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Single Idea 5799

[filed under theme 7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 2. Reduction ]

Full Idea

Eliminative reductions require a distinction between reality and appearance; for example, the sun appears to set but the reality is that the earth rotates.

Gist of Idea

Eliminative reduction needs a gap between appearance and reality, as in sunsets

Source

John Searle (The Mystery of Consciousness [1997], Concl 2.10)

Book Ref

Searle,John R.: 'The Mystery of Consciousness' [Granta 1997], p.212

A Reaction

A bad analogy. You don't 'eliminate' sunsets. It is just 'Galilean' relativity - you thought it was your train moving, then you discover it was the other one. You don't eliminate hallucinations when you show that they don't correspond to reality.

The 25 ideas with the same theme [explaining higher levels of existence by lower ones]:

3425 Reduction has been defined as deriving one theory from another by logic and maths [Nagel,E, by Kim]
6550 Reduction requires that an object's properties consist of its constituents' properties and relations [Sellars]
5791 Reduction is either by elimination, or by explanation [Searle]
5799 Eliminative reduction needs a gap between appearance and reality, as in sunsets [Searle]
3473 Reduction can be of things, properties, ideas or causes [Searle]
6984 Smooth reductions preserve high-level laws in the lower level [Jackson]
2317 Reductionism is good on light, genes, temperature and transparency [Kim, by PG]
3990 The whole truth supervenes on the physical truth [Lewis]
8607 Supervenience is reduction without existence denials, ontological priorities, or translatability [Lewis]
5516 Reduction can be by identity, or constitution, or elimination [Parfit, by PG]
4986 A weaker kind of reductionism than direct translation is the use of 'bridge laws' [Kirk,R]
6531 Institutions are not reducible as types, but they are as tokens [Lycan]
6532 Types cannot be reduced, but levels of reduction are varied groupings of the same tokens [Lycan]
21110 An understanding of the most basic physics should explain all of the subject's mysteries [Krauss]
7017 The reductionist programme dispenses with levels of reality [Heil]
15050 Reduction might be producing a sentence which gets closer to the logical form [Fine,K]
15051 Reduction might be semantic, where a reduced sentence is understood through its reduction [Fine,K]
15052 Reduction is modal, if the reductions necessarily entail the truth of the target sentence [Fine,K]
15056 The notion of reduction (unlike that of 'ground') implies the unreality of what is reduced [Fine,K]
18539 Our categories lack the neat arrangement needed for reduction [Heil]
7508 Good reductionism connects fields of knowledge, but doesn't replace one with another [Pinker]
14599 Three types of reduction: Theoretical (of terms), Definitional (of concepts), Ontological (of reality) [Schaffer,J]
7944 Reduce by bridge laws (plus property identities?), by elimination, or by reducing talk [Macdonald,C]
22180 Multiple realisability is said to make reduction impossible [Okasha]
16345 That Peano arithmetic is interpretable in ZF set theory is taken by philosophers as a reduction [Halbach]