Among the many conceits of modern thought is the idea that
philosophy, tainted as it is by subjective evaluation, is a shaky
guide for human affairs. People, it is argued, are better off if
they base their conduct either on know-how with its pragmatic
criterion of truth (i.e., possibility) or on science with its
universal criterion of rational necessity.
Since Helmholtz, there has been increasing concern in the life
sciences about the role of reductionism in the construction of
knowledge. Is psychophysics really possible? Are biological
phenomena just the deducible results of chemical phenomena? And if
life can be reduced to molecular mechanisms only, where do these
miraculous molecules come from, and how do they work? On a
psychological level, people wonder whether psychological phenomena
result simply from genetically hardwired structures in the brain or
whether, even if not genetically determined, they can be identified
with the biochemical processes of that organ. In sociology,
identical questions arise.
If physical or chemical reduction is not practicable, should we
think in terms of other forms of reduction, say, the reduction of
psychological to sociological phenomena or in terms of what Piaget
has called the "reduction of the lower to the higher" (e.g.,
teleology)? All in all, then, reductionism in both naive and
sophisticated forms permeates all of human thought and may, at
least in certain cases, be necessary to it. If so, what exactly are
those cases?
The papers collected in this volume are all derived from the
29th Annual Symposium of the Jean Piaget Society. The intent of the
volume is to examine the issue of reductionism on the theoretical
level in several sciences, including biology, psychology, and
sociology. A complementary intent is to examine it from the point
of view of the practical effects of reductionistic doctrine on
daily life.
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