Thanks Randy, for your input into the hierarchy of science(s) issue. I hope people didn’t find it too distracting from other topics such as Dembski’s theodicy, especially since the issue of hierarchy is common to the membership at ASA that includes several scientific and more-scientific fields. It appears that since Dembski is versed in several disciplines (though ID is still not disciplined), it would probably be helpful if he would discuss hierarchies in science(s) also. When I asked him by e-mail ‘why must ID begin in biology’ he simply (and rather curtly, it seems) replied that biologists (he knows) apparently agree it is relevant there. Well, but then again he is not himself a biologist, so the hearsay of others appears to play a role in his (supposed) hierarchy of science(s) too.
The issue of foundational levels and levels of abstraction is a helpful distinction. Also, Randy wrote that “Any level of meaning depends on an external body of information brought to bear on that system. And a description of one level helps to understand that of another level.” The ID crew wants to begin in biology, but wants also to involve discussions from other disciplines as entirely relevant. It seems to me then that they are having troubles with issues of directionality, and also, as many at ASA have noted, with having too many contradictory voices presenting the message of ID as if it had coherence and inevitable revolutionary implications. But this thread is *not* about ID.
In the area of study and research I am involved with, it is the empirical basis that is said to make the discipline scientific, while the theoretical branch or basis is somehow ‘less rigorous’ or at least not (immediately) amenable to experiment and testing. MacKay’s chalkboard analysis is completely backwards in the sense of starting with a physical description. What is written on the board, even our ability to discuss what atoms (10^24) are, begins with communication, a non-physical thing that sometimes takes physical form, for example, in writing. Nevertheless, the fact that he acknowledges the respective levels of meaning is a step in the right direction against reductionism and claims to universal-contextual knowledge.
Perhaps relevant to this topic also is ‘a map of knowledge’ presented by Arthur Peacocke, both in his “The Palace of Glory: God’s World and Science” (2005) and his “Evolution: The Disguised Friend of Faith?” (2004). He identifies four focal ‘levels’ that can be distinguished: 1. the physical world, 2. living organisms, 3. behaviour of living organisms, and 4. human culture. At first, I objected to this seemingly simplistic diagram, on the basis that none of the ‘sciences’ or ‘disciplines’ (which he lists on one side of the diagram, opposite to the ‘systems’), should be considered ‘superior’ to others. There should rather be appropriate dialogue in places where fields of study overlap, but also attention to and respect for the sovereignty of each scientific (or less-scientific) field. But then just recently I noticed that at the top of his diagram comes the science (or discipline) of linguistics, above economics, arts, technology, theology, religious studies, sociology and
social anthropology, et al., ending with (or starting with) astronomy and finally cosmology. This struck me as a significant recognition by Peacocke that without language, the other disciplines (yes, even physics!) would not/could not coherently function. [Note: ‘mathematics’ is not in Peacocke’s map.]
“Within some of these four levels of interest,” writes Peacocke (2005), “there can be found at least portions of hierarchies of complexity which consist of parts integrated into larger wholes. Moreover, within any particular analytical level of this scheme of disciplines, there are often subdisciplines that form a bridge with an adjacent level by focusing on the same events or domains as does the next higher-level discipline.” Peacocke also makes sure to note that his "[map of knowledge is not intended as a grading according to any value judgments.]”
At the same time, we would likely not be comfortable in saying that ‘science’ itself, as M. Weber noted, is value-free. It is rather based on meaningful-causal unities that are also the foundation of our Christian faith. One example of how the meaning of the sentence, in MacKay’s example, in fact *can* affect the position of the atoms: write the same ‘meaning-sentence’ in another language.
Randy’s closing sentences reminded me of a quotation from an interesting book published in 1999 with Marshall McLuhan’s ‘reflections on religion,’ under the title “The Medium and the Light.’ In it, McLuhan says: “You can’t test anything in science or in any part of the world except on its own terms or you will get the wrong answer.” ([1970]: xvii) Whether or not we’ll ever know, as Randy wonders, “whether additional levels exist or when a set of levels is complete” or how to generally validate the meaning of different levels, is a significant question. I wonder if scholars and scientists at ASA, by addressing the topic of hierarchies of science(s), could help in this endeavo(u)r.
