tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5673382.post2360013382090797203..comments2024-02-24T20:58:00.069-08:00Comments on There is some truth in that: Sider, structure, reduction, and knowledge firstJonathan Jenkins Ichikawahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05260245860017778409noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5673382.post-27644997068484744592012-11-01T15:10:15.352-07:002012-11-01T15:10:15.352-07:00Ok, thanks, that's helpful!Ok, thanks, that's helpful!Richard Y Chappellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16725218276285291235noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5673382.post-63584130873403595572012-11-01T13:44:13.057-07:002012-11-01T13:44:13.057-07:00Thanks, Richard. Two things. First, I don't th...Thanks, Richard. Two things. First, I don't think that Sider's 'reasonably' simple can be a comparative notion; if I understand him rightly, in that section, he's setting out certain candidate meanings as ineligible tout court, not because they compare unfavorably to others.<br /><br />Second, I think that this situation is going to be pretty common anyway. Maybe this is the kind of case you suggest with 'overlap', I'm not sure. Here's a toy example of the way I'm thinking. (If I knew more science, I could give you a more realistic example.) Suppose that 'hydrocarbon' and 'zinc' each have reasonably simple analyses in the absolutely fundamental. Zinc's analysis is P1 & P2 & P3 & (P4 v P5). Suppose also that (P1 & P2 & P3 & P4) is not an interesting chemical property; it is in some sense an approximation of zinc (P5, perhaps, is pretty rare in the relevant circumstances). It would be pretty difficult to articulate this property in chemical, as opposed to physical, terms. Now take two candidate meanings for some theoretical term in biochemistry: (hydrocarbon attached to zinc) and (hydrocarbon attached to P1 & P2 & P3 & P4). The latter's fundamental analysis is simpler, but the former is simpler in chemistry.Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05260245860017778409noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5673382.post-65105147885992715932012-11-01T08:20:18.744-07:002012-11-01T08:20:18.744-07:00"Often, but not always, the simpler definitio..."<i>Often, but not always, the simpler definition is the more fundamental theory will correspond to the simpler definition in the ultimately fundamental theory</i>"<br /><br />Could you say a little more about why this doesn't always hold? Are you thinking, e.g., that there may be cases where definition D1 is more complex than D2 in chemical terms, but its chemical disjuncts involve a lot of physical overlap, so that its physical disjunction is actually a bit shorter than D2's turns out to be? Are there plausible actual cases of this (or some other explanation for the divergence) that you have in mind?<br /><br />I was just thinking that if such divergences are sufficiently rare, then this would seem to be in tension with your previous objection to Sider -- at least if his "reasonably simple" is read to mean something like "<i>comparatively</i> simple". The physical reduction of <i>pig</i> could be incredibly complex but still reasonably simple in comparison to <i>pigs-before-2011-AD-or-cows-afterwards</i>, right?<br /><br />(Though none of this is to deny that the extra layers of structure you propose could be nice for independent reasons.)Richard Y Chappellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16725218276285291235noreply@blogger.com