Concerning the fallacy of scientism
Scientism is the idea that there is only one knowledge-justification method, i.e. the scientific one. Every question would be decidable by experimentally testing possible answers. In other words, the scientific domain would be all-encompassing and complete.
This view is in staunch denial of the fact that there is more than one knowledge-justification method. For example, mathematics uses the axiomatic method and does not use experimental testing at all.
Unlike science, mathematics is capable of self-inquiry. This has led to the Gödel's famous incompleteness theorems. Mathematics is simply not complete. There exist mathematical questions that mathematics cannot possibly answer.
Science, on the other hand, cannot even investigate if science would be complete. There are no equivalent scientific incompleteness theorems in science about the scientific method. That alone makes science very, very incomplete.
Stephen Hawking still tried to shoehorn the scientific method into Gödel's incompleteness theorems, but in my opinion, his approach lacks rigour:
What is the relation between Godel’s theorem and whether we can formulate the theory of the universe in terms of a finite number of principles? One connection is obvious. According to the positivist philosophy of science, a physical theory is a mathematical model. So if there are mathematical results that can not be proved, there are physical problems that can not be predicted.
Where is the falsificationism of the scientific method in all of that? Can his view actually be experimentally tested anyhow?
Therefore, I maintain my stand that science is super-incomplete because it cannot even properly investigate its own incompleteness.
This view is in staunch denial of the fact that there is more than one knowledge-justification method. For example, mathematics uses the axiomatic method and does not use experimental testing at all.
Unlike science, mathematics is capable of self-inquiry. This has led to the Gödel's famous incompleteness theorems. Mathematics is simply not complete. There exist mathematical questions that mathematics cannot possibly answer.
Science, on the other hand, cannot even investigate if science would be complete. There are no equivalent scientific incompleteness theorems in science about the scientific method. That alone makes science very, very incomplete.
Stephen Hawking still tried to shoehorn the scientific method into Gödel's incompleteness theorems, but in my opinion, his approach lacks rigour:
What is the relation between Godel’s theorem and whether we can formulate the theory of the universe in terms of a finite number of principles? One connection is obvious. According to the positivist philosophy of science, a physical theory is a mathematical model. So if there are mathematical results that can not be proved, there are physical problems that can not be predicted.
Where is the falsificationism of the scientific method in all of that? Can his view actually be experimentally tested anyhow?
Therefore, I maintain my stand that science is super-incomplete because it cannot even properly investigate its own incompleteness.
Comments (103)
What this is blind to, in my opinion, is that the objective sciences can never even in principle determine what a human is, or what any being is, because they are beings, and not simply objects. At best, the equations of physics describe objects and the relations of objects, but do they have anything to say about the nature of being qua being, which is the subject of philosophy proper?
[quote=Thomas Nagel][i]The scientific revolution of the 17th century, which has given rise to such extraordinary progress in the understanding of nature, depended on a crucial limiting step at the start: It depended on subtracting from the physical world as an object of study everything mental – consciousness, meaning, intention or purpose. The physical sciences as they have developed since then describe, with the aid of mathematics, the elements of which the material universe is composed, and the laws governing their behavior in space and time.
We ourselves, as physical organisms, are part of that universe, composed of the same basic elements as everything else, and recent advances in molecular biology have greatly increased our understanding of the physical and chemical basis of life. Since our mental lives evidently depend on our existence as physical organisms, especially on the functioning of our central nervous systems, it seems natural to think that the physical sciences can in principle provide the basis for an explanation of the mental aspects of reality as well — that physics can aspire finally to be a theory of everything.
However, I believe this possibility is ruled out by the conditions that have defined the physical sciences from the beginning. The physical sciences can describe organisms like ourselves as parts of the objective spatio-temporal order – our structure and behavior in space and time – but they cannot describe the subjective experiences of such organisms or how the world appears to their different particular points of view. There can be a purely physical description of the neurophysiological processes that give rise to an experience, and also of the physical behavior that is typically associated with it, but such a description, however complete, will leave out the subjective essence of the experience – how it is from the point of view of its subject — without which it would not be a conscious experience at all.
So the physical sciences, in spite of their extraordinary success in their own domain, necessarily leave an important aspect of nature unexplained.[/i] [sup] 1 [/sup][/quote]
And will forever do so, whilst ever they remain physical.
