Re: reductionism - there is a big difference between saying that, for some system: "if we know what the little things do, we know what the big things do" (which is trivial)...

...and claiming that the low-level forces between the smallest particles are the only things that do or can have any causal power in determining how a system evolves from moment to moment

The latter is a metaphysical claim, not a scientific one. And it fails to answer the question of why the particles are organised the way they are...

...which, in many cases (especially in living organisms) is because that organisation is functional at a macroscopic level and has been selected for

Nothing about particle physics can account for, predict, or explain why living organisms are organised the way they are. Nor can the equations governing such particles predict how such systems will behave

Especially because they only predict how particles themselves will behave in a statistical, probabilistic fashion, not deterministically

This leaves lots of room for higher-order, organisational causes to come into play, which they demonstrably do

Discussed more here: Escaping Flatland - when determinism falls, it takes reductionism with it www.wiringthebrain.com/2020/07/escaping-flatland-when-determinism.html?spref=tw