Scientific Evidence Against Reductionism (Aquinas 101)
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The dream of complete reductionism is still just a dream.
Scientific Evidence Against Reductionism (Aquinas 101) - Fr. Thomas Davenport, O.P.
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Meeting those who struggle with "scientism" on their own turf. Good play. Real evangelization.
The quantum chemistry example is a good one: we can't get a strictly solvable system for anything worse than helium. Taking a class in it rn, pray for me.
Lmao😂😂, you'll be fine lol🙂
This is a good one. I love to see the tailored scholastic response to modern, erroneous notions of reality.
Yes. I'ts great to see modern ideas and pseudo "thinkers" being refuted by someone who lived almost one thousand years ago, like St. Thomas.
@@anahata3478 When I said modern ideas I was referring to nominalism and "philosofies" like that. I didn't mean present-day studies in general.
You're all talk buddy
This guy clearly knows what's he's talking about with that PhD in physics and all. Good examples. Good points.
Exactly. This way, foolish objections and snark responses would not work against him. So many folks on social media who are atheists love to throw science around like a magic elixir against theism or act as if theists don’t know anything about science.
Many thanks for this great video, Fr. (and Dr.) Davenport! I love the thought-provoking points raised here. PS. I'm a chemist who's worked in nanotechnology and materials science, so the "area" between chemistry and physics is a familiar and cherished one. (Also to fellow Catholics, don't be afraid of pursuing the natural sciences!)
Have you come across "It keeps me seeking"...Briggs , Halvorson and Steane . O U P ? Two scientists and a philosopher ...and theists.
Thanks for watching!
God has given us so much mystery to contemplate and study.
The most wonderful to contemplate is the infinite Creater.
Thank you Dominicans for challenging our minds. The finite leading to the infinite.
We're glad you found the video helpful! God bless you.
It is awesome to see friars that know that much! I am really grateful for your work Thomistic institute! I keep you in my prayers🙌
"Biology is applied chemistry. Chemistry is applied physics." Thus physics too is nothing but applied mathematics.
We can go further arguing that mathematics is nothing but applied syllogism of logical system. Ultimately everything is redused to absurdity.
'Man will know more and more about the less and less until he knows everything about nothing'
God bless you and your mission. May Mary Our Blessed Mother help you.
Benedicamus Domino!!!!
@@anahata3478 Eugene Wigner 'Unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in physical sciences" .... excellent paper on this
Ultimately I agree with you, but I'd be careful saying that Mathematics is reducible to logic statements. That's affirming logicism as True, something that is highly contentious within the philosophy of Math. A lot of mathematics simply postulates the existence of things (I.e: Let y=mx+b, etc) rather than derives them.
no. mathematics is the way we cope with reality, maths is inside our minds. but then physics is also inside our mind but physics are configuref to conform with reality.
so math is a tool. physics is the application of maths to build a working model of reality. so physics models reality but math is just a tool. a tool do convert one true statement into another true statement.
@@matswessling6600 refer Kurt Gurdel's Incompleteness Theorem, if you think maths is in human mind
@@shashikamanoj1160 i know that proof. it does not show that math isnt in human mind.
4:38 true that the idea of temperature only properly applies only at the wholistic level, but can be part of describing lower level properties. So I think your implicit question is: why privilege the realism of lower level ideas over higher level ones?
This was greatly helpful. Thank you! I can't wait to see the rest of this Philosophy of science and nature series!
We're glad to hear that, Andrew. Thanks for watching!
It overlooks the possibility that things like temperature, although useful aren't real in any way.
it does indeed assume realism, though by saying at 4:38 that lower level descriptions "already uses the [higher level] idea of temperature" he does allude to the phenomenological insight that all is known through such ideas ... so why privilege one level?
Thanks for this. God bless all your efforts to educate us. 🙏🏽✝️
Thank you for watching! God bless you as well.
Great video. Many thanks!
Thanks for this excellent overview, Dr. Davenport! I hope there will be further videos engaging in more detailed responses to reductionist claims.
