Event Title
Reductionism and feminist values
Start Date
27-6-2010 9:00 AM
End Date
27-6-2010 10:30 AM
Description
This presentation is part of the Reductionism, Determinism and Feminist Values track.
Over the past few decades, the topic of reductionism has fueled a wide array of controversies ranging from the philosophy of science to general discussions in popular science and intellectual culture. If there is one general observation that applies to almost all of these issues, it would surely be that the word reductionism is seldom, if ever, used in a purely descriptive manner; most of the times, its uttering is accompanied by some kind of pejorative connotation, or, as Jaegwon Kim puts it: „If you want to be politically correct in philosophical matters, you would not dare come anywhere near reductionism, nor a reductionist.” (Kim 2000, p. 89)
One of the most prominent protagonists of feminist philosophy of science to openly endorse a clearly anti-reductionist stance is Helen Longino. In her book „Science as Social Knowledge“ (Longino 1990), she diagnoses scientific “contests between a simplifying reductionist approach and a more complex and interactive one“ (Longino 1990, p. 229) and supports Richard Lewontin's „unargued, bedrock commitment to a nonreductionist, dialectical view of nature.“ (Longino 1990, p. 196) In one of her recent writings, she makes explicit her reasons for opposing reductionism and by doing so also provides a characterization of reductionist research strategies that will be of utmost importance for my dealing with this subject matter: „Resistance to concealment of dominance is the feminist basis of resistance to reductionism.“ (Longino 2008, p. 78)
These comments paint a picture of the two main characteristics ascribed to reductionism by Longino. The first is an exaggerated simplification of diverse interactions that had better be understood in their whole complexity. The second is a hierarchical structuring of theories and their corresponding ontological levels, which is viewed by Longino as a scientific mirror of sociopolitical preferences for centralized control and dominance.
It is my aim to show that Longino's viewing these characteristics as inherent to reductionism is due to a very narrow conception of this topic; the ties between reductionism and anti-egalitarian views on society are not as close as one might suspect at first glance.
The first step to establish my claims will be to show how Longino's conception of reductionism is derived from the aforementioned account of Richard Lewontin's, and how, on this account, it is hard to see any conceptual difference between reductionism and theses of biological or genetic determinism with all their alluding to, for example, sociobiology or its more recent counterpart, evolutionary psychology.
On the positive side, I will discuss from a feminist point of view some of the themes that keep busying the commentators on the reductionism debates, in order to show that one can very well endorse feminist approaches to the philosophy of science, like Helen Longino's contextual empiricism, and yet be open-minded towards several aspects of a properly construed reductionist position.
In particular, my approach will consist of dealing with the values that Longino proposes as alternatives to the classical „Kuhnian Values.“ (cf. Kuhn 1977, Longino 1995, 1996) In doing this, I will review some theoretical aspects of the reductionism debate as well as some examples from scientific practice and their possible interpretations in the light of my extended conception of reductionism.
On the theoretical side, I will propose that the argument of multiple realizability - and one of the most prominent responses to it, the „splitting of domains“ (cf. Bickle 1998) - shows how reductions in the sciences can conform to Longino's ideal of ontological heterogeneity. Knowing that this begs the question of the dominance of a particular ontological level, I will present a theoretical model first proposed by Kenneth Schaffner, (Schaffner 1967) which supplants the notion of a one-to-one-correspondence between theories and ontological levels by considering multilevel theories, especially in the life sciences. This conception of reduction, I will argue, renders possible a reconciliation of reductionist methodology with Longino's theoretical virtue of mutuality of interactions.
A further approach concerning this value will consider the concept of co-evolution of theories and the question of whether a theory that is being reduced by another one can have a substantial amount of epistemic authority during the process of reduction. As I will suggest, it is not only the anti-reductionist who can endorse such influences coming from the „higher level“.
Subsequent to this theoretical discussion, I will consider an example from physics, where the process of reduction of one theory to another leads to astonishing results. In Robert Batterman's book „The Devil in the Details“ (Batterman 2002), one can find a detailed account of the problems that arise when theoretical physicists try to reduce classical geometrical optics to the wave theory of light. Due to the mathematical incommensurabilities arising in this situation one would be hard put to call this case a paradigmatic example of theory reduction. However, this does not mean that the anti-reductionist eventually wins the day. Instead, the mathematical difficulties give rise to a new kind of problem-solving capacities in the „no man’s land“ (Batterman 2002, p. 97) between the two theories involved in the reduction. This case will serve as a genuine instance of novelty, as found in Helen Longino's advocating „novelty [...] of frameworks of understanding.“ (Longino 2008, p. 70)
To summarize, it is my aim to achieve at least a partial reconciliation of reductionist themes with feminist philosophy of science. On the one hand, this serves the reductionist by making his position seem less blinkered, or even dangerous. On the other hand, my approach intends to benefit feminist philosophy of science by showing that it is possible to include a further position in the plurality of approaches to science without being hindered by worries that stem from an unnecessarily narrow interpretation of a mere word.
