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Mayr made perhaps the most concerted attempt by any biologist to draw clear disciplinary boundaries around his subject, smartly isolating it from other fields of science. In doing so, he supplies one of the clearest demonstrations of the folly of that endeavor.
He identifies four fundamental features of physics that distinguish it from biology. It is essentialist (dividing the world into sharply delineated and unchanging categories, such as electrons and protons); it is deterministic (this always necessarily leads to that); it is reductionist (you understand a system by reducing it to its components); and it posits universal natural laws, which in biology are undermined by chance, randomness, and historical contingency. Any physicists will tell you that this characterization of physics is thoroughly flawed, as a passing familiarity with quantum theory, chaos, and complexity would reveal.
full: http://nautil.us/issue/35/boundaries/why-physics-is-not-a-discipline _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
