Conservative Reductionism

The aim of this study is to set out a new theory of the relationship between physics and the special sciences within the framework of functionalism. The authors establish their position using two theses: a) All properties that there are in the world, including the physical ones, are functional properties in the sense of being causal properties and b) all true descriptions (laws, theories) that the special sciences propose can in principle be reduced to physical descriptions (laws, theories) by means of functional reduction, despite multiple realization. Against the background of the causal theory of properties, the authors develop Kim's account of functional reduction into a fully fledged conservative theory reduction by means of introducing functional sub-types that are coextensive with physical types. They illustrate this new version of functionalism by going into the philosophy of biology, notably the relationship between classical and molecular genetics. Based on concrete examples from current research, the authors further show how one can build functional sub-types within the conceptual means of a still valid core theory of classical genetics and thereby reduce classical to molecular genetics without losing the scientific quality of the former. In general, they show how, due to selection, the abstract theories of the special sciences possess a scientific quality in seizing natural kinds that cannot be matched by molecular of physical theories, whereby that scientific quality just is being vindicated by their being reducible to molecular or physical theories via functional sub-types. The authors therefore call their position "conservative reductionism," stirring a firm middle course between the Skylla of epiphenomenalism with respect to the properties in which the special sciences trade and the Charbydis of eliminativism as regards the scientific quality of the concepts or classifications of the special sciences.