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Seventeenth-Century Mechanism: An Alternative Framework for Reductionism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Kari L. Theurer
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Abstract

The current antireductionist consensus rests in part on the indefensibility of the deductive-nomological model of explanation, on which classical reductionism depends. I argue that the DN model is inessential to the reductionist program and that mechanism provides a better framework for thinking about reductionism. This runs counter to the contemporary mechanists’ claim that mechanism is an alternative to reductionism. I demonstrate that mechanists are committed to reductionism, as evidenced by the historical roots of the contemporary mechanist program. This view shares certain core commitments with reductionism. It is these shared commitments that constitute the essential elements of the reductionist program.

Type
General Philosophy of Science
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 80 , Issue 5 , December 2013 , pp. 907 - 918
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

Portions of this article were presented at the PSA 2012 biennial meeting in San Diego and at the 2011 meeting of the International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology in Salt Lake City. This research was made possible in part by Myles and Peg Brand and the Indiana University College of Arts and Sciences. For many productive conversations about mechanism, reduction, and the seventeenth century, I thank Colin Allen, Elisabeth Lloyd, Antony Aumann, Irina Meketa, Carlos Zednik, Jason Lopez, Andrew McAninch, Trin Turner, Steven Lawrie, Ashley Inglehart, John Bickle, Tom Polger, Doug Keaton, Daniel Hartner, Seth Jones, Kris Phillips, and Carl Craver.

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