[1]Principia Cybernetica Web

                               The Newtonian World View

   The world view underlying traditional science may be called "mechanistic" or
   "Newtonian". It is based in reductionism, determinism, materialism, and a
   reflection-correspondence view of knowledge. Although it is simple, coherent and
   intuitive, it ignores or denies human agency, values, creativity and evolution.
     ____________________________________________________________________________

   Until the early 20th century, classical mechanics, as first formulated by Newton
   and further developed by Laplace and others, was seen as the foundation for
   science as a whole. It was expected that the observations made by other sciences
   would sooner or later be reduced to the laws of mechanics. Although that never
   happened, other disciplines, such as biology, psychology or economics, did adopt
   a general mechanistic or Newtonian methodology and world view. This influence was
   so great, that most people with a basic notion of science still implicitly equate
   "scientific thinking" with "Newtonian thinking".

   The reason for this pervasive influence is that the mechanistic paradigm is
   compelling by its simplicity, coherence and apparent completeness. Moreover, it
   was not only very successful in its scientific applications, but largely in
   agreement with intuition and common-sense. Later theories of mechanics, such as
   relativity theory and quantum mechanics, while at least as successful in the
   realm of applications, lacked this simplicity and intuitive appeal, and are still
   plagued by paradoxes, confusions and multiple interpretations.

   The logic behind Newtonian science is easy to formulate, although its
   implications are subtle. Its best known principle, which was formulated by the
   philosopher-scientist Descartes well before Newton, is that of analysis or
   reductionism: to understand any complex phenomenon, you need to take it apart,
   i.e. reduce it to its individual components. If these are still complex, you need
   to take your analysis one step further, and look at their components.

   If you continue this subdivision long enough, you will end up with the smallest
   possible parts, the atoms (in the original meaning of "indivisibles"), or what we
   would now call "elementary particles". Particles can be seen as separate pieces
   of the same hard, permanent substance that is called matter. Newtonian
   [2]ontology therefore is materialistic: it assumes that all phenomena, whether
   physical, biological, mental or social, are ultimately constituted of matter.

   The only property that fundamentally distinguishes particles is their position in
   space (which may include dimensions other than the conventional three).
   Apparently different substances, systems or phenomena are merely different
   arrangements in space of fundamentally equivalent pieces of matter. Any change,
   development or evolution is therefore merely a geometrical rearrangement caused
   by the movement of the components. This movement is governed by deterministic
   laws of cause and effect. If you know the initial positions and velocities of the
   particles constituting a system together with the forces acting on those
   particles (which are themselves determined by the positions of these and other
   particles), then you can in principle predict the further evolution of the system
   with complete certainty and accuracy. The trajectory of the system is not only
   determined towards the future, but towards the past: given its present state, you
   can in principle reverse the evolution to reconstruct any earlier state it has
   gone through.

   The elements of the Newtonian ontology are matter, the absolute space and time in
   which that matter moves, and the forces or natural laws that govern movement. No
   other fundamental categories of being, such as mind, life, organization or
   purpose, are acknowledged. They are at most to be seen as epiphenomena, as
   particular arrangements of particles in space and time.

   Newtonian [3]epistemology is based on the[4] reflection-correspondence view of
   knowledge: our knowledge is merely an (imperfect) reflection of the particular
   arrangements of matter outside of us. The task of science is to make the mapping
   or correspondence between the external, material objects and the internal,
   cognitive elements (concepts or symbols) that represent them as accurate as
   possible. That can be achieved by simple observation, where information about
   external phenomena is collected and registered, thus further completing the
   internal picture that is taking shape. In the limit, this should lead to a
   perfect, objective representation of the world outside us, which would allow us
   to accurately predict all phenomena.

   All these different assumptions can summarized by the principle of [5]distinction
   conservation (Heylighen, 1990): classical science begins by making as precise as
   possible distinctions between the different components, properties and states of
   the system under observation. These distinctions are assumed to be absolute and
   objective, i.e. the same for all observers. The evolution of the system conserves
   all these distinctions, as distinct initial states are necessarily mapped onto
   distinct subsequent states, and vice-versa (this is equivalent to the principle
   of causality (Heylighen, 1989)). In particular, distinct entities (particles)
   remain distinct: there is no way for particles to merge, divide, appear or
   disappear. In other words, in the Newtonian world view there is no place for
   novelty or creation (Prigogine & Stengers, 1984): everything that exists now has
   existed from the beginning of time and will continue to exist, albeit in a
   somewhat different configuration. Knowledge is nothing more than another such
   distinction-conserving mapping from object to subject: scientific discovery is
   not a creative process, it is merely an "uncovering" of distinctions that were
   waiting to be observed.

