Again, thinking about nature & stuff: how do biology & sociology differ? On the one hand, there seem to be conflicts and divergences between them. Let us take standards of beauty. To some extent, these are given to us biologically. We are hard-wired to find certain features attractive. Those who are attracted to females like human female breasts and are not looking for peacock tails instead. But at the same time, society can work with that and present differing ideals of beauty. Sometimes these even conflict. The American obsession with thin women goes against what seems to be a overall global trend, which is about 20 lbs heavier (or so I remember from an undergrad psych class. If anyone has the actual scientific data on hand to back this up, that would be appreciated, but the whole point of my writing a blog instead of a journal article is that I don't feel like looking that up to have a chat :p .) On top of that, it would seem that sociology could in turn affect biology: sociological constraints give new standards of fitness for evolution.
But at the same time, sociology is biology.1 Even as we can talk about these conflicts in ideals of beauty, these conflicts are differing parts of biology. We are social beings by nature, and the social dimensions of beauty and sexuality are written into our genes.
So there is a sense in which it is all biology which is interacting with itself. Some biological features develop and turn around to influence the features already there; some of which gave rise to the "higher order" features in the first place. This feedback loop creates the domain of sociology, which has its own principles and objects as distinct from bilogoy, even though it is also explained by biology.
This seems to be what is going on with the Neoplatonic principle of emanation. There are higher orders of reality, more "real" levels, that give rise to lower levels of reality.2 The lower levels, though, do really exist in their own way. (Some indian philosophy has similar stuff, but there seems to be less value give to these lower levels, to the point that they are all equally "mâyâ" or play/illusion.)
There is a possible study of societies as such. But at the same time, sociology is an "emanation" of biology (as chemistry is of physics and biology of chemistry). Similarly, the search for a Grand Unifying Theoroy of Physics would be a search of a originary principle, motion, force, or whatnot, from which the other features of the physical universe emanate;3 that is, whatever the originary principle is, it is a dynamic one which interacts with itself. Considered as itself alone, it is one. Considered as interacting with itself, as "stumbling as from a drunken slumber" as Plotinus describes the descent of Being from the One, it is regarded as multiple forces, and ultimately as the innermost essence of every existing thing.
1 Which is not necessarily to say that human nature is reducible to biology - that is a separate question. But it would seem that, insofar as societies can be studied scientifically and as mired in natural causes, it produced by biology. But if you still don't like this, than take physics and chemistry for the illustration instead.
2 One might argue that Neoplatonism would go in the opposite direction, however - from the wholes to the parts. One admittedly cannot simply assume Proclus' entire metaphysical scheme and apply it to modern science. However, if we look at physics as describing the fundamental principles of the world, and so that which unifies it the most, instead of as all the quintillions of atoms rushing around forming everything, there is something to be said for a Neo-Neoplatonism.
3 I have been going through easy examples, in which we merely have concentric circles: physics emanates chemistry, which emanates biology, which emanates sociology. Of course, it could be (and probably is) more complicated. For example, at least restricting ourselves to scientific psychology (which is not in itself a slam against other types), biology would then give rise to psychology, which together with biology would give rise to sociology, or something like that (insofar as there are features of society which are not mediated by direct mental processes).4
4 Now, where would consciousness fit in? We can see how chemical rules follow from physical ones, and can have an inkling of how sociology follows from biology. However, it is hard to see how consciousness would follow from biology or whatnot except insofar as the latter provides a suitable base of neurons (and by "hard to see," I mean that I don't feel like going through the arguments right now, but I have them). In other words, biology provides the material and formal causes for sociology, but only the material causes for consciousness. It might be that the elusiveness of any Grand Unifying Theory is that such theory does not merely provide unify physics, but would also explain other features of the world; in other words, it would always be underdetermined by purely physical data. This is mere speculation, but it does present a possibility, akin to Spinoza's God.
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