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Discussion: Aims and Achievements of The Reductionist Approach in Biochemistry/Molecular Biology/Cell Biology: A Response to Kincaid

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Joseph D. Robinson
Joseph D. Robinson*
Affiliation:
Department of Pharmacology, SUNY Health Science Center at Syracuse
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Abstract

Kincaid argues that molecular biology provides little support for the reductionist program, that biochemistry does not reveal common mechanisms, indeed that biochemical theory obstructs discovery. These assertions clash with biologists' stated advocacy of reductionist programs and their claims about the consequent unity of experimental biology. This striking disagreement goes beyond differences in meaning granted to the terms. More significant is Kincaid's misunderstanding of what biochemists do, for a closer look at scientific practice— and one of Kincaid's examples—reveals substantial progress toward explaining biological function with biochemical models. With the molecular detail emerge unifying generalizations as well as further aspects of the functional processes.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 59 , Issue 3 , September 1992 , pp. 465 - 470
Copyright
Copyright © 1992 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

I thank an anonymous referee for valuable suggestions on restructuring and reorganizing the arguments.

‡

Send reprint requests to the author, Department of Pharmacology, SUNY Health Science Center at Syracuse, Syracuse, New York 13210, USA.

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