The Temporal Problem of Biological Relativity and Its Relation to Hayek's Views of Civilizational Development

In his book, Dance to the Tune of Life: Biological Relativity (D. Noble 2017), Denis Noble presents the principle of biological relativity “as simply that there is no privileged level of causation in biology; living organisms are multi-level open stochastic systems in which the behaviour at any level depends on higher and lower levels and cannot be fully understood in isolation” (2017, 160). This characterization was preceded by Noble’s paper, “A theory of biological relativity: no privileged level of causation” (2012) and followed by the popular science book, with brother Raymond Noble, Understanding Living Systems (R. Noble and Noble 2023). An additional point made in the paper is that “Each level provides the boundary conditions under which the processes at lower levels operate. Without boundary conditions, biological functions would not exist” (D. Noble 2012, 58).

The evidence for biological relativity is strong, and I have no grounds for criticism—it seems to be right. However, it prompts the question, “If there are levels (the Nobles prefer nesting, or inner/outer levels to higher/lower), don’t the inner levels precede the development of the outer ones in time?” And, if the answer is, “Yes,” don’t we have to wonder if the outer level is actively constructed by the low level and, hence, agreed to by it in a way that we have little or no concept of what “agree” means?

In Hayek we see a similar problem where he argues that civilization creates reason:

Man did not adopt new rules of conduct because he was intelligent. He became intelligent by submitting to new rules of conduct. [italics in original] (Hayek 2021, 522)

Hayek seems to deny that developing new rules of conduct involves trial-and-error learning, which requires in Popper’s terms the creation of a theory and its testing followed by error elimination, demanding intelligence. Elaine Sternberg finds a similar problem when she writes:

Unlike the Ferguson formula of ‘human action but not human design’, the alternate formula—’the unintended coordination of intentional action’—clearly differentiates orders from their elements. It therefore also helps clarify the relation of spontaneous order and reason. (2021)

The creation of civilization requires reason to create a new theory, to enact it, and then to evaluate the results. While Hayek is correct that civilization is not designed in toto, incremental uses of reason, not necessarily with good results, produces civilization.

To conclude, I believe that both in biological causation and in civilizational development there is a bootstrapping process in which the current base must, in some way, produce and/or accept the new constraints that then establish the new base upon which, if successful, the next leg is built. This process may be expressed in terms of Popper’s tetradic schema, P1->TT->EE->P2: problem situation one leads to tentative theories followed by error elimination leading to problem situation two. The implication that a teleological process is at work seems inescapable.

Bibliography

Hayek, Friedrich A. 2021. Law, Legislation, and Liberty: A New Statement of the Liberal Principles of Justice and Political Economy. Edited by Jeremy Shearmur. XIX. The Collected Works of F. A. Hayek, volume XIX. The University of Chicago Press.

Noble, Denis. 2012. “A Theory of Biological Relativity: No Privileged Level of Causation.” Interface Focus 2 (1): 55–64. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsfs.2011.0067.

Noble, Denis. 2017. Dance to the Tune of Life: Biological Relativity. Cambridge University Press.

Noble, Raymond, and Denis Noble. 2023. Understanding Living Systems. Cambridge University Press.

Sternberg, Elaine. 2021. “The Power and Pervasiveness of Spontaneous Order.” Column. Econlib Articles, July 5. https://www.econlib.org/library/columns/y2021/sternbergspontaneousorder.html.