If you follow current theories in dark matter and energy and quantum field theory, however, you will find that there are lots of credible cross-domain thinkers. And that many modern physicists are seeking to broaden science to include the concept of mind.
Obviously, thousands of years studies in the humanities have immense value. So if the adherents of a narrowly construed science are dismissive, what of it? I study everything with equal curiosity, interest, and effort.
I'm not sure if that's completely accurate. In 2015, there was an article, Quantum physics problem proved unsolvable: Godel and Turing enter quantum physics, which claims that physicists have found a problem that can't be solved. An excerpt from the article:
That's not as broad as Godel's Theorem in mathematics; but it does imply that physics is capable of recognizing the existence of problems that it can't solve.
On the connotation of treating science like a religion, this is neither necessary nor sufficient: "There is only one knowledge-justification method, i.e. the scientific one. Every question would be decidable by experimentally testing possible answers. In other words, the scientific domain would be all-encompassing and complete."
There are definitely people who treat science as a religion. I'm not sure if there's actually anyone with the view you describe in quotation marks above. If there is, they probably either (a) believe that mathematics actually is characterized by experimental testing in some sense, or (b) stress that mathematical utterances are not actually true or false, so that they're not knowledge in the jtb sense.
(b) can be the case on a constructivist view--a view that sees mathematics as simply a language that we've constructed to talk about how we think about relations on an abstract level.
Beings are "simply" objects. ("Simply" is in quotation marks because objects are not really that "simple.")
A couple of common things I could put under the banner of scientism would be:
treats the results of scientific research as proofs and treats scientific models as proven. More of less in the mathematical sense, that is, not every potentially revisable. (I think you said this in other words)
2) Considers current science complete. Very rarely will someone assert this, unless it is to couch it as, well, there are details to work out but no more fundamental surprises. However it seems implicit in how they react to beliefs held outside the scientific community and also within the scientific community that have not gained consensus. If it isn't consensus scientific belief, it is wrong.
3) There seems to often be a conflation of insufficient evidence with no evidence.
4) They often think it is easy to rule things out by reference to current models. Of course science uses similar types of deduction, and this is one of the ways they sift through potential research, but it isn't particularly scientific to rule things out in this way. It certainly isn't empirical research, for example.
I don't agree with Pigliucci in that essay. What he calls the "expansive" definition is the one on track, I'd say. That doesn't make the term meaningless. We don't always employ reasoning about empirical matters in a way where we'll make changes based on recalcitrant evidence, etc. The important thing to stress is rather that scientists aren't really doing something significantly different than what plumbers do, what we do when we learn how to cross the street, etc.
They are doing something significantly different than what preachers do (or at least, they should be doing something different than that).
But perhaps it is the example that's in the way. Let me try this question out -- is there any practiced field, like plumbing but something else, where you would say the person is both employing empirical methods and is not doing science?
Some examples that come to mind for me: A machine operator. A lighting technician. A cook.
If those don't seem to "ring true" for you, are there any that do?
This by way of getting to the heart of the question of how you and I understand science and what you and I understand science to be.
I can't think of something where I'd say that offhand.
The examples where people aren't doing science are things like when someone simply intuits that they're the reincarnation of Napoleon, or that aliens are monitoring their thoughts, or that Gods exist, etc.
I agree with the examples, but I suspect our disagreement is the reasoning behind them.
The examples you provide aren't the sorts of things that scientists research. So if science is what scientists do then clearly personal intuitions, delusions, or theological claims aren't the stuff of science. Though in some far-fetched sense I suppose they could be, if scientists began research programs around such stuff.
I take a pretty hard historicist stance on science. I believe that such an approach allows us to, through familiarity with the history, begin to gain an understanding of what science is without boiling it down to a programatic methodology or set of allowed inferences based on rules. It allows us to discover what this thing called science consists of while leaving breathing room for the creative aspect which goes into scientific work.
The counter-part to that, however, is that machine operators, lighting technicians, and cooks are not scientists, and therefore they are not doing science. Same goes for plumbers.
But then I don't think that science can be characterized along methodological lines. Even broad ones will come across exceptions simply because science isn't static, it grows and changes with the people that do it. I suspect that those who wish to demarcate science wish to do so along either methodological lines, or possibly other ways too -- like natural vs. supernatural or something like that; something which is metaphysical.
