New Mechanism Explanation, Emergence and Reduction

• Other Authors: Cordovil, João L. (Editor), Santos, Gil (Editor), Vecchi, Davide (Editor)
• Format: Electronic Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer Nature 2024
• Series: History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences
• Subjects: Philosophy: epistemology & theory of knowledge; Philosophy of science; Machine learning; Evo-devo; Structural realism; New mechanism; Mechanistic explanation; Mechanistic models; Organisms need mechanisms; Mechanisms of emergence; Mechanisms in chemistry
• Online Access: DOAB: download the publication; DOAB: description of the publication

Summary

This open access book addresses the epistemological and ontological significance as well as the scope of new mechanism. In particular, this book addresses the issues of what is "new" about new mechanism, the epistemological and ontological reasons underlying the adoption of mechanistic instead of other modelling strategies as well as the possibility of mechanistic explanation to accommodate a non-trivial notion of emergence. Arguably, new mechanism has been particularly successful in making sense of scientific practice in the molecular life sciences. But what about other sciences? This book enlarges the context of analysis, addressing the issue of the putative compatibility between the current ways of conceiving new mechanism and actual scientific practices in quantum physics, chemistry, biochemistry, developmental biology and the cognitive sciences.

Physical Description

1 electronic resource (272 p.)

ISBN

978-3-031-46917-6
9783031469176
9783031469169

Access

Open Access