This quote is rather unclear—I had to look at the original source to determine what it might mean—and equally importantly, it seems rather useless. Schaffer wants to establish … something about being real, i guess, by his philosophy, but I don’t see how he would expect anything different thereby.
There is some tendency—or bias, if you wish—on this site to take reductionism for granted. Schaffer might help here. By reading him we might come to expect, with some probability, scientific findings that point to an infinite descent of ontological levels, and so to the failure of reductionism.
His other goal is to argue against a stronger form of reductionism that comes easily with the first: eliminativism in regard to, say, qualia, or beliefs.
I’m not sure your (or his) argument actually addresses popular beliefs. Two points:
Reductionism has been proposed not (merely) because it is intuitive, but because it is supported by the evidence. Starting with particle physics, you really can infer chemistry, thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, solid mechanics, heat transfer, and so on—and you can make correct predictions about when the assumptions used in the latter will break down. (For example: when the channels of fluid flow are comparable in size to the particles.) This is just as would be the case in a reductionistic universe.
Eliminativism is no more implied by reductionism than amorality. If you think that rainbows don’t exist once they’ve been unweaved, you’re making a mistake that has nothing to do with science.
I’m not sure your (or his) argument actually addresses popular beliefs.
I still think it relevant:
ad 1.: that might be so, but it’s not all there is to reductionism, at least according to this or that attempt.
ad 2.: that might be so, but it’s nonetheless a theory people rather easily catch, along with reductionism. For example: If you take reductionism for granted, and some entity does not easily fit it, then you are seduced into eliminating that entity.
Eliezer makes the further claim in those pieces that non-reductionism is based on confusion and doesn’t lead to a coherent worldview, but that’s not a property of reductionism.
| If you take reductionism for granted, and some entity does not easily fit it, then you are seduced into eliminating that entity.
Are there any actual individuals you have in mind when you make this generalization? To my knowledge, I have never heard of an individual ignoring observed phenomena they could not predict reductively.
Ok, I wasn’t specific enough.
I meant mainly that Eliezer also claimed that there is a fundamental level and that there are no funda-mental entities.
Are there any actual individuals you have in mind when you make this generalization? To my knowledge, I have never heard of an individual ignoring observed phenomena they could not predict reductively.
I take it you mean explain reductively?
Anyway, behaviourism (and its problems with mental entities) seems the locus classicus. Or what about eliminativists like the churchlands or dennett (for qualia)? Or hartry field for numbers? There must be lots of others.
Point taken. Nevertheless, the fact that people draw absurd conclusions from a belief has no bearing on whether that belief should be questioned unless those absurd conclusions are (1) logical, rather than philosophical, inferences, and (2) contrary to evidence. Those conditions do not hold for reductionism (and Dennett, in particular, had a few things to say about “greedy reductionism”).
A logical inference is inescapable. If the universe is purely deterministic, then everything that happens tomorrow can be predicted from a complete description of the laws of nature and state of the universe at this exact instant—this is a logical inference. But if the universe is purely deterministic, then the people in the universe might be fully responsible for their acts or they might not—philosophers have drawn both inferences, because the deduction depends on additional premises not stated in the syllogism.
Likewise, the inference from reductionism to the conclusion that ordinary things do not exist—what Dennett called “greedy reductionism”, and what you^H^H^Hspuckblase (sorry, didn’t look at the names!) offered Schaffer’s beliefs as an anodyne to—has been argued, but has also been denied, by philosophers. Its validity depends on other premises, such as what it means to exist.
scientific findings that point to an infinite descent of ontological levels, and so to the failure of reductionism.
I don’t believe that breaks anything. Tabooing “reductionism”, I don’t see how infinity of ontological levels (whatever that could mean) is a surprising view. The problem is with mental concepts, thoughts manifested in the rules of the game, a design implemented in terms of the territory happening to also be engraved in its deepest principles.
I’m afraid you sort of lost me after “mental concepts”, so the followong might not apply, but:
“deepest principles” make no sense in an appropriate (as worked out by schaffer in the paper) account of infinite levels.
His idea is that since every level is grounded by AND grounds another level, all entities on all levels are on an equal footing, including mental entities.
I suspected you might pay attention to that detail. The appropriate generalization just says that you don’t expect the same laws to apply at different levels (between levels): a concept in a mind (in a brain, that is a system constructed on top/in terms of lower levels) won’t obey the same laws as the lower-level stuff from which the mind is built. There is also a nice antisymmetry here: a mind can look at lower levels and organize its thoughts to model them, but lower levels can’t do the same to the thoughts in a mind.
I suspected you might pay attention to that detail. The appropriate generalization just says that you don’t expect the same laws to apply at different levels
What detail? What generalization of what?
Is this supposed to be a refutation? If so, of what?
Translation needed.
Sorry for the confusion. The detail of using the word “deepest” that doesn’t apply to the case where there is no bottom, and generalization from systems with a bottom to systems without. It was supposed to be a clarification of the sense in which I consider “mental” entities and what would make them irreducible.
Thanks for the attempt to clarify it for me. Do we actually disagree?