But to pronounce methodologies as science leads one to absurdities, on the whole -- unless construed along historicist lines which observe tendencies while keeping room open for new methodologies. And to put up metaphysical barriers on science seems to poison the well from the get-go. Either science answers questions about metaphysical things or it does not -- we can't go about prescribing to scientists what it is they should discover. And if it doesn't answer metaphysical questions at all then there is no reason for a metaphysical demarcation ala natural/supernatural.
Any user of technology who isn’t trying to fix that technology.
Edit: except scientists who are employing technology in the pursuit of science.
Psychiatrists
A lack of making observations, formulating and testing hypotheses, and then revising beliefs and hypotheses in response to evidence.
More in a way that it (science) answers everything. Yet the fact is that we have extremely important and necessary questions that are simply subjective.
How the physical world is doesn't gives us an answer to what is morally right or wrong, how things ought to be. Or answer things about what we like or not.
Where many believers in scientism go wrong is when they think that these subjective questions can be answered objectively by science...and typically simply assume their own subjective view has to be the natural answer that science gives.
Well, that is again mathematics (abstract-Platonic provability) answering the question and not science (real-world testability) itself.
Ahum, correction!
Mathematics was possibly somehow grouped in with sciences.
You see, the easy part is reading the classics, but the hard part is to know what exactly still makes sense.
Ever since Karl Popper published his seminal article, Science as Falsification, science has become defined as the collection of propositions, i.e. the epistemic domain, that can be tested experimentally.
Mathematics utterly rejects experimental testing as an epistemic method. Mathematics belongs to the epistemic domain of axiomatic derivation.
You see, according to the classics, in terms of subject matter, mathematics was about quantities, i.e. numbers (Diophantes arithmetica), and anything that you can reasonably draw with unmarked straightedge and compass, i.e. Greek geometry (Euclid).
They generally still held that view in 18th century, while this view was already fundamentally outdated in the 12th century, after Algorithmi's publication, the "Liber Algebrae".
That is why they undoubtedly did not see it coming when Carl Friedrich Gauss published his theorems on the fundamental limitations of (geometrically) constructible numbers, which can only represent the absolutely simplest radical field extension (?2):
This has the effect of transforming geometric questions about compass and straightedge constructions into algebra. This transformation leads to the solutions of many famous mathematical problems, which defied centuries of attack.
Grouping in mathematics with science is even a bigger misconception than the idea that mathematics would be about quantities or numbers. Seriously, not everything in the classics is still applicable today.
I'm guessing the reverse would be that having these qualities makes something science, in the broad sense you espouse.
But I'd say the emphasis on observe-hypothesize-test-revise misses out what's going on in theoretical discussions. The Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies doesn't have observations and tests and so forth. It is largely an argument from the basis of what difficulties are resolved -- towards a more coherent theory.
Surely you'd include this in your notion of science. But then there must be more to science than just these qualities. And if there be more to science than just these qualities I'd wonder -- how would you differentiate theoretical discussions on the existence of the ether from, say, discussions on the existence of God?
I group math with science because they have the similar resonances to one another. Mathematicians create knowledge by publishing and having peers review their work. Scientists are similar. I don't think that the emphasis on reasoning vs. empirical matters much in treating it as something different because all knowledge requires us to reason as well as sense. It's just the way our mind works.
Theoretical discussions about possible scientific hypotheses have not yet managed to pass the unforgiving knowledge-justification filter in science. The justification will become available only after successful experimental testing.
A scientific theory that has not been experimentally tested is not a scientific theory (=justified) but a scientific hypothesis or conjecture (=unjustified).
Therefore, discussions on the existence of God are not part of epistemic domain of science. If you want to make them part of the domain, you will have to propose how exactly the hypothesis is supposed to be experimentally tested.
Hence, adding the question concerning the existence of God to the scientific domain is first and foremost a question of experimental test design.
In the meanwhile, all the pseudo-scientific-sounding hypotheses about the existence of God, usually atheist ones, are objectively just a pile of bullshit, as they are in gross violation of the rules and regulations governing the epistemic method that generates the scientific domain.
First I just want to say that what you're replying to was directed at @Terrapin Station -- not that you aren't welcome to answer the question, but there is a flow to the conversation that I'm following with him that would be different in your case -- because you two both clearly have very different beliefs about science.
Let's put this to you, then: You wouldn't call theoretical discussions scientific knowledge. But would you still count theoretical publications in physics as doing science? It is still science, even if it is not knowledge, right?
