Physics is the model of what a successful science should be. It provides the basis for the other physical sciences and biology because everything in our world, including ourselves, is made of the same fundamental particles, whose interactions are governed by the same fundamental forces.
It’s no surprise then, as Princeton University’s Philip Anderson has noted, that physics represents the ultimate reductionist subject: Physicists reduce matter first to molecules, then to atoms, then to nuclei and electrons, and so on, the goal being always to reduce complexity to simplicity (see Physics Today, July 1991, page 9). The extraordinary success of that approach is based on the concept of an isolated system. Experiments carried out on systems isolated from external interference are designed to identify the essential causal elements underlying physical reality.
The problem is that no real physical or biological system is truly isolated, physically or historically. Consequently,...
