- #1
- 3,012
- 42
In Phil Anderson’s often quoted paper “More is Different”, he claims, “The elementary entities of science X obey the laws of science Y.” The first page of his paper outlines what he wants here by providing an abbreviated table indicating a type of scientific ladder which starts at the lowest possible level of elementary particle physics and advancing to the social sciences.
Anderson goes on to say:
He uses the phrase “entirely new laws” to describe each stage, seemingly to indicate that new physical laws are required at each stage, which leads me to the question of this post.
What do you think Anderson means by this phrase?
I can think of a few specific meanings:
1. At one extreme, he could be truly saying that new physical laws are necessary at each level which would indicate that perhaps we don’t yet know what these laws are.
2. At the other extreme, he may be merely referring to the generalities created by people in various fields such as the law of supply and demand which are general concepts that don’t require new physical laws, but only general laws which are created by people and are not natural, physical laws.
3. He could be saying something in between, such that the laws we already understand (ex: supply and demand) are actually physical laws in the sense that they have causal affects over the sub-levels.
4. Or perhaps he means something else.
Note that right after he makes the above statement he also says.
This seems to indicate #2 above, but I don’t want to make that assumption just yet.
So what do you think Anderson means here?
Anderson goes on to say:
But this hierarchy does not imply that science X is “just applied Y.” At each stage entirely new laws, concepts, and generalizations are necessary, requiring inspiration and creativity to just as great a degree as the previous one. Psychology is not applied biology, nor is biology applied chemistry.
He uses the phrase “entirely new laws” to describe each stage, seemingly to indicate that new physical laws are required at each stage, which leads me to the question of this post.
What do you think Anderson means by this phrase?
I can think of a few specific meanings:
1. At one extreme, he could be truly saying that new physical laws are necessary at each level which would indicate that perhaps we don’t yet know what these laws are.
2. At the other extreme, he may be merely referring to the generalities created by people in various fields such as the law of supply and demand which are general concepts that don’t require new physical laws, but only general laws which are created by people and are not natural, physical laws.
3. He could be saying something in between, such that the laws we already understand (ex: supply and demand) are actually physical laws in the sense that they have causal affects over the sub-levels.
4. Or perhaps he means something else.
Note that right after he makes the above statement he also says.
Before beginning this I wish to sort out two possible sources of misunderstanding. First, when I speak of scale change causing fundamental change I do not mean the rather well-understood idea that phenomena at a new scale may obey actually different fundamental laws – …
This seems to indicate #2 above, but I don’t want to make that assumption just yet.
So what do you think Anderson means here?