Full Idea
The intelligibility of a phenomenon consists in the mechanisms being portrayed in terms of a field's bottom out entities and activities.
Gist of Idea
We understand something by presenting its low-level entities and activities
Source
Machamer,P/Darden,L/Craver,C (Thinking About Mechanisms [2000], 7)
Book Reference
-: 'Philosophy of Science' [-], p.21
A Reaction
In other words, we understand complex things by reducing them to things we do understand. It would, though, be illuminating to see a nest of interconnected activities, even if we understood none of them.
Related Idea
Idea 16559 Descriptions of explanatory mechanisms have a bottom level, where going further is irrelevant [Machamer/Darden/Craver]