Pattee H H
Am J Physiol. 1979 May;236(5):R241-6. doi: 10.1152/ajpregu.1979.236.5.R241.
The classical structure-function relation is presented as an example of an epistemological complementarity. Complementarity implies that a satisfactory explanation requires two modes of description, neither derivable from nor reducible to the other, as well as mutual incompatibility in a formal logical sense. Complementarity arose from the difficulty in describing conditional measurement processes in the language of causal microscopic laws of physics. Biological structure is associated with description in the language of physical laws, whereas biological function is associated with description of informational processes, i.e., measurement and control, that are complementary in the above sense. An explicit incompatibility between these two modes of description is that laws are expressed as rate-dependent equations, whereas informational processes are expressed as rate-independent nonintegrable constraints. The functional mode allows a simplification of structurally complex organization that is essential, not only for explanation, but for self-description at all levels of biological organization.
经典的结构 - 功能关系被作为认识论互补性的一个例子呈现出来。互补性意味着一个令人满意的解释需要两种描述模式，它们既不能从彼此推导出来，也不能相互归约，并且在形式逻辑意义上相互不兼容。互补性源于用因果微观物理定律的语言来描述条件测量过程存在困难。生物结构与用物理定律的语言进行描述相关联，而生物功能与信息过程的描述相关联，即上述意义上互补的测量和控制。这两种描述模式之间一个明显的不兼容性在于，定律以速率相关方程来表达，而信息过程以速率无关的不可积约束来表达。功能模式允许对结构复杂的组织进行简化，这不仅对解释至关重要，而且对生物组织各个层面的自我描述也至关重要。
