Reductionism and the micro–macro mirroring thesis

Eric Hiddleston

pp. 209-226

in: Marc Moffett, Greg Ray (eds), The 37th annual meeting of the society for exact philosophy, Synthese 181 (2), 2011.

Abstract

This paper concerns reductionist views about psychology and the special sciences more generally. I identify a metaphysical assumption in reductionist views which I dub the ‘Micro–Macro Mirroring Thesis’. The Mirroring Thesis says that the relation between the entities of any legitimate higher-level science and their lower-level realizers is similar to that between the entities of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. I argue that reductionism implies the Thesis, and that the Thesis is not a priori. It is more difficult to tell whether the Thesis is true, and I indicate some relevant considerations.