Gregory
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“In the hierarchy of complexity, each level links to the one above: chemistry links to biochemistry, to cell biology, physiology, psychology, to sociology, economics, and politics.” – George Ellis “Physics, Complexity and Causality” (Nature, 2005)
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“While physics asks for causes and origins, evolutionary theorizing assumes that the same effects can be caused by different underlying arrangements…there is no longer a need for the specification of an unambiguous origin. The metaphysical quest for last causes and foundational origins is replaced with a (potentially empirical) focus on emerging order.” – Loet Leydesdorff (“Luhmann, Habermas, and the Theory of Communication” in Systems Research and Behavioral Science 17(3) 273-288: 2000)
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Hierarchy Humo(u)r (in a Newtonian Universe):
There’s a hierarchy in science:
Sociologists all want to become psychologists, because if they can understand the human mind they can understand society. Psychologists all want to become biologists, because if they can understand the brain they can understand the mind. Biologists all want to become chemists, because if they can understand all its chemical reactions they can understand what is going on in the body. Chemists all want to become physicists, because if they can understand the laws that particles follow they can understand the interactions between chemicals. Physicists all want to become God, because if they understand the ways of God they will understand how the universe works.
God wants to become (or rather *is*) a mathematician.
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“[I]f 'morality' comes to be seen as an evolved set of behaviors with no more authoritative impetus behind it than natural explanation, then it seems to me it has ceased dwelling under that label and has become mere 'expediency' towards some collection of naturally driven ends – chief among them: survival.” – Mervin
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"For me one of the fundamental perspectives is that an internally complete description of a system at one level does not in any way deny the validity of another different and non-contradictory description at another level. There can be several internally complete levels of description within the broad umbrella of science. At a yet higher level, the whole hierarchy of scientific descriptions become one type of understanding of reality that can be (at least theoretically) complete, but yet cannot exclude the existence of another equally valid, equally true, and non-conflicting understanding." - Keith
Randy Isaac <randyisaac@adelphia.net> wrote: Greg,
I don't know what philosophers of science say about it but I can comment on how we as practitioners of science think about it, though we don't write about it. It's rather informal and not formally identified, for the most part.
I would say there are various criteria for setting hierarchies in science. One is the degree of abstraction. A foundational level would be a physical description of the system whereas more abstract levels deal with the implications. In my own field of semiconductors, this would for example, mean that a detailed derivation of the density of states of electrons is a foundational level but a more abstract level would deal with the application to conductivity in a transistor. In biology, the foundational level might be the structure of DNA whereas its functionality is a higher level.
A second partitioning is breadth of application. Again from semiconductor science, a specific study of arsenic impurities in silicon is a narrow, but important application, whereas a study that applies to any impurity in any semiconductor is more broadly applicable and at a different functional level.
To use Donald Mackay's example of a sentence written in chalk on a blackboard, the physical description is pretty basic. In principle, you could cite the physical location and type of each atom, though it would be rather tedious to use a fine grid and cite each of the 10^24 atoms. That's a complete description at that level. Another level would be a description of the forces, such as the bonding structure, connecting the atoms. A more abstract level is the form and shape delineated by the chalk atoms. A whole new class of meaning deals with the interpretation of those shapes as a linguistic alphabet, a vocabulary of words, and finally a meaning(s) of the sentence. These levels of meaning depend on the conventions established by a group of people that assign a pre-determined meaning to letters, words, and grammar. Of course, the physical descriptions depended on the conventions and interpretations of physicists and chemists. Any level of meaning depends on an
external body of information brought to bear on that system. And a description of one level helps to understand that of another level. In this case, the meaning of the sentence helps to understand the reason for the specific physical location of the atoms.
The core premise of ID is often explained in these terms. The pattern of the information content in terms of the physical sequence and state of biomolecules in a living cell can be understood by the meaning and function of the system as a whole. The difference of course is in the feedback loop. For the atoms of chalk on the blackboard, there is no feedback mechanism whereby the meaning of the sentence can influence the positions of the atoms. For genetic material, there is a feedback loop whereby the probability of propagation through reproduction is influenced by the precise state of the biomolecular system. The argument is all about whether that feedback system is sufficient to explain the resulting pattern.
And that leads me to the insufficiency of Mackay's hierarchical levels of meaning. As Keith pointed out, his approach is very helpful to show how a 'complete' explanation at one level does not precule or invalidate an explanation at another level. On the other hand, he offers no way of knowing whether additional levels exist or when a set of levels is complete. Neither is there a general way of validating a level of meaning. Each level of explanation must be validated by means of methodologies appropriate to that genre.
Randy
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Received on Fri May 12 13:11:10 2006
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