Well, at the highest level of epistemology, concerning the nature of science, or the nature of mathematics, or the nature of any knowledge field, really, we have a conversation, with sometimes acrimonious debates. We have schools of thought, and we may or may not have a majority view, i.e. a consensus.
There is obviously criticism on Popperian falsificationism.
If the criticism is useful, I will certainly adopt it. Still, the descriptions of the criticism in the link above, of why they dislike Karl Popper's falsificationism, does not sound convincing to me.
I personally very much like Popper's views, because they allow for the concept of "epistemic domain", and to shift the debate on the nature of the various knowledge disciplines away from the otherwise arbitrary concept of "subject matter".
As far as I am concerning, a knowledge discipline is not "about something". A knowledge discipline is what you can justify with a particular method. Therefore, it is an epistemic domain.
So, I personally consider Karl Popper to be a gigantic step forward.
As long as we clearly distinguish between hypothesis/conjecture (no experimental test available) and theory (experimentally testable), I am ok with the hypothetical-theoretical discussions.
We need to be able to black-swan a scientific theory, i.e. search for a counterexample, otherwise it is not a scientific theory.
Since all scientific theories obviously start their life cycle as mere conjectures, I am certainly not against the activity of conjecturing. So, yes, it is "pre-science". Conjectures are the staging area for science. They are therefore necessary.
Would you say that the methods of a plumber, a machine operator, a lighting technician, or a cook are based on his criterion? I wouldn't.
Quoting alcontali
Hrm. Pre-science? Alright. I guess I would just call it science, but that's OK. So to you "science" is knowledge specifically, it seems. Yes?
I don't think that science is getting blurry "these days", but that it's always been at least a little blurry -- when we put the question of demarcating science from not-science up, at least. And whence the importance of such a question? What does the charge of scientism denote?
To myself, at least, philosophy seems to be a kind of cure to scientism -- which I think of in a more relational manner. Rather than making an epistemic mistake of saying that science is the one and only knowledge, I think scientism is more about how an individual feels about science -- and given that the word is a pejorative the person in question feels too strongly that science gives us the best answers to questions.
So it's kind of a charge against one's character, really, rather than a fallacy. At least as I construe these things. And philosophy (of science) is a cure because I think that philosophy is just doing what philosophy does best -- making us all a little less confident in what we thought was certain and beyond needing explanation.
Well said.
They may occasionally do some experimental testing.
In fact, experimental testing is a systematic protocol in various supply chain situations. It is often specified upfront in commercial contracts. The next paragraph describes a very common commercial practice:
In destructive testing (or destructive physical analysis, DPA) tests are carried out to the specimen's failure, in order to understand a specimen's performance or material behavior under different loads. These tests are generally much easier to carry out, yield more information, and are easier to interpret than nondestructive testing. Destructive testing is most suitable, and economic, for objects which will be mass-produced, as the cost of destroying a small number of specimens is negligible.
You can ask Walmart how they make sure that their Chinese suppliers do not get into a habit of filling the containers with mere sand. The fact that Walmart does not report on their work in experimental testing, is mostly because they do not carry it out with a view on black-swanning a scientific theory.
Still, according to Nassim Taleb, most (empirical) theory was born from recording, systematizing and idealizing existing practice:
Theory is born from (convex) practice more often than the reverse (the nonteleological property). Textbooks tend to show technology flowing from science, when it is more often the opposite case, dubbed the "lecturing birds on how to fly" effect v vi. In such developments as the industrial revolution (and more generally outside linear domains such as physics), there is very little historical evidence for the contribution of fundamental research compared to that of tinkering by hobbyists.
So yes, plumbers, machine operators, lighting technicians, cooks know a lot of things that were never systematized scientifically. They may have stumbled upon them through sheer serendipity, through trial and error, and possible also by experimentally testing them. These things have never been documented or otherwise formalized into science or engineering, because nobody has ever bothered to do so. I personally suspect that the entire industry would collapse if this knowledge does not get transmitted from one generation of workers to the next.
Quoting Moliere
To me, "science" is every belief that you can justify by experimentally testing it; and therefore, that you can also "black-swan", by systematically looking for counterexamples in such tests.
If you can justify a belief, then yes, then it is knowledge.
Science are beliefs that are backed by experimental test reports, i.e. their justifications. Mathematics is different. Mathematics are beliefs that are backed by axiomatic derivation from other beliefs, i.e. their justifications, and ultimately always from unexplained beliefs, i.e. the axioms of the theory.