   In essence, the philosophy of Newtonian science is one of simplicity: the
   complexity of the world is only apparent; to deal with it you need to analyse
   phenomena into their simplest components. Once you have done that, their
   evolution will turn out to be perfectly regular, reversible and predictable,
   while the knowledge you gained will merely be a reflection of that pre-existing
   order.

Rationality and modernity

   Up to this point, Newtonian logic is perfectly consistent--albeit simplistic in
   retrospect. But if we moreover want to include human agency, we come to a basic
   contradiction between our intuitive notion of [6]free will and the principle of
   determinism. The only way Newtonian reasoning can be extended to encompass the
   idea that people can act purposefully is by postulating the independent category
   of mind. This reasoning led Descartes to propose the philosophy of dualism, which
   assumes that while material objects obey mechanical laws, the mind does not.
   However, while we can easily conceive the mind as a passive receptacle
   registering observations in order to develop ever more complete knowledge, we
   cannot explain how the mind can freely act upon those systems without
   contradicting the determinism of natural law. This explains why classical science
   ignores all issues of [7]ethics or [8]values: there simply is no place for
   purposeful action in the Newtonian world view.

   At best, economic science has managed to avoid the problem by postulating the
   principle of rational choice, which assumes that an agent will always choose the
   option that maximises its utility. Utility is supposed to be an objective measure
   of the degree of value, "[9]happiness" or "goodness" produced by a state of
   affairs. Assuming perfect information about the utility of the possible options,
   the actions of mind then become as determined or predictable as the movements of
   matter. This allowed social scientists to describe human agency with most of the
   Newtonian principles intact. Moreover, it led them to a notion of linear
   [10]progress: the continuous increase in global utility (seen mostly as
   quantifiable, material welfare) made possible by increases in scientific
   knowledge. Although such directed change towards the greater good contradicts the
   Newtonian assumption of reversibility, it maintains the basic assumptions of
   [11]determinism, materialism and objective knowledge, thus defining what is often
   called the project of modernity.

   The purpose of the Principia Cybernetica Project can be summarized as the
   development of a [12]world view that is as clear and coherent as the Newtonian
   one, but that is based on the notion of [13]system or whole, creative
   [14]evolution, and intelligent [15]action.
     ____________________________________________________________________________

   [16]Copyright© 2006 Principia Cybernetica - [17]Referencing this page

   Author
   F. [18]Heylighen,

   Date
   Apr 19, 2006

                                       [19]Home
                                       [up.gif]
                       [20]Introduction to Principia Cybernetica
                                       [up.gif]
                             [21]Philosophy, Introduction
                                       [up.gif]
                               [22]What is a world view?

                                          Up
                           [23]Prev. [4arrows.gif] [24]Next
                                         Down
     ____________________________________________________________________________
   ____________________________________________________________________________

                                    [25]Discussion
     ____________________________________________________________________________

                                  [26]Add comment...

                                      [space.gif]

References

   1. LYNXIMGMAP:http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/NEWTONWV.html#PCP-header
   2. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/ONTOLI.html
   3. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/EPISTEMI.html
   4. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/REFCORR.html
   5. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/DISTINCT.html
   6. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/FREEDOM.html
   7. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/ETHICS.html
   8. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/VALUES.html
   9. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HAPPINES.html
  10. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/PROGRESS.html
  11. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/FREEDOM.html
  12. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/WORLVIEW.html
  13. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SYSAPPR.html
  14. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/EVOLUT.html
  15. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/ACTION.html
  16. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/COPYR.html
  17. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/REFERPCP.html
  18. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HEYL.html
  19. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/DEFAULT.html
  20. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/INTRO.html
  21. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/PHILOSI.html
  22. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/WORLVIEW.html
  23. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/WORLVIEW.html
  24. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBSYSTH.html
  25. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/MAKANNOT.html
  26. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/hypercard.acgi$annotform?

[USEMAP]
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/NEWTONWV.html#PCP-header
   1. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/DEFAULT.html
   2. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HOWWEB.html
   3. http://pcp.lanl.gov/NEWTONWV.html
   4. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/NEWTONWV.html
   5. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SERVER.html
   6. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/hypercard.acgi$randomlink?searchstring=.html
   7. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/RECENT.html
   8. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/TOC.html#NEWTONWV
   9. http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SEARCH.html