Nagel on reduction
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 53:43-56 (2015)
Abstract
This paper attempts a critical reappraisal of Nagel's (1961, 1970) model of reduction taking into account both traditional criticisms and recent defenses. This model treats reduction as a type of explanation in which a reduced theory is explained by a reducing theory after their relevant representational items have been suitably connected. In accordance with the deductive-nomological model, the explanation is supposed to consist of a logical deduction. Nagel was a pluralist about both the logical form of the connections between the reduced and reducing theories (which could be conditionals or biconditionals) and their epistemological status (as analytic connections, conventions, or synthetic claims). This paper defends Nagel's pluralism on both counts and, in the process, argues that the multiple realizability objection to reductionism is misplaced. It also argues that the Nagel model correctly characterizes reduction as a type of explanation. However, it notes that logical deduction must be replaced by a broader class of inferential techniques that allow for different types of approximation. Whereas Nagel (1970), in contrast to his earlier position (1961), recognized the relevance of approximation, he did not realize its full import for the model. Throughout the paper two case studies are used to illustrate the arguments: the putative reduction of classical thermodynamics to the kinetic theory of matter and that of classical genetics to molecular biology.Author's Profile
DOI
10.1016/j.shpsa.2015.05.006
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Citations of this work
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Two-step emergence: the quantum theory of atoms in molecules as a bridge between quantum mechanics and molecular chemistry.Chérif F. Matta, Olimpia Lombardi & Jesús Jaimes Arriaga - 2020 - Foundations of Chemistry 22 (1):107-129.
Coherence and Reduction.Andrea Giuseppe Ragno - 2022 - Kriterion – Journal of Philosophy 36 (1):51-81.
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