Dr. Eleonore Stump is a friend of the Dominicans, and she has a talk that I think is a great takedown of reductionism, titled “Natural Law, Metaphysics, and God as Creator.” I know it’s on Vimeo, and it might also be on TH-cam. It doesn’t have the same short, slick format these videos have, but the content is phenomenal.
Anyway, I share your hope that the OPs address the topic in more detail in the future! These videos are super helpful!
Excelent explanation! Thanks, TI !!!
Cheers, thanks for watching! May the Lord bless you!
Thomas Aquinas had it right. Too many secular humanist that think "science" is the new god (little "g"). If one simply contemplates the complexity involved in the existence of matter and form, it is easy to understand that it all comes from God.
Great video. There solution to chemistry is still intriguing: the inability to solve analytically the wave function for a many body system or the required functionals to describe bonding integrations.
There are many things we don't know.
Yes. There are however several examples of exactly solvable quantum many-body problems. But I think Fr.'s broader point is emergence, namely that certain qualitatively novel phenomena (like spontaneous symmetry breaking, collective phenomena, macroscopic properties like color, rigidity, thermal conductivity) appear only in the limit of large systems (the thermodynamic limit). This can be made precise mathematically. You can calculate them from the microscopic wavefunction, but you wouldn't "see" them by just looking at the wavefunction as a collection of numbers. They are completely non-obvious consequences of quantum mechanics. A good book on emergence is Laughlin's "A Different Universe: Reinventing Physics From the Bottom Down".
🤯
Thank you so much!
You're welcome! We hope you continue to find the series helpful.
We can use calculus to define a local temperature: the average kinetic energy in some small volume. Then we can look at or think of the temperature as something that varies over space, even on small scales. Granted, once you get to atomic scales, the notion of temperature breaks down. Regardless, we don't have to speak of "the temperature" of a cup of coffee. Just like we don't have to talk about the temperature on Earth (the death valley is hotter than Antarctica). But temperature is perfectly well defined both in a planet and on a cup scales as a function over space.
It is one thing to say that "one can only build some highly idealized examples" (05:30), which probably is due to the complex heterogeneity of nature; the superposition of various effects - too many to be taken into account by our computational or experimental models. But to me, that does not necessarily rule out Physical Reductionism in principle. Any thoughts?
Science itself debunks reductionism. Science recognizes emergent phenomenon that aren't simply properties of constituent components.
Great video! God Bless.
Love yours opinion broo
Thanks for the video! "Moreover, there is more and more evidence, and new and convincing arguments, that there are important features about the molecular, chemical, cellular, and biological worlds that cannot be reduced to particle physics, even in principle." This is really intriguing to me; can you point me to some sources where I can read about this in more detail? It's definitely impractical to reduce most complex systems down to the interactions between the fundamental particles that the systems comprise, but it seemed to me like you could do it in theory with sufficient computational power (but again, the computational power required would be completely impractical for most complex systems, and it makes much more sense to learn experimentally). So now I really want to learn about the evidence that says otherwise.
Excellent question. Some good sources:
George Ellis, a cosmologist, has several good videos on this topic - top down vs bottom up causation.
David Bentley Hart’s book “The Experience of God” is also excellent.
Edward Feser and David Bentley Hart have several videos on how consciousness is not reducible to physical reality.
Good example of avoid reductionism when using scientific method was: when explaining anything Paranormal and Supernatural as Nanotech/AI, we gone with hyperdimensional nanotechnologies as explanations for the supernatural
Perfect
Thanks!
The absolute mass of information that human beings can never know due to limitations of the five senses is vast compared to what human beings will ever know. In this world anyway.
The light of intelligence dissipates the powers of obdurate foolishness!
Hohoho...
Hmm... I think the temperature distribution example of hot coffee and cold milk can be thought in this way, that the molecules of each substance type present that make up the newly created coffee milk respond to kinetic energy from each different type of molecules differently. And in molecular levels, not only pure momentum is at play but also molecular electrical forces from each molecule, the hydrostatic pressure, plus density of each molecule, which affect the total dynamics at play.
