Cognitive Autonomy and Methodological Individualism by Francesco Di Iorio

Author:Francesco Di Iorio
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Springer International Publishing, Cham

4.8 The Systemic Approach and Nominalism

By methodological individualism, Hayek means the anti-atomistic individualism that relates to the tradition of the Scottish Enlightenment. He criticizes the widespread, but historically inaccurate, tendency to equate methodological individualism with atomism. According to Hayek (1948, p. 6), this tendency is “the silliest of the common misunderstandings” (see also Watkins 1957, p. 112). As Popper (1966b, p. 421) stated, because this tendency is wrong, “there is some similarity” between methodological individualism, understood as a non-atomistic approach, and sociological holism. “But”, he pointed out, “there are very considerable differences also”. The most basic of these is ontological. Methodological holists:argue that, since we owe our reason to “society” … “society” is everything and the individual nothing; or that whatever value the individual possesses is derived from the collective, the real carrier of all values (ibid.)

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