Reductionism vs. Holism: What's the Difference?

An attempt or tendency to explain a complex set of facts, entities, phenomena, or structures by another, simpler set

The theory that living matter or reality is made up of organic or unified wholes that are greater than the simple sum of their parts.

An approach to studying complex systems or ideas by reducing them to a set of simpler components.

A holistic investigation or system of treatment.

(philosophy) A philosophical position which holds that a complex system is nothing but the sum of its parts, and that an account of it can be reduced to accounts of individual constituents. In a reductionist framework, the phenomena that can be explained completely in terms of relations between other more fundamental phenomena, are called "epiphenomena".

A theory or belief that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

A theory that all complex systems can be completely understood in terms of their components

A practice based on such a theory or belief.

The analysis of complex things into simpler constituents

The theory that the parts of any whole cannot exist and cannot be understood except in their relation to the whole;