Addressing Scientific Reductionism


In case anybody thinks this issue isn't of relevance to s.b.e. note
that under this title are listed the ideas of Dawkins, Dennett, and
Pinker. All of these folks ideas have been posted on here before so it
is an appropriate topic. Informative perhaps all these people have
written on evolution. The impression is the subject of reductionism is
important to these men. According to the article, "Both Dennett and
Steven Pinker argue that too many people who are opposed to science use
the words "reductionism" and "reductionist" less to make coherent
claims about science than to convey a general distaste for the
endeavor." I think that is true. I think the key is not merely the
scientific methods used to produce evidence but how empirical evidence
is interpreted. Although science has been specifically accused of
reductionism it pervades society at all levels. To
reductionists/materialists there may be nothing unknowable to science
yet Einstein once stated the source of all science was the mysterious
(paraphrasing). And does anybody seriously think science will someday
know everything? How absurd and arrogant in this immense universe.
Notice how the term "scientific reductionism" is used instead of
rational analysis. Scientific reductionism is a form of metaphysical
idealogy.

Dawkins, Pinker, and Dennett are all reductionists. They don't take
criticisms of it seriously.
Smith's article "On Reductionism" was very cogent and his argument
appeared to rely on the anthropology of man and how science and other
forces have disconnected man from himself.

Michael Ragland




[moderator's note: Michael here inserts the entire wiki page on this
topic; I'll save a hundred lines and simply point you to it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_reductionism - JAH]


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