrees with my personal research regarding systems and interaction: emergence is just a subjective ...
- 6,831
2
votes
Does good chess strategy reduce to the rules of the game?
The short answer is a resounding no, because rules do not encompass the values of the agents that use the rules.
A theory, as often conceived, can be abstracted to a set of set-theoretic, logical, ...
- 22.8k
2
votes
Accepted
Are there examples of the narrowing scope of scientific explanations?
Quasicrystals seem to be a good example, even if that might need some technical details.
In a nutshell: crystals were defined as materials producing sharp diffraction spots; it was thought that ...
- 3,684
2
votes
References for books/papers about emergentism and reductionism
To get an overview of the concepts and discussions, I recommend the collection
Emergence by Mark A. Bedau and Paul Humphreys
- 121
2
votes
What are the missing pieces that prevents us from deriving the laws of chemistry from physics?
Short Answer
There is no canonical response on why total reductionism fails between any two bodies of theories, so it is only possible to offer some canonical insights into the challenges of ...
- 22.8k
2
votes
Hard stuff made easy?
Even if a concept is sufficiently "algorithmically random" (ie in Kolmogorov complexity sense, cannot be compressed or "explained" further) it is still possible to approximate it ...
- 2,143
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