To understand the necessity assigned to laws of nature, we must realize that, while these laws may be necessarily true in the abstract, they are not so in the individual. That is because as generalizations, they abstract away other influences upon the behavior of individual. Given that all other influences are NOT present, then YES, the sort of thing pointed out in the law may necessarily behave in the manner described by the law. But with the application of the alw to an individual case, all that was abstracted away comes back into play, and with that concretion the necessity found in the abstract law dissipates like fog in the sunlight.
Take for example the speed of light. The claim that it travels 186K miles/second is true-- in a vacuum. It travels more slowly through our own atmosphere and especially underwater. That it travels more slowly under these conditions is not a violation of the law, for the law was an abstraction.
Even if reductive materialism is true, it is still the case that no specific law determines how any molecule behaves at any moment. That is because every law abstracts away other factors which immediately come into play as soon as we consider molecular behavior in concrete situations.
A reductive materialist believes that concrete events are determined, necessitated by law inasmuch as the event is the result of the confluence of all of the applicable laws. But perhaps all of the laws that were understood abstractly as having necessity are translated into more flexible laws when applied to the concrete situation. Perhaps, light TRIES to go at 186K/sec but is somewhat slowed down by something else that's TRYING to do something else. Perhaps nature in concreto is teleological.
If reductive materialism is false, then this or that molecule's behavior will be determined by more than the laws governing non-living things. But this influence on THIS molecule in a living thing will not longer violate any law of inanimate motion any more than a hand that picks up a pencil to write with it violates the law of inertia.
To appeal to the lawfulness of physics to argue against the possibility of influences other than those findable in a physical textbook is to commit a category mistake.
Take for example the speed of light. The claim that it travels 186K miles/second is true-- in a vacuum. It travels more slowly through our own atmosphere and especially underwater. That it travels more slowly under these conditions is not a violation of the law, for the law was an abstraction.
Even if reductive materialism is true, it is still the case that no specific law determines how any molecule behaves at any moment. That is because every law abstracts away other factors which immediately come into play as soon as we consider molecular behavior in concrete situations.
A reductive materialist believes that concrete events are determined, necessitated by law inasmuch as the event is the result of the confluence of all of the applicable laws. But perhaps all of the laws that were understood abstractly as having necessity are translated into more flexible laws when applied to the concrete situation. Perhaps, light TRIES to go at 186K/sec but is somewhat slowed down by something else that's TRYING to do something else. Perhaps nature in concreto is teleological.
If reductive materialism is false, then this or that molecule's behavior will be determined by more than the laws governing non-living things. But this influence on THIS molecule in a living thing will not longer violate any law of inanimate motion any more than a hand that picks up a pencil to write with it violates the law of inertia.
To appeal to the lawfulness of physics to argue against the possibility of influences other than those findable in a physical textbook is to commit a category mistake.
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