Reductionism and feminist values
This presentation is part of the Reductionism, Determinism and Feminist Values track.
Over the past few decades, the topic of reductionism has fueled a wide array of controversies ranging from the philosophy of science to general discussions in popular science and intellectual culture. If there is one general observation that applies to almost all of these issues, it would surely be that the word reductionism is seldom, if ever, used in a purely descriptive manner; most of the times, its uttering is accompanied by some kind of pejorative connotation, or, as Jaegwon Kim puts it: „If you want to be politically correct in philosophical matters, you would not dare come anywhere near reductionism, nor a reductionist.” (Kim 2000, p. 89)
One of the most prominent protagonists of feminist philosophy of science to openly endorse a clearly anti-reductionist stance is Helen Longino. In her book „Science as Social Knowledge“ (Longino 1990), she diagnoses scientific “contests between a simplifying reductionist approach and a more complex and interactive one“ (Longino 1990, p. 229) and supports Richard Lewontin's „unargued, bedrock commitment to a nonreductionist, dialectical view of nature.“ (Longino 1990, p. 196) In one of her recent writings, she makes explicit her reasons for opposing reductionism and by doing so also provides a characterization of reductionist research strategies that will be of utmost importance for my dealing with this subject matter: „Resistance to concealment of dominance is the feminist basis of resistance to reductionism.“ (Longino 2008, p. 78)
These comments paint a picture of the two main characteristics ascribed to reductionism by Longino. The first is an exaggerated simplification of diverse interactions that had better be understood in their whole complexity. The second is a hierarchical structuring of theories and their corresponding ontological levels, which is viewed by Longino as a scientific mirror of sociopolitical preferences for centralized control and dominance.
It is my aim to show that Longino's viewing these characteristics as inherent to reductionism is due to a very narrow conception of this topic; the ties between reductionism and anti-egalitarian views on society are not as close as one might suspect at first glance.
The first step to establish my claims will be to show how Longino's conception of reductionism is derived from the aforementioned account of Richard Lewontin's, and how, on this account, it is hard to see any conceptual difference between reductionism and theses of biological or genetic determinism with all their alluding to, for example, sociobiology or its more recent counterpart, evolutionary psychology.
On the positive side, I will discuss from a feminist point of view some of the themes that keep busying the commentators on the reductionism debates, in order to show that one can very well endorse feminist approaches to the philosophy of science, like Helen Longino's contextual empiricism, and yet be open-minded towards several aspects of a properly construed reductionist position.
In particular, my approach will consist of dealing with the values that Longino proposes as alternatives to the classical „Kuhnian Values.“ (cf. Kuhn 1977, Longino 1995, 1996) In doing this, I will review some theoretical aspects of the reductionism debate as well as some examples from scientific practice and their possible interpretations in the light of my extended conception of reductionism.
On the theoretical side, I will propose that the argument of multiple realizability - and one of the most prominent responses to it, the „splitting of domains“ (cf. Bickle 1998) - shows how reductions in the sciences can conform to Longino's ideal of ontological heterogeneity. Knowing that this begs the question of the dominance of a particular ontological level, I will present a theoretical model first proposed by Kenneth Schaffner, (Schaffner 1967) which supplants the notion of a one-to-one-correspondence between theories and ontological levels by considering multilevel theories, especially in the life sciences. This conception of reduction, I will argue, renders possible a reconciliation of reductionist methodology with Longino's theoretical virtue of mutuality of interactions.
A further approach concerning this value will consider the concept of co-evolution of theories and the question of whether a theory that is being reduced by another one can have a substantial amount of epistemic authority during the process of reduction. As I will suggest, it is not only the anti-reductionist who can endorse such influences coming from the „higher level“.
Subsequent to this theoretical discussion, I will consider an example from physics, where the process of reduction of one theory to another leads to astonishing results. In Robert Batterman's book „The Devil in the Details“ (Batterman 2002), one can find a detailed account of the problems that arise when theoretical physicists try to reduce classical geometrical optics to the wave theory of light. Due to the mathematical incommensurabilities arising in this situation one would be hard put to call this case a paradigmatic example of theory reduction. However, this does not mean that the anti-reductionist eventually wins the day. Instead, the mathematical difficulties give rise to a new kind of problem-solving capacities in the „no man’s land“ (Batterman 2002, p. 97) between the two theories involved in the reduction. This case will serve as a genuine instance of novelty, as found in Helen Longino's advocating „novelty [...] of frameworks of understanding.“ (Longino 2008, p. 70)
To summarize, it is my aim to achieve at least a partial reconciliation of reductionist themes with feminist philosophy of science. On the one hand, this serves the reductionist by making his position seem less blinkered, or even dangerous. On the other hand, my approach intends to benefit feminist philosophy of science by showing that it is possible to include a further position in the plurality of approaches to science without being hindered by worries that stem from an unnecessarily narrow interpretation of a mere word.