Hostname: page-component-7479d7b7d-qs9v7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-10T07:16:16.413Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Reductionism in Biology: Prospects and Problems

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2022

Kenneth F. Schaffner
Kenneth F. Schaffner*
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Explications of what it means for one science to be reduced to another have been the focus of considerable interest in recent years, and when the reducing science is physics (and chemistry) and the reduced science is biology, additional concerns seem to arise. In this paper I wish to represent a model for theory reduction which has occupied my attention for some years now, and consider its applicability in the area of the biological sciences.

I should state in advance that the model to be discussed represents an ideal standard for accomplished reductions, and does not characterize the research programmes of molecular biologists. Recently I have argued, in point of fact, that a research programme which might be generated from the tenets of the reduction model to be outlined in this paper would not represent some of the most significant advances in molecular biology, such as the development of the Watson-Crick model of DNA or the genesis of the Jacob-Monod operon theory.

Type
Symposium: History and Philosophy of Biology
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1974 , 1974 , pp. 612 - 632
Copyright
Copyright © 1976 by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht-Holland

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Carlson, E. A., 1966, The Gene: A Critical History, Saunders, Philadelphia.Google Scholar
Causey, R.,1972, J.Phil. 69, 407.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crick, F. H. C., 1958, Symp. Soc. Exp. Biol. 12, 138.Google Scholar
Feigl, H., 1958, in Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, II, (ed. by Feigl, H., Scriven, M., and Maxwell, G.), University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.Google Scholar
Feyerabend, P. K., 1962, in Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, III, (ed. by Feigl, H. and Maxwell, G.), University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.Google Scholar
Feyerabend, P. K., 1965, in Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, II, (ed. by R. S., Cohen and M. W., Wartofsky), Humanities Press, New York.Google Scholar
Hull, D., 1972, Phil. Sci. 39, 491.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hull, D., 1973, in Logic, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science, IV: Methodology and Philosophy of Biological Science (ed. by P., Suppes,et al.), North Holland, Amsterdam.Google Scholar
Hull, D., 1974, Philosophy of Biological Science, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.Google Scholar
Hull, D., 1976, ‘Informal Aspects of Theory Reduction’, this symposium, p. 653.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, R. C., 1965, Genetics, Oxford University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Kuhn, T. S., 1962, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Google Scholar
Massey, G., 1973, Ann. Japan Assn. Phil. Sci. 4, 203.Google Scholar
Mills, D. R., Kramer, F. R., and Spiegelman, S., 1973, Science 180, 916.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muller, H. J., 1932, Proc. Intern. Congr. Genet., Ithaca, N.Y., I, 213.Google Scholar
Nagel, E., 1949, in Science and Civilization (ed. by R. C., Stauffer), University of Wisconsin Press, Madison.Google Scholar
Nagel, E., 1961, The Structure of Science, Harcourt, Brace, and World, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nickels, T., 1973, J. Phil. 70, 181.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Orgel, L. E., 1973, The Origins of Life: Molecules and Natural Selection, Wiley, New York.Google Scholar
Polanyi, M., 1968, Science 160, 1308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quine, W. V. O., 1959, Methods of Logic, Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, New York.Google Scholar
Quine, W. V. O., 1964, J. Phil. 51, 209.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruse, M., 1971a, Dialectica 25, 17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruse, M., 1971b, Dialectica 25, 39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schaffner, K., 1967a, Phil. Sci. 34, 137.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schaffner, K., 1967b, Science 157, 644.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schaffner, K., 1969a, Brit. J. Phil. Sci. 20, 325.Google Scholar
Schaffner, K., 1969b, Amer. Sci. 57, 410.Google Scholar
Schaffner, K., 1974a, in Cohen, R. and Seeger, R. J. (ed.), Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, II, Reidel, Dordrecht, p. 207.Google Scholar
Schaffner, K., 1974b, J. Hist. Biol. 7, 111.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schaffner, K., 1974c, Stud. Hist. Phil. Sci. 4, 349.Google Scholar
Shapere, D., 1974, in The Structure of Scientific Theories, (ed. by F. Suppe) University of Illinois Press, Urbana, p. 518.Google Scholar
Sklar, L., 1964, ‘Intertheoretic Reduction in the Natural Sciences’, unpubl. diss., Princeton University.Google Scholar
Wagner, R. P. and Mitchell, H. K., 1955, Genetics and Metabolism, Wiley, New York.Google Scholar
Wagner, R. P. and Mitchell, H. K., 1964, Genetics and Metabolism, 2nd ed., Wiley, New York.Google Scholar
Watson, J. D., 1970, Molecular Biology of the Gene, 2nd. ed., Benjamin, New York.Google Scholar
Wimsatt, W., 1976, this symposium, p. 671.CrossRefGoogle Scholar