The Devil in the Details: Asymptotic Reasoning in Explanation, Reduction, and Emergence by Robert W. Batterman

Author:Robert W. Batterman [Batterman, Robert W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 0195146476

end p.68

Let M be some upper level, say, mental property. Further, suppose that M, as a matter of fact, has two distinct, heterogeneous physical realizers, P 1and P 2 . (For instance, suppose M is pain and P 1and P 2are pain's realizers in humans and reptiles.) We assume, with Kim, that this means that P 1and P 2are causally heterogeneous and that, therefore, they are distinct as natural kinds. One first construes M (or reconstrues it, if M had not been taken to be a functional property before) as a second-order property defined by its causal/nomic specification D as discussed before. Thus, M is the property of having some property in the base domain with certain causal features. The reduction consists in identifying M with its realizer P irelative to the species or structure under consideration (also relative to the reference world [the world relative to which nomological possibility is to be judged]). Thus M is P 1in species 1, P 2in species 2, and so on. Given that each instance of M has exactly the causal powers of its realizer on that occasion ("the causal inheritance principle"), all the causal/explanatory work done by an instance of M that occurs in virtue of the instantiation of realizer P 1is done by P 1 , and similarly for other instances of M and their realizers . . . . This contrasts with Nagelian reduction via bridge laws in which M only nomologically correlates with P 1in species 1 but remains distinct from it, and similarly for P 2 , and so on. (Kim, 1998, p. 110)

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