Conservative Reductionism
eBook - ePub

Conservative Reductionism

  1. 204 pages
  2. English
  3. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

Conservative Reductionism

About this book

Conservative Reductionism sets out a new theory of the relationship between physics and the special sciences within the framework of functionalism. It argues that it is wrong-headed to conceive an opposition between functional and physical properties (or functional and physical descriptions, respectively) and to build an anti-reductionist argument on multiple realization. By contrast, (a) all properties that there are in the world, including the physical ones, are functional properties in the sense of being causal properties, and (b) all true descriptions (laws, theories) that the special sciences propose can in principle be reduced to physical descriptions (laws, theories) by means of functional reduction, despite multiple realization. The book develops arguments for (a) from the metaphysics of properties and the philosophy of physics. These arguments lead to a conservative ontological reductionism. It then develops functional reduction into a fully-fledged, conservative theory reduction by means of introducing functional sub-types that are coextensive with physical types, illustrating that conservative reductionism by means of case studies from biology (notably the relationship between classical and molecular genetics).

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Yes, you can access Conservative Reductionism by Michael Esfeld,Christian Sachse in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Philosophy & Mind & Body in Philosophy. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Information

Publisher
Routledge
Year
2011
eBook ISBN
9781136728495

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Half Title
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Contents
  6. List of Figures
  7. Introduction
  8. 1. The Dilemma of Functionalism
  9. 2. The Metaphysics of Causal Structures
  10. 3. The Theory of Evolution and Causal Structures in Biology
  11. 4. Case Study: Classical and Molecular Genetics
  12. 5. Conservative Functional Reduction
  13. Conclusion
  14. Summary of the Sub-chapters
  15. Bibliography
  16. Index of Names
  17. Index of Subjects