The fact that "the cup of coffee, properly speaking, has no temperature" yet, when the cold milk is poured into the hot coffee, is exactly because "temperature" state is determined by each molecule and not an entire system, realistically; unless we have an equipment that can measure movement of each molecule in the cup of coffee to determine individual "temperature" or kinetic state of each molecule without interfering with the movement of each molecule measured, we cannot know in an instant the temperature of the recently mixed hot coffee and cold milk because the substances have not yet "agreed" with each other and hence "can't" give answer to average temperature yet
Even a glass or a gallon of pure water under a normal environment does not have an exact average temperature, each section will have slightly higher or lower temperature even though it is in relative equilibrium already, because nothing in the universe is purely isolated. I just don't know why this example can't be explained by the molecular physics.
I think Fr.'s point is that temperature is a concept that only properly applies to systems in thermodynamic equilibrium, while when the cold milk is poured into the hot coffee, the system is out of equilibrium. For sure, there are approximate descriptions of the physics like the heat equation where we make sense of notions of local equilibrium and local temperature T(x,y,z), and one would obviously model the coffee-milk example that way. But I think Fr.'s point is that these formulations cannot be derived rigorously from the microscopic equations (the many-particle Schrödinger equation). You always have to invoke some approximations at some stage.
Im confused. In the temperature example, where the kinetic energy of each particle cannot wholly explain temperature, then what else is going on? If we knew the velocity and location of each particle, doesn’t that lead us to an explanation of temperature? If not, what is added that lets us measure the temperature of a substance?
How would one answer the argument that differential equations supposedly tell us that once we know the initial state then the future is already determined and supposedly in turn destroys the idea that we have free will?
With the temperature example. Don't we also define temperature to be the change in energy/change in entropy. Energy and entropy both seem to be values that can be described purely based on the properties of the particles in the system. Could you give another example of a definition that is circular or information to why higher order sciences (like biology or chemistry) cannot be broken down to physics?
I have a potential objection. Can’t it be said that terms like temperature, car, dog, etc. be simply a way to reference the parts that are assembled into those forms? This way you still have reductionism and the terms of form we use simply reflect a way of talking about appearances of ultimately a jumble of particles even if they are organized.
Thoughts?
"It keeps me seeking" (Briggs Halvorson and Steane) O U P is a good read in this area.
Also,
3:43
How can the concept of temperature be applicable to the individual molecules of the mixture? Isn't it a macroscopic phenomenon in the first place?
"No part of the liquid would actually have that temperature yet," you say? What about the set called "the whole"? Why doesn't the set-of-two-liquids-mixing-but-not-mixed-yet have a temperature?
I conjecture that there is a conflation of the ability to measure a temperature with the concept per se - the qualia of the science with its knowledge.
yes I would think the fact that no part of the liquid has the average temperature of the whole is actually proof of reductionism not it's refutation. It's only phenomenology (qualia as rooting referential concepts, etc) than can defeat reductionism
Smart dude
The quantum chemistry example doesn't disprove it, just tells are we still don't know much about to physics to explain it. All the other examples as well, once we truly know everything about the physics what would hold it back from explaining itself which are the things obeying the physical laws like chemistry biology etc?
Great!
My atheist comrades, whose got this same neurological difficulties like me, taking off temptated on the scholastic scienceship conscience that, God was The Creator of everything - because of never do exist only cosmologically, but only in the ontology of God persons, exist only for theirselves - and this is 'non seqitur' argument, because God exist only in topology of ontological matter.
What I can dig above this argument? Please explain me.
Regrets,
Adam +
2:10
3:30
6:20
Did not Thomas Aquinas correct Aristotle in defense of the Catholic faith?
