Two Perspectives on Explanatory Reduction

Abstract

In Chapter 4 I critically discuss the two perspectives on explanatory reduction that have been proposed in the philosophy of biology so far, namely Rosenberg’s thesis that explanatory reduction is a relation between a higher-level and a lower-level explanation of the same phenomenon and Sarkar’s, Hüttemann’s, and Love’s approach to focus on individual reductive explanations. The result of my critical examination will be that Rosenberg’s perspective on explanatory reduction in biology has several shortcomings and that, even though Sarkar’s, Hüttemann’s, and Love’s encounters objections, too, it seems to be the more promising path to run.