Since you can say “Why? Elan vital!” to any possible observation, it is equally good at explaining all outcomes, a disguised hypothesis of maximum entropy, etcetera.
But you say earlier ‘Elan vital’ was greatly weakened by a piece of evidence
Heh. A fair point! Every mysterianism, though it may fail to predict details and quantities, is ultimately vulnerable to the one experience in all the world that it does prohibit—the discovery of a non-mysterious explanation.
Every mysterianism, though it may fail to predict details and quantities, is ultimately vulnerable to the one experience in all the world that it does prohibit—the discovery of a non-mysterious explanation.
Is that true? Does the discovery of a non-mysterious explanation serve as negative evidence of a mysterious one? If by “mysterious” we mean “not strongly predicting any outcomes” then when a theory that is strongly predictive is discovered, the available evidence will shift probability from the mysterious explanation to the predictive one. And I do think that’s what you mean by “mysterious”, so that’s a good observation.
However, I’m not sure that this is the case with Elan vital. I’m not sure that Elan vital was weakened by virtue of being nonpredictive and thereby losing some of its credibility to a more predictive explanation. It may also be the case that Elan vital predicted something which was contradicted by the synthesis of urea. If this was the case, then it is inaccurate to say that Elan vital served only as a curiosity-stopper or was a fake explanation. It would, in fact, be a perfectly fine explanation.
So what was the theory of Elan vital, and did it prohibit urea synthesis? The theory was that the matter of living bodies has a property that non-living bodies can’t have. This is clearly a predictive theory. It prohibits any living matter from being identical to non-living matter because if two things are identical then there aren’t any properties that one has that the other doesn’t.
The synthesis of urea showed that at least one type of biological matter could be produced using purely mechanical means. Is this evidence that the synthetic urea and the natural urea are identical? No. One could postulate that there was a non-material difference between them. However, this would make that difference impossible to observe, and thus make the theory nonpredictive.
According to your post:
Wöhler’s later synthesis of urea, a component of urine, was a major blow to the vitalistic theory because it showed that mere chemistry could duplicate a product of biology.
The fact that this synthesis served as negative evidence implies that the proponents of Elan vital believed that the difference between biological matter and non-biological matter would be observable. Therefore, the theory of Elan vital, as portrayed in your post, was predictive. Admittedly, not very predictive, but also not merely a curiosity stopper. Rather, it was a sufficiently vague theory to reflect the lack of evidence that they had at the time.
On the other hand, it’s a self-contradictory theory. If they thought the difference would be observable, they must have also thought that it was physical. Yet they thought that the processes of life could not be explained with physical interactions. Yet they clearly thought that those processes were caused by the physical structure of biological matter. How can something be caused entirely by physical matter but not be explainable by a physical explanation?
In conclusion, there are valid criticisms of Elan vital, as portrayed by your post, but not the ones you leveled against it.
But you say earlier ‘Elan vital’ was greatly weakened by a piece of evidence
Heh. A fair point! Every mysterianism, though it may fail to predict details and quantities, is ultimately vulnerable to the one experience in all the world that it does prohibit—the discovery of a non-mysterious explanation.
Is that true? Does the discovery of a non-mysterious explanation serve as negative evidence of a mysterious one? If by “mysterious” we mean “not strongly predicting any outcomes” then when a theory that is strongly predictive is discovered, the available evidence will shift probability from the mysterious explanation to the predictive one. And I do think that’s what you mean by “mysterious”, so that’s a good observation.
However, I’m not sure that this is the case with Elan vital. I’m not sure that Elan vital was weakened by virtue of being nonpredictive and thereby losing some of its credibility to a more predictive explanation. It may also be the case that Elan vital predicted something which was contradicted by the synthesis of urea. If this was the case, then it is inaccurate to say that Elan vital served only as a curiosity-stopper or was a fake explanation. It would, in fact, be a perfectly fine explanation.
So what was the theory of Elan vital, and did it prohibit urea synthesis? The theory was that the matter of living bodies has a property that non-living bodies can’t have. This is clearly a predictive theory. It prohibits any living matter from being identical to non-living matter because if two things are identical then there aren’t any properties that one has that the other doesn’t.
The synthesis of urea showed that at least one type of biological matter could be produced using purely mechanical means. Is this evidence that the synthetic urea and the natural urea are identical? No. One could postulate that there was a non-material difference between them. However, this would make that difference impossible to observe, and thus make the theory nonpredictive.
According to your post:
The fact that this synthesis served as negative evidence implies that the proponents of Elan vital believed that the difference between biological matter and non-biological matter would be observable. Therefore, the theory of Elan vital, as portrayed in your post, was predictive. Admittedly, not very predictive, but also not merely a curiosity stopper. Rather, it was a sufficiently vague theory to reflect the lack of evidence that they had at the time.
On the other hand, it’s a self-contradictory theory. If they thought the difference would be observable, they must have also thought that it was physical. Yet they thought that the processes of life could not be explained with physical interactions. Yet they clearly thought that those processes were caused by the physical structure of biological matter. How can something be caused entirely by physical matter but not be explainable by a physical explanation?
In conclusion, there are valid criticisms of Elan vital, as portrayed by your post, but not the ones you leveled against it.