The traditional way of thinking about science goes back to the corpuscular philosophy with its micro-reductive mechanism and
metaphor of reading God’s Book of Nature. This “story-1” with its rhetoric of exact truths contrasts with “story-2” which
describes science as a continuation of the always imperfect powers of representation given to us by evolution. On story-2
reduction is one among other knowledge fashioning strategies and shares the imperfections of all human knowledge. When we
appreciate that human knowledge always admits of refinement, what appear as “emergent properties” no long seems mysterious.
Many thanks to the Tilberg Conference on Reduction and the Special Sciences, organized by Mark Colyvan, Stephan Hartmann,
Maurice Schouten, and Katie Steele, for the opportunity to present and further develop this material; and also to Andrew Wayne
for many materially useful comments. Two anonymous referees provided superb comments that prompted a great deal of improvement
in the paper.