As far as I am concerned, every legitimate knowledge-justification method will generate around itself its epistemic domain of knowledge. Epistemology itself does that too.
Of course. To say that their knowledge is not-scientific is not the same as to say that their knowledge is not-valuable. In fact, in terms of our day-to-day lives, such knowledge is more valuable than systematic theories about how the world works -- at least I believe so.
But do you see how, if we admit that these professions have knowledge that is not-scientific, the point you were trying to make originally is simple to make? That not all knowledge is scientific after all?
In which case the kind of scientism you are arguing against would be unjustified.
Though I don't know if anyone would agree to that belief, as @S states above. Still a worthwhile point of reference in situating ourselves, I suppose. What do you think of my notion that scientism is not a set of beliefs as much as it is a character trait -- the trait of feeling too strongly about science?
In that case, mathematics is also not valuable, because it is also not-scientific, and staunchly so.
This kind of fake morality ("not-scientific knowledge is not-valuable") is a mainstay in the vulgarizing and ultimately also vulgar, pseudo-scientific mainstream press. You will see CNN journalists displaying their amazing ineptitude -- the blind leading the blind -- when they further mislead the already delusional unwashed masses.
As long as it has the trappings and superficial appearance of science, the delusional populace will swallow it all. Of course, they will never ask to repeat any inexistent experimental tests, because they do not even understand the nature of their own fake religion.
Scientism is a mental disease. Seriously.
Quoting Moliere
Science is a one epistemic domain in the field of knowledge. There is nothing wrong with that.
It is the beliefs [1] that it is the only epistemic domain [2] that it is complete (can answer every question), that irritate me to no end.
Quoting Moliere
Scientism is so incredibly widespread, and its fake morality so prevalent with the unwashed masses, especially in the West, that it cannot merely be a character trait. There is an entire, organized media-clergy preaching its heresies. The political class loves it too. The political manipulators happily subscribe to it, because it increases their power. Scientism is a fake religion that comes with its own fake morality. It is simply obnoxious.
Interesting.
Concerning Quine's dogma one, "Analyticity and circularity", and "the notion of synonymy, which Quine holds as unexplained", I certainly agree. Furthermore, it is exactly because of this problem that Alonzo Church spent an inordinate amount of effort avoiding sheer naming in his lambda calculus.
The ?-calculus incorporates two simplifications that make this semantics simple. The first simplification is that the ?-calculus treats functions "anonymously", without giving them explicit names. The second simplification is that the ?-calculus only uses functions of a single input.
This dogmatic simplification was absolutely necessary for Alonzo Church to be able to give an answer to Hilbert's Entscheidungsproblem (negative), along with Alan Turing, who arrived there via an independent route, both of them coincidentally in 1936.
So, now the answer to David Hilbert's Entscheidungsproblem goes by the name of Church-Turing thesis.
Quine only published his dogma one in 1951. Hence, he was in fact, a bit late to the game for his dogma one.
Concerning Quine's dogma two, "Quine maintains that reductionism is another "metaphysical article of faith", yes, I completely agree.
Axiomatic derivation reduces theorems to underlying, unexplained axioms. So, if we equate the term "metaphysical" with presuppositionalism (apriori knowledge), then yes, mathematics is by design indeed presuppositionalist.
So?
Isn't this again a case of fake morality concerning the term "metaphysical", considered "bad"? Why is it "bad"?
The entire domain of mathematics, generated by the axiomatic method, is staunchly presuppositionalist. Does that mean that mathematics is "bad"?
Concerning Quine's holism:
Instead of reductionism, Quine proposes that it is the whole field of science and not single statements that are verified. All scientific statements are interconnected.
That is utterly wrong.
No, Quine's holistic solution is not even wrong.
A scientific statement stands by itself, because it can only be tested experimentally by itself. Experimental testing of one scientific statement says nothing about any other scientific statement. You would have to experimentally test that one too.
Mathematical theories are indeed axiomatic systems, of which the statements are interconnected.
An entire such system has indeed its systemic (system-level) properties.
Scientific theories are not axiomatic systems.
Quine fails to distinguish between mathematics (provability) and science (testability). That is why the holistic amalgamation that he proposes, is rather silly.
Yes, rant some more, I love it!
