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I'd say for the same reason programs need APIs and cars need steering wheels and emotions need words. It's often very helpful to be able to understand the stack

I'd say for the same reason programs need APIs and cars need steering wheels and emotions need words. It's often very helpful to be able to understand the stack all the way down, but there's power in abstraction, and the nature of things changes as they scale while their context remains constant such that by talking about all the component pieces, you might miss the greater whole. Or at least not be able to handle it with any reasonable dexterity.

jamesrcole 8y ago
>> Why does reductionism need an antidote? > I'd say for the same reason programs need APIs and cars need steering wheels and emotions need words. It's often very helpful to Your examples hardly involve antidotes. An antidote is for a poison, and we talk of metaphorical antidotes for things we perceive in a negative light. I think the person you replied to has a point. I've read a fair bit of philosophy for my PhD work, and I've never come across a criticism of reductionism that seemed to actually understand it. Criticisms of reductionism are always criticisms of a strawman of reductionism. Both Daniel Dennett (for an overview see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greedy_reductionism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greedy_reductionism), and Steven Weinberg https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1995/10/05/reductionism-redux/ https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1995/10/05/reductionism-red... (behind a paywall) or his book "Facing Up" have pretty decent descriptions of reductionism. It's not just that people misunderstand what reductionism itself is, but they also misunderstand what reductionism is and isn't meant to explain. It's not meant to explain or document the characteristics of specific patterns made up of the elements, yet again and again people present the fact that it doesn't explain such details as somehow a fatal flaw in the notion of reductionism.
- sudosteph 8y ago
  I hate doing this... but what has changed on HN such that a comment like this is downvoted so soon after it's been posted? Sources are present, the tone is not hostile. There may be valid disagreements or gaps somewhere here, but the typical HN response in the past was to explore that via further discussion. That said, it really does seem like the term "reductionism" is overloaded. Perhaps it would have been more clear if the author had specifically referred to the concept of Scientism, which is related to a specific problem with excessive or mis-applied reductionism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientism > The term scientism is also used by historians, philosophers, and cultural critics to highlight the possible dangers of lapses towards excessive reductionism in all fields of human knowledge I believe in that context, the original article and content make more sense. Personally, as a fan of David Deutsch's "Beginning of Infinity", I see absolutely no conflict between acknowledging both that scientism is harmful and that many systems can be reduced to elegant, simple definitions that are incredibly useful to understand.

jamesrcole 8y ago

>> Why does reductionism need an antidote? > I'd say for the same reason programs need APIs and cars need steering wheels and emotions need words. It's often very helpful to Your examples hardly involve antidotes. An antidote is for a poison, and we talk of metaphorical antidotes for things we perceive in a negative light. I think the person you replied to has a point. I've read a fair bit of philosophy for my PhD work, and I've never come across a criticism of reductionism that seemed to actually understand it. Criticisms of reductionism are always criticisms of a strawman of reductionism. Both Daniel Dennett (for an overview see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greedy_reductionism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greedy_reductionism), and Steven Weinberg https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1995/10/05/reductionism-redux/ https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1995/10/05/reductionism-red... (behind a paywall) or his book "Facing Up" have pretty decent descriptions of reductionism. It's not just that people misunderstand what reductionism itself is, but they also misunderstand what reductionism is and isn't meant to explain. It's not meant to explain or document the characteristics of specific patterns made up of the elements, yet again and again people present the fact that it doesn't explain such details as somehow a fatal flaw in the notion of reductionism.

sudosteph 8y ago
I hate doing this... but what has changed on HN such that a comment like this is downvoted so soon after it's been posted? Sources are present, the tone is not hostile. There may be valid disagreements or gaps somewhere here, but the typical HN response in the past was to explore that via further discussion. That said, it really does seem like the term "reductionism" is overloaded. Perhaps it would have been more clear if the author had specifically referred to the concept of Scientism, which is related to a specific problem with excessive or mis-applied reductionism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientism > The term scientism is also used by historians, philosophers, and cultural critics to highlight the possible dangers of lapses towards excessive reductionism in all fields of human knowledge I believe in that context, the original article and content make more sense. Personally, as a fan of David Deutsch's "Beginning of Infinity", I see absolutely no conflict between acknowledging both that scientism is harmful and that many systems can be reduced to elegant, simple definitions that are incredibly useful to understand.