The critical reductionist

[W]e may be faced with the possibility that the origin of life (like the origin of the universe) becomes an impenetrable barrier to science, and a residue to all attempts to reduce biology to chemistry and physics. For even though Monod's suggestion of the uniqueness of life's origin is refutable --by attempts at reduction, to be sure-- it would amount, if true, to a denial of any successful reduction. With this suggestion Monod, who is a reductionist for reasons of method, arrives at the position which, I believe, is the one forced upon us all in the light of our earlier discussion of the reduction of chemistry to physics. It is the position of a critical reductionist who continues with attempted reductions even if he despairs of any ultimate success.Yet it is in going forward with attempted reductions, as Monod stresses elsewhere in his book, rather than in any replacement of reductionist methods by 'holistic ones', that our main hope lies --our hope of learning more about old problems, and of discovering new problems which, in turn, may lead to new solutions, to new discoveries.

Karl Poppper, The Open Universe, Scientific reduction and the essential incompleteness of all science.