Is Physics the New Metaphysics? The Hope for Integration.
The modern question
Beginning with Aristotle, metaphysics was classically considered the first philosophy or the first science. Aristotle himself never used the word “metaphysics” but the field of study he called “first philosophy” and which concerned the study of “being qua being” (i.e. being insofar as it is being) was later known as metaphysics. Aristotle lived in a time and place, rare in world history, where disciplined and meticulous observation was wedded with abstract philosophizing about meaning. He believed that each particular science studied being insofar as it was some particular kind of being. Biology studied living beings, physics studied natural/changeable bodies, ethics studied human action, etc. But metaphysics studied that which belongs to any being insofar it is, regardless of what it is – being qua being.
Today, I doubt that many people look to metaphysics for an ultimate explanation of reality. If anything, we implicitly or explicitly look to physics. Among the natural sciences, physics singularly seeks universal explanations that pertain to every particle and force in the cosmos. We know, for example, of the four fundamental interactions (forces) that mediate all energy: gravitational interaction, electromagnetic interaction, weak nuclear interaction, and strong nuclear interaction. It also appears that matter itself (i.e. anything with mass) is a particular manifestation of energy, and matter can emerge from and return to energy (even spontaneously out of thin air: see Quantum Fluctuation). Meanwhile, the electromagnetic properties of atoms allow them to bond with other atoms in particular ways, giving rise to chemistry. The various chemically-bonded molecules give rise to biology, which gives rise to neuroscience and psychology, which gives rise to sociology, and so on. In other words, physics may provide the foundational explanation of all things, the explication of everything insofar as it exists. Physics may be the study of being insofar as it is being and the new metaphysics.
Emergent properties do not emerge
The world built from the ground up in this way sounds appealing. But from the vantage point of consciousness, the world appears remarkably different from such a world of atoms and forces – the atomic world – governed by the four fundamental interactions, quantum mechanics, relativity, etc. The consciousness-constructed world is governed by people, one’s particular relationships, history, poetry, wonder, etc. To speak of the “vantage point of consciousness” and the “consciousness-constructed world” is actually somewhat pretentious, not because there is anything false about it, but because there is nothing true beyond it. What other vantage point is there? It is like saying, “My brains think X,” as though there were some other part of me that thinks differently. The atomic world is not a primitive world but an abstraction of the consciousness-constructed world, gained through observations about our observations. It is not even the only all-encompassing abstraction out there. History too is such an abstraction and it explains everything, even physics. Evolutionary psychology explains not merely physics but every intellectual discipline whatsoever that is contingent upon a human brain.
We sometimes act as though everything is basically figured out already, that some genius out there could, in theory, establish all the causal links between my subatomic particles and my choosing to sip my coffee right now. Meanwhile, any remotely disciplined and honest scientist, from any of the intervening disciplines between my subatomic particles and my coffee-drinking behavior, would have to laugh at such a notion. We possess only the tiniest fragments of understanding about how the universe works, and in the 20th century alone whatever we did understand was upended multiple times over. To imply that we hold a clear and distinct understanding of subatomic particles in our minds, like lego pieces, and that we are therefore tickled by the many ways we can arrange these particles and watch their “emergent properties” is quite simply a pretense. The truth is much more plebeian. The “emergent properties” do not emerge at all; they were already there. If we must be brutally honest, they were our starting point. We started with the “emergent properties” and began to theorize about what their underlying mechanisms might be. And then, once we became bold in our theories, we pretended that the emergent properties just emerged, in some marvelous and mathematical fashion, from these underlying mechanisms that we theorized.
Meanwhile, for every real human being, reality is still that stubborn and simplistic, consciousness-constructed world, as it always has been since the dawn of the human race. And everything else we postulate is essentially an observation about it. On a given morning, I might observe how water molecules appear to split into $H$ and $O_2$ through a simple electrolysis setup. But on the same evening, I might observe how people seem much more joyful after letting the Lord embrace them in the places of their deepest shame. Why should I discriminate between these two phenomena of the experienced world? I should rather seek to accept and integrate them.
The modern solution
Therefore, we do not need a return to Aristotle. But we do need a rediscovery of integration, of mutual recognition and appreciation among all the fields that explain the world and our existence. Such an integration would not require the subjugation of any party. But it would require the humility of acknowledging that one’s own discipline, left to itself, fails to explain even all the aspects of one’s own life. Even the biologist may need a marriage counselor. Even the mathematician should be taught about forgiveness. And even the priest must come to terms with evolution.