I'd love to know where Aquinas directly rejects the idea -- if he does -- that the lowest-level entities/processes and their interactions (plus God's omnipresent act of creation) might explain _why there _*_exist_*_ the substantial forms that exist?_ I worry that these recent videos against reductionism are lumping in that kind of explanatory picture with (specifically *eliminativist*) _reductionism._
@Kevin Weiss That does help -- thank you! I find the "taken up into" relation somewhat mysterious, though, I'll admit. My thought was that it's not unreasonable to think that _to have such and such substantial form_ is just to have parts (in principle replaceable parts) that relate to each other in such and such particular ways -- namely the ways that yield the kind of causal unity and specific causal powers associated with the particular (kind of) substance. So _these low-level entities' being and relating to each other the way they are/do_ might completely explain why _this_ substantial form is present/instantiated. And that wouldn't mean substantial forms aren't real or that they _reduce_ to the relationships and features of any _particular_ group of low-level entities sufficient for instantiation of the form (let alone to any particular set of low-level entities themselves!). But substantial forms _might_ nonetheless be reducible, in a non-eliminativist way, to some highly 'multiply-realizable' governing pattern of relations among parts.
In sum, the thought wasn't about denying reality/form to low-level entities but about the seeming compatibility between affirming the importance and reality of substantial forms (at the controversial levels being discussed) and affirming a _kind_ of explanatory completeness of the low-level entities (and conceptually low-level but geometrically macro-level _relations),_ at least in explaining what it is for a given substantial form to be instantiated and possibly for explaining what that substantial form _is._
Any further help/thoughts would be greatly appreciated!
@Kevin Weiss Thanks for the response!
1) Aquinas seems to think the only reason we need to posit immateriality for the human soul (and any rational soul) is that rational animals have conceptual representation, which is abstract and thus general over all _possible_ material 'instances' of the _kind_ referred to by a concept. So even though I get the force of your point here about the high stakes in the human case, the only thing Aquinas seems to directly motivate is the need to explain the capacity for abstract representation, and that seems amenable to the kind of picture I was giving above.
2) Katniss as a cat but not recognizably a cat! I enjoyed that. I think we can distinguish artificial from substantial unities, but basically in terms of homeostasis and 'intrinsic teleology,' where the former point is just that all or virtually all currently existing artifacts need (lots of!) outside help to be repaired and in general to hold onto any of their causal powers against entropy (not so for organisms!), and the latter 'teleology' point can be seen as _very_ related (despite its highfalutin pedigree): organic unities can be described as having homeostasis (and other things like reproduction) as _goals._ I'm not sure I _totally_ get what you meant here, though -- is appealing to organic unity too flimsy just because it wasn't a filled-in explanation (which I've barely improved here, but I could do more), or something else?
@Kevin Weiss Thanks for another helpful response! Basically I think that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, but maybe not greater than _the configuration, dynamics, and repeatable patterns of_ its (individually all in principle replaceable) parts. That view can be understood as a kind of reductionism, but it isn't *eliminativist* like the kinds of reductionism discussed in and rejected by these videos.
The idea is that the configuration and dynamics of, and repeatable _patterns_ instantiated by, the lowest-level material entities can _explain_ all other entities and forms -- *not* that they can explain all other entities and forms *away.* (So I'm into acknowledging entities at _all_ levels, from quarks to religions to numbers to ideas to ….)
For the same reason, I think the view I'm interested in could even be considered a form of hylomorphism: it doesn't eliminate forms, and it can fully agree that it's in fact impossible for a substance to exist without a substantial form. The view just sees substantial forms as repeatable patterns -- specifically (e.g.) homeostasis-realizing patterns -- in the dynamics and configurations of lower-level entities. Note that since on this view patterns are explanatorily ineliminable -- where (e.g.) _number_ and _relative location_ are simple such patterns -- this is not a form of materialism (or not obviously so).
So that's how the picture I'm interested in doesn't collapse into the views rejected in the video. It just rejects the rejection of the idea that 'repeatable patterns in the dynamics and configurations of lowest-level entities' might explain all higher-level entities (including substantial forms and things like _human dignity_ and _essential teloi_ and so on).
Lastly, I can totally agree that "It is the cat's life and the cat's nature (catness) that makes everything else below makes sense." Cat-hearts, as you suggest, wouldn't _be_ cat-hearts if they weren't playing the heart role in a cat, and they would never have evolved independently of cats! I'm just suggesting that accepting all of that doesn't mean that all of _that_ couldn't potentially be explained in terms of the patterns in the configuration and dynamics of lower-level entities. (Not explained *away*!)
@Kevin Weiss It really did -- thanks so much for the conversation!
