Here is a summary of problem 8, block 2.3. It has been edited after the post discussion so only relevant information is included. All sources and materials are included in the summaries. I got full marks in this course. My average was a 10.
Reductionism
Ontological Reductionism
Ontological reductionism - the belief that the whole of reality consists of a minimal
number of entries or substances
Could be refering to entities of a particular kind such as all organisms are reducible
to molecules but often it is meant in a metaphysical sense that there is but one
substance or ‘world stuff’ and that this is material
It is equivalent to some kind of monism, denying the existence of unseen life forces
and such things, claiming that organisms are no more (nor less) than complex
functioning machines
One might well be trying to reduce material things to come other substance, like
consciousness
One might think that there are two or more irreducible substances – the aim would
then be to reduce all other substances to these fundamental few
Methodological reductionism
The best scientific strategy is always to attempt to explain in terms of ever more
minute entities
A psychologist may try to reduce major sociological movements to the feelings and
behaviours of individual humans, but may think it would be silly to attempt a further
reduction to molecules or below
Highly controversial for it denies the claims of those who argue that the world is
ordered hierarchically, and that entities at upper levels can never be analysed
entirely in terms of entities at lower levels
- Biological reductionism – all human behaviour is fully understandable in terms of
genetics
Theory reductionism
Raises the question of the relation between successive theories in a field
Theories get reduces rather than replaced
Some believe that eventually all sciences will and should be reduced to one super-
theory
Strongly challenged by Khun who believed that because the terms between theories
are always incommensurable, theory reduction is never possible
- Linked to the picture of scientific theories as hypothetico-deductive systems
which has fallen out of favour
What matters less is the relationship between old and new than the relative merits
of successive theories through time
Although few would deny the ontological claim that humans are made of the same
materials as the rest of the physical world, it does not necessarily follow that the
modes of explanation are the same throughout the scientific world or that a
theoretical reduction is always possible or fruitful
Giving up on convergence and autonomy
Long-standing debate in the philosophy of mind and philosophy of science regarding
how best to interpret the relationship between neuroscience and psychology
, Both sides explain cognitive behaviour but do so using different models and theories.
Two possibilities have been given in which this relationship can be interpreted
1. As psychology and neuroscience change over time, the different theories and
models will slowly co-evaluate until they eventually converge into one approach
to cognitive behaviour
2. Psychology and neuroscience will not merge but will continue in isolation from
each other. This is because the systems are characterized at different levels of
organisation/mechanisms. As a result, the theories from psychology can never be
traced back to those of neuroscience
Hochstein – believed both of these to be wrong. He believed that advances in both
domains are due to the fact that their theories are incompatible in different ways
- The theories and models of both domains of thought are dependent on each
other but they will not merge
The two domains must adopt different idealising assumptions about the target
system, resulting in vastly different and incompatible sets of theories useful for their
own representational purposes, but not the other’s
- Convergence between the domains would therefore require that they give up
the very idealising assumptions that allow them to effectively represent the
different aspects of the cognitive system we use them to study
Traditional characterisations of the psychological/neuroscientific divide
Convergence
Convergence - both domains have the same goal; to find a correction theory for
cognitive behaviour. they do this using two different approaches
Psychology uses a top-down approach – tries to understand cognitive behaviour by
identifying high-level cognitive capacities, behavioural patterns and environmental
factors and draws conclusions about how the underlying neurological mechanisms in
the system work
Neuroscience uses a bottom-up approach – starts with studying neurological
mechanisms and from this draws conclusions about general cognitive behaviour
Both domains inform and limit each other directly
- A process of mutual refinement takes place until finally one explanation of
cognitive behaviour is developed
- According to some philosophers, the ultimate reduction from psychology to
neuroscience is inevitable and can therefore be seen as the end point of the
process
Neuroscience needs psychology because it needs to know what they system does – it
needs high-level specifications of the input-output properties of the system
Psychology needs neuroscience because it needs to know what the system does – it
needs to know whether lower-level specifications bear out the initial input-output
theory, where and how to revise the input-output theory, and how to characterise
processes at levels below the top
Autonomy
Autonomy – states that the statements of the two domains are autonomous to each
other
Primarily based on appeals to computationalism and multiple realisability
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