Quoting alcontali
How would you define "axiom"? Do you see a difference between an axiom in mathematics and an axiom in metaphysics? In mathematics an axiom is produced and stated to serve some purpose, and accepted because of its usefulness. In metaphysics an axiom is stated as something self-evident, and therefore is supposed as a truth.
Now consider the problem which is the societal illness called scientism. When modern science first began developing centuries ago, it was based in solid metaphysics, truths, and it was designed to bring forth further truths, by employing valid logic to truthful premises which were demonstrated to be sound through empirical process. Notice the base, sound empirically proven premises, not mathematical axioms. But mathematics proved to be an extremely useful form of logical. However, mathematicians are prone to produce premises which are simply useful axioms, rather than sound truths. They are useful for the purpose of solving a mathematical stumbling point. Many axioms simply veil, or make vague such mathematical stumbling points. So, into science creeps unsound premises, from mathematicians, which are accepted because they are extremely useful. Now pragmatism has invaded science. Science is no longer guided by the desire for truth, it has turned into the art (because mathematics is an art, and it has subdued science) of statistics and probabilities, because the goal is not to know the truth, but to predict the future.
Actually, I'd say that insofar as something isn't based on observations, hypotheses, testing hypotheses, etc., it's philosophy at best. Which of course doesn't mean that it's not valuable as such--philosophy is more "where I'm coming from" than science, after all.
Keep in mind that Einstein had a "Library of Living Philosophers" volume: Albert Einstein: Philosopher-Scientist
Most generally, axioms are arbitrary:
These terms and axioms may either be arbitrarily defined and constructed or else be conceived according to a model in which some intuitive warrant for their truth is felt to exist.
In this context, I certainly subscribe to the formalist philosophy in mathematics:
According to formalism, mathematical truths are not about numbers and sets and triangles and the like—in fact, they are not "about" anything at all.
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
Mathematics helps science maintain consistency in its theories. Nothing more. Nothing less. It is up to the scientists themselves to determine if they want to use a particular tool and if they find the tool actually useful. In my impression, scientists generally consider the consistency-maintaining contribution of mathematics to be useful to them.
It is a similar situation with spreadsheets and accountants. A spreadsheet helps accountants to maintain consistency in their one-off financial reporting tasks. Accountants seem to be quite ok to use spreadsheets as a tool in their jobs.
This would be how a "falsificationist" is an "anti-inductivist", I dare say?
The only kind of links, by which it makes sense (on this view) to connect scientific statements into some larger web, is the deductive kind of links. If the whole thing appears to hang together tighter than the known deductive links would themselves suggest, or if we are asked what brought this (rather than any other) particular set of largely unlinked statements together, we must still resist recognising any other kind of linkage.
And if we succeed in this resistance, we will find it easy enough to deny any holistic influence among scientific statements. Because we recognise far fewer links than the holist typically does.
Is this fair? Do you identify as "anti-inductivist" in this sense, of recognising only deductive links between scientific statements?
I think you missed a "not" my statement. I said the opposite of what you're responding to here. Granted it was a confusing way of wording things, but we are in agreement -- not-scientific knowledge is valuable.
Quoting alcontali
How do you know it is widespread?
But I would at least say that while of course you can double down on your theory, you are in the curious position of calling canonical papers in the history of science as being something other than science. Not that that is necessarily a bad thing -- my own position has its faults, in particular it doesn't really give a definition of science as much as rely upon our intuitions of what counts as a scientist and encourages people to look at what those people are doing to get a feel for it.
But for me, at least, calling that paper philosophy rather than science isn't a bullet I can bite.
It's widespread at TPF, although it has a bad reputation so many who practise it here, claim not to.
I would say that there are two distinct forms of scientism, those who believe "only science can give us truth", and those who believe "if it's claimed by scientists, it must be science". The op seems to focus on the former, but there may be some conflation between the two. The latter is much more prevalent, and extremely difficult to reckon with. The difficulty arises from the problems with defining what qualifies as science. Philosophers of science cannot even decide this, so how could the average person? The average person believes that if it is claimed by a scientist, or if the news media reposts it as "science", it is science. This is the scientism which is most widespread.
Alcontali has described a division between science and mathematics. Further, the axioms of mathematics are said to be arbitrary. If this is the case, then there is an incompatibility between using mathematics and practising the scientific method, because science requires premises which are empirically proven.
Let's check what the top search results are for e.g. "I believe in science".
There are undoubtedly other search terms that can shed light on the world