If something has more than, say, 5 parameters, it should be divided into components that have less.
Less is more. Hierarchies, if sensibly applied, can manage complexity.
Think LEGO.
5 isn't a magic number, just a guide. Actually, even having 2 unnamed parameters for a function can be confusing when you can't remember which one comes first. When you have named parameters, you can have more of them - but at some point, it just explodes. I mean, ActiveRecord's has_many currently has 23 possible options, and some of them take hashes themselves! I think everything that is software can be broken into parts, yes. But I don't think that's always the way you should go. Some things are just too complex or too strange to be modelled beautifully into a simple set of parameters. There's another side to this: APIs can't take away the burden of coding, and often, it's easier and better to code it yourself than to fiddle with a hundred APIs. Maybe libraries shouldn't provide APIs. They should provide tools. The UNIX philosophy is another example. You just can't model everything, because a model is not the real thing. Original things require original hacks.