Anyway, ill try to do a top-level post tomorrow to shake your (apparent) belief that mental entities need to have non-mental parts.
This quote is rather unclear—I had to look at the original source to determine what it might mean—and equally importantly, it seems rather useless. Schaffer wants to establish … something about being real, i guess, by his philosophy, but I don’t see how he would expect anything different thereby.
There is some tendency—or bias, if you wish—on this site to take reductionism for granted. Schaffer might help here. By reading him we might come to expect, with some probability, scientific findings that point to an infinite descent of ontological levels, and so to the failure of reductionism. His other goal is to argue against a stronger form of reductionism that comes easily with the first: eliminativism in regard to, say, qualia, or beliefs.
I’m not sure your (or his) argument actually addresses popular beliefs. Two points:
Reductionism has been proposed not (merely) because it is intuitive, but because it is supported by the evidence. Starting with particle physics, you really can infer chemistry, thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, solid mechanics, heat transfer, and so on—and you can make correct predictions about when the assumptions used in the latter will break down. (For example: when the channels of fluid flow are comparable in size to the particles.) This is just as would be the case in a reductionistic universe.
Eliminativism is no more implied by reductionism than amorality. If you think that rainbows don’t exist once they’ve been unweaved, you’re making a mistake that has nothing to do with science.
I still think it relevant:
ad 1.: that might be so, but it’s not all there is to reductionism, at least according to this or that attempt.
ad 2.: that might be so, but it’s nonetheless a theory people rather easily catch, along with reductionism. For example: If you take reductionism for granted, and some entity does not easily fit it, then you are seduced into eliminating that entity.
Eliezer makes the further claim in those pieces that non-reductionism is based on confusion and doesn’t lead to a coherent worldview, but that’s not a property of reductionism.
| If you take reductionism for granted, and some entity does not easily fit it, then you are seduced into eliminating that entity.
Are there any actual individuals you have in mind when you make this generalization? To my knowledge, I have never heard of an individual ignoring observed phenomena they could not predict reductively.
Ok, I wasn’t specific enough. I meant mainly that Eliezer also claimed that there is a fundamental level and that there are no funda-mental entities.
I take it you mean explain reductively? Anyway, behaviourism (and its problems with mental entities) seems the locus classicus. Or what about eliminativists like the churchlands or dennett (for qualia)? Or hartry field for numbers? There must be lots of others.
Point taken. Nevertheless, the fact that people draw absurd conclusions from a belief has no bearing on whether that belief should be questioned unless those absurd conclusions are (1) logical, rather than philosophical, inferences, and (2) contrary to evidence. Those conditions do not hold for reductionism (and Dennett, in particular, had a few things to say about “greedy reductionism”).
I’m not sure what you mean by ‘logical, rather than philosophical, inferences’. Aren’t most (all?) philosophical inferences logical?
A logical inference is inescapable. If the universe is purely deterministic, then everything that happens tomorrow can be predicted from a complete description of the laws of nature and state of the universe at this exact instant—this is a logical inference. But if the universe is purely deterministic, then the people in the universe might be fully responsible for their acts or they might not—philosophers have drawn both inferences, because the deduction depends on additional premises not stated in the syllogism.
Likewise, the inference from reductionism to the conclusion that ordinary things do not exist—what Dennett called “greedy reductionism”, and what you^H^H^Hspuckblase (sorry, didn’t look at the names!) offered Schaffer’s beliefs as an anodyne to—has been argued, but has also been denied, by philosophers. Its validity depends on other premises, such as what it means to exist.
I don’t believe that breaks anything. Tabooing “reductionism”, I don’t see how infinity of ontological levels (whatever that could mean) is a surprising view. The problem is with mental concepts, thoughts manifested in the rules of the game, a design implemented in terms of the territory happening to also be engraved in its deepest principles.
I’m afraid you sort of lost me after “mental concepts”, so the followong might not apply, but: “deepest principles” make no sense in an appropriate (as worked out by schaffer in the paper) account of infinite levels. His idea is that since every level is grounded by AND grounds another level, all entities on all levels are on an equal footing, including mental entities.
I suspected you might pay attention to that detail. The appropriate generalization just says that you don’t expect the same laws to apply at different levels (between levels): a concept in a mind (in a brain, that is a system constructed on top/in terms of lower levels) won’t obey the same laws as the lower-level stuff from which the mind is built. There is also a nice antisymmetry here: a mind can look at lower levels and organize its thoughts to model them, but lower levels can’t do the same to the thoughts in a mind.
What detail? What generalization of what? Is this supposed to be a refutation? If so, of what? Translation needed.
Sorry for the confusion. The detail of using the word “deepest” that doesn’t apply to the case where there is no bottom, and generalization from systems with a bottom to systems without. It was supposed to be a clarification of the sense in which I consider “mental” entities and what would make them irreducible.
Thanks for the attempt to clarify it for me. Do we actually disagree? Anyway, ill try to do a top-level post tomorrow to shake your (apparent) belief that mental entities need to have non-mental parts.
I see this whole discussion as royally confused and not worth pursuing unless a much more technical setting is introduced.