Sunday, October 24, 2010

Philosophy TV - John Dupré and Alex Rosenberg: On Physicalist Anti-reductionism

More good philosophy discussion from Philosophy TV. Follow the link below to watch the video at their site, or scroll down for the download link.

John Dupré and Alex Rosenberg

John Dupré (left) and Alex Rosenberg (right) on physicalist anti-reductionism.

According to physicalism, there is no non-physical stuff. According to reductionism, all facts can be captured by some purely physical description of the world. Nowadays, physicalist anti-reductionism is orthodox among philosophers. In this debate, Dupré defends that orthodoxy, while Rosenberg defends a considerably less popular view: physicalist reductionism.

Related works

by Dupré:
Is Biology Reducible to the Laws of Physics?” (2007)
The Disorder of Things: Metaphysical Foundations of the Disunity of Science (1995)

by Rosenberg:
Darwinian Reductionism (2006)
Defending Information-Free Genocentrism” (2005)

More video:
Alex Rosenberg and David Levine (BhTV)


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