Date: Fri, 12 Apr 1996 13:40:14 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re: More on Modernism, Reason and Myth



If I wanted to be as snotty as you are here, Rahul, I'd say that these
remarks are  a typical example of a scientists venturing into seas of
philosophy without rudder or sail, and going way beyond his depth. But I
wouldn't say that, because it would be rude. Also uninformed: I do not
know about the depth of your training in philosophy and you don't know
about the depth of mine in science (which pretty good in physics, but
minimal in biology). So, since we are on the terrain of philosophy, I'll
talk to you philosopher to philosopher.

I don't understand the distinction you make bewteen "merely
linguistically useful" and really analytically useful in this context. The
question is whether we are to understand the application of ractional
choice theory and game theory to evolutionary biology, where ir covers the
behavior of organisms without any beliefs or desires and other things
structurally implicated in RCT as an analogy. What else could it be? Smith
and the other game theoretic biologists are saying that it's useful and
explanatory to treat even nonsentient organisms as if or just like
rationally maximizing economic agents. If that isn't an analogy, I don;t
know an analogy when I see it. 

You say, no, all that's going on here is a "form of words"--and what else
is a scientific theory, pay tell, but a form of words (including, of
course, mathematical ones?). The "form of words" here and irs value is
predicated on the evolutioanry behavior of organisms and the strategic
behavior of rational economic actors being analogous in the relevant
respects. Then you say that all that is meant is that biologists can use
teleological language if they are careful. Well, the RCT approach to
biology involvesa  lot more than that. It involves taking over the
analytical structure of RCT and importing it into a biological context.
But even if it involved only permission to use careful teleological
language, it would still be analogical, since of course no one imputes
purposes to bacteria or plants. Finally you say that in any application of
the RCT approach to evolution, a biologist doesn't actually use the RCT
equipment at all. I think this would be a big suprise to Smith, Sawkins,a
nd others, who do use it. 

The RCT biology example is only one example. There are lots of others.
Darwin's borrwoing of Malthus' winnowing mechanism in economic as the
basis of natural selection is another, A different sort is Newtonian
mechanics, based on the picture of the world as a machine
composed of interacting billiard ball particles that, except for gravity,
affect each other by mechanical interaction (bouncing off each other) is a
classic case. Here of course we do not have one science taking over the
analytical structure of another scientific theory, but rather the use in a
science of a model of interaction drawn from a certain conception of
common sense and how macroscopic objects work. Different treatments of
light as particle-like or wave-like is a another of this general ilk, of
course here (as with the Newto\nian mechanics model) with the anlogy
regimented mathematically.

In a context closer to the interests of the Marxism list we have Marx's
notion that the economy is a basis and politics and ideology
superstructures dependent on that base, an anlogy which various people
have triued to make more precise by spelling out the nature oif that
dependence. Or again Marx's idea that the social psychology of a market
society involves "fetishism," a notion explicitly drawn by analogy with
the sociology of religion. 

I could go on, but the point is, Hesse's right: the sciences are imbued
with analogy in a profoundly structural way. This is not to say that
anlogy in the sciences operates the way analogy did in the medieval or
Renaissance era. In particular, it sends to work by way of provinding
theoretiucal structures rather than empirical support for theories. But
thea nalogies are there, irreducible, ineliminable, unavoidable, snd
scientific as you like.

--Justin  

 

On Thu, 11 Apr 1996, Rahul Mahajan wrote:

> 
> This is just wrong, Justin. The proper interpretation of your evolutionary
> example is rather that the structure of the theory allows one to treat
> organisms as rational actors in a limited way. This analogy means nothing
> except to provide a form of words -- biologists can use teleological
> language as long as they're careful about it. The actual analysis of any
> specific example draws nothing from the analogy -- you simply look at what
> will affect the preservation (and sometimes the rate) of various mutations.
> This is a typical example of the confusion that arises when a layman tries
> to analyze science based on its popularization in the colloquial
> vernacular. So far from being "constitutive" of the theory, the analogy in
> this case is not even analytically useful, merely linguistically useful.
> Until philosophers of science start understanding science, they will have
> nothing worthwhile to say about it. Evolution in this regard is even a much
> smaller quagmire than quantum mechanics, which has been misunderstood by
> all the important 20th-century philosophers (at least that I know of). J.S.
> Bell's little work on epistemology is worth far more than all the prolixity
> of Popper, Kuhn, and the rest of the gang.
> 
> Rahul
> 
> 
> 
> 
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