It seems to me that '[X science] is just applied physics' is interpreted rather strictly here so as to mean, "any given scientific discipline is practicable by means of the discipline of physics."
I believe that the correct and sensible reading of the phrase ought to go, "any given phenomenon in a scientific discipline can potentially be represented by/constructed from the principles of physics." That is to say, in the 'hierarchy' of disciplines, the lower sciences have for their material causes the principles of the higher; biology cannot be without chemistry, which cannot be without physics.
From this arises the notion of reducibility which I find reasonable enough - the theoretic kind. Putting this into practice does seem absurdly beyond the scope of human capacity.
But that's not really the impression/takeaway I have from this video... which is more alone the line of, "Even in principle, biology is not a subset of chemistry."
?
I think the hierarchy of the sciences that you suggest makes total sense; St. Thomas speaks of sciences in the same way.
But reductionism asserts that there is only one science and the rest of them are simply putting physics in a different context. It would follow that knowing everything that physics can tell you about something would exhaust everything there is to know about it. That's a big leap from just saying that the principles of chemistry are built on those of physics. Hence Fr.'s examples about macro phenomena that aren't explained by micro phenomena. It's true that chemistry can't exist without physics, but it's also true that chemistry tells you things that physics can't.
I find the Reductionism vs Thomism distinction interesting, but the type of points made here seem futile. I think the divide can only be addressed on philosophical grounds and not by 'scientific' or empirical examples. This is because the two worldviews seem to be better described as approaches to understanding the world than as understandings of the world themselves. Thus, any arguments on empirical grounds will only talk past each other. Take for instance, the thermal disequilibrium example:
The Thomistic interpretation seems to be that since the reductionist definition of temperature seems to fail under certain conditions, there must be some substantial attribute of temperature that is independent of our reductionist characterization, thus proving Thomism.
The Reductionist interpretation would be that since the definition of temperature seems to fail under certain conditions, it does not exist under certain conditions. From this, it cannot itself be some substantial attribute, thus proving reductionism.
I could defend the latter view. We can still define temperature non-rigorously over an object not in thermal equilibrium. We do so by discussing the temperature at points in the object. The temperature at a point can be defined by imagining a spherical region centered at the point. As the radius of this sphere increases from zero, so too does the number of particles contained within the sphere. We can define the 'continuum radius' as the smallest radius that collects a statistically relevant amount of particles. From this, the temperature at a point can be defined as the average kinetic energy of the particles contained within the sphere constructed around this 'continuum radius'. Any device we use to measure temperature (whether this be our own senses or our equipment), only does so over an area much larger than the circle constructed from this 'continuum radius'. Also, this definition is sufficient for fluid mechanics, as a core assumption of fluid mechanics is that the phenomena involved is well above the size of this 'continuum radius'. Thus, while this definition is not too rigorous, it is sufficient to describe all of the phenomena we can encounter.
In fact, if we were to imagine measuring devices that could become smaller than this 'continuum radius', we would expect the measurement of temperature to become just as ill defined as our definition of temperature. Thus, the idea of temperature as some irreducible substantial attribute seems absurd, as experience of it would break down along with the break down of our reductionist definitions.
I am certain the Thomistic interpretation could be argued equally well, though I am not well versed enough in the position to make that argument. I would, however, be open to hearing it.
👍👍👍
I wish this video would’ve provided some arguments instead of just saying that some scientists and philosophers of science don’t believe in reductionism.
I would like to see them explain spirit acting as matter , matter acting as spirit consciously and at will.
Such as Christ appearing in the upper room , eating a fish and then
Disappearing .
Spirit to matter , matter to spirit.
I believe natural law depends on supernatural nature to exist , both
Needed for natural law to function.
The first cause having an underlying will in which spirit becomes matter and is held in
Existence .this being the intelligent
Design behind nature .
4:00 this goofball is arguing FOR reductionism. He’s saying the abstraction of the temperature of what’s in the cup is incorrect, and what is correct is that it is a mixture of different temperature liquids. He’s holding the less abstract interpretation to be more true, that is literally reductionism.
He then goes on to say that temperature is defined by equilibrium which is defined by temperature. That’s fine, you can define the temperature within the definition by it’s underlying reality, the motion of the particles. I’m really sorry to see everybody in the comments taking this guy so seriously. Any abstraction that cannot be defined by its underlying reality would mean that the universe is not even self consistent.
this wouldn’t be similar to the arguments from Michael Behe on irreducible complexity right ? He tries to argue complex systems like the circulatory system couldn’t have been caused through evolution because if you take away one part they can’t survive, but I disagree , just because something is complex and irreducable today doesn’t mean it did not form irreducible complexity over time , in fact I remember a video that shows how it could have and Behe was refuted in a way when they brought up how Bacteria flagellum evolved... but of course I’m sure we can still hold that things evolved over time.. we will just say they have Substantial forms/ primary substances which account for the parts it has.. and the forms are what change over time ? We need a Thomistic video on biological evolution And how it ties into a top down explanation of the substantial forms over time from the first eukaryotes to animals and then human beings ( rational souls ) and what happens to the forms during that process . Would you say it’s the entire form that evolves from small to bigger and from simple to more complex thus accounting for a top down explanation still? ....and I would like to see more on emergent properties .
Good question.
Thanks for the comment, Josh. You asked for a Thomistic video on biological evolution; how about an entire website? Take a look at www.thomisticevolution.org, a website dedicated to understanding evolution with St. Thomas Aquinas. Fr. Thomas Davenport (from this video) is a contributor to the project. Thanks for watching!
@@ThomisticInstitute This is awesome! Such a good resource.
Who is this chad OP
Chad dominicans
Exelent
The purpose of Reductionism clicked for me at 05:15. If we can reduce everything down to the most basic parts, we can build from there; we can become god.
Yes. It ultimately always comes down to the primordial temptation "you shall be as Gods" (Gen 3,5). The old snake wants us to be "partakes" of his proud, but empty "non serviam" - disobeying God and non acknowledging the wholeness of reality.
The ultimate irony is that by using a physicalist, reductionist approach, they have cut themselves off from vast swaths of nature and thus ensure they will always be severely limited in their knowledge.
This guy looks like the dude that buys Paul Mall Black Menthol 100's at 3am down at the citgo.
The error of reductionism is oversimplifying observed phenomena, (a good example is Hobbes' very specific and erroneous materialistic explanations of the mind). There are mysteries in science that may never be solved. However, all available evidence supports the idea that these processes are dependent on matter and energy, along with every other observable phenomenon. There is no reason to believe that Aristotelian theories would better or more usefully explain observed phenomenon.
Aristotelianism does not deny the reality of matter and energy.
However, the belief that the vividness of our conscious experience or the logical power of rationality are themselves an accidental byproduct of matter is, as MLK famously said, little beyond a belief in secular magic.
@@randomperson2078 Well, that's what the overwhelming amount of evidence supports. You can be an ignoramus, putting your fingers in your ears and denying the possibility that consciousness could be an emergent property, or you can look into the myriad of evidence showing how consciousness arose. It's arbitrary to say that organic processes could have resulted from evolution by natural selection, but not consciousness, especially since there couldn't be a better explanation, since what else would be the source of this consciousness? If it's another consciousness, considering it took billions of years for sentient life to develop, it was a fairly inefficient process, and it only raises the question of where this original consciousness came from, since it would have had to come about somehow as well, or the simplest quality of the universe was a consciousness, which only compounds absurdity upon absurdity to conclude ultimately, consciousness is too complicated to be anything but the simplest possible thing.
So, consciousness is a hard problem, but the theistic explanation is a horrible explanation.
@@Manx123
I don’t think a teleological explanation of the discovery of mind is terrible, nor do most philosophers of mind like Thomas Nagel.
“You can be an ignoramus….” ? Oh, cool name calling!
Most philosophers of mind *agree* that substance dualism is the ordinary and intuitional belief based upon the evidence, and the argument against it is not an Evolutionary Debunking Argument like Plantinga’s or Street’s. Rather, it is a vague incredulity as to how immaterial and material things interact, ignoring Karl Popper’s work with Eccles on this, and then asserting that *of course* the external world is more real than the internal world.
Also, are you arguing for property dualism (emergent property) or eliminativism or what?
@@randomperson2078 Irrelevant opinion, argument from authority. It is a terrible explanation because there's no indication whatever the mechanism by which consciousness developed, while with evolution, there is at least such a mechanism, and strong evidence to suggest how consciousness develops. Anything else is a just a God of the gaps, non-explanation.
Yes, some people are ignoramuses.
I think that's total bullshit, and today most philosophers are naturalists.
The reality of the eternal world is entirely different issue. Even if qualia are inherently subjective, irreducible to material qualities that still does not imply monism is false, or there is any need for a non-naturalistic explanation.
I'm advocating that whatever consciousness is, we can act on the assumption that it's a purely emergent property of matter and energy, developing as a result of evolution by natural selection.
@@Manx123
There’s no indication that your mind developed, but there is indication that most other people have minds.
The reality of the external world and internal world is at issue. If you can explain to me why we should accept the existence of the former and not the latter, explain why. Are you defending reductionism? Property dualism? Idealism? Panpsychism? Or just a gobbledygook assault born out of a fear of religion?
I have a hard time following the way he speaks, always making pauses in the middle of sentences. Otherwise, this is an interesting topic!
Thanks for the feedback. Much appreciated!
So I see 2 defenses that he's attempting to use here. The first is an argument from authority. He claims that many scientists agree with him. This is not a road he wants go down since the vast majority of scientists disagree with him. The second strategy he uses is to point out that reductionism hasn't explained everything yet. In what world would that discredit any form of inquiry? Reductionism is definitely a more defensible position than trying to posit an infinite number of forms that would be applied arbitrarily to ever collection of matter that we see.
No, really it's not, unless you actually deny that things like planets and chairs exist.
th-cam.com/video/FcPyTgLILqA/w-d-xo.html
The human body, and indeed every living organism is never in thermodynamic equilibrium, or else it would be dead, yet we can still measure a person's body temperature. So to say that the milk/tea mixture doesn't have a temperature until it reaches a thermodynamic equilibrium, seems errant to me.
Don't you answer your objection in your objection because the milk and tea mixture is not alive?
its been a long time since I have heard so many sentences stringed together that eloquently says absolutely nothing.
Why are you trying to disprove reductionism?
I don't like his skeptic face with frequent smirks. It gives an impression that he has a bias. There is also very little data presented along with his arguments. I was expecting a more neutral evidence-based presentation.
Invalidating reductionism does not help you prove your imaginary substances. Substances is a medieval philosophical mind game, which has no empiric evidence to confirm it.
If some scientidfic theory proves wrong, the next best answer is: "we don't know", and not some medieval theory.
This is a silly comment. The Pythagorean Theorem is a 2500 year old theorem, and the date of it has absolutely nothing to do with it being correct.
The denial that people and planets are fundamentally real has to be among the dumbest ideas in human history, irrespective of what year it is, and the fact that the imbeciles who believe it are currently alive.
What is this guy talking about? Reductionism is a perfectly coherent perspective.
Wtf?
@@godfreydebouillon8807 reductionism is the best way to explain anything. Reductionism is about breaking things down into their component parts and documenting the dynamics of how they work. If you're not explaining how something works, you're not explaining anything at all. You're just having fun categorizing your random thought associations. That's fun and stuff for art class, but you're not going to build a rocket using Myers Briggs personality test. 😄
@@dmitrysamoilov5989 No, but you don't understand. Scientific Reductionism states that rockets are an "illusion", they are just a bunch of molecules that have been adjitated by another clump of molecules. People, planets and stars are just more illusions.
At the very least it states that things like atoms and molecules are "more fundamental" than the things they form.
This is absurd, because the very nature of everything that can be reduced is to be apart of a composite. These reduced parts (prime matter) are literally purposed to be apart of a composite, not the other way around, and anyone can see this fact, and this means composites are more fundamental to reality than prime matter.
Any philosophy that goes around claiming that composites do not exist is irrational to it's core, which is why atheists are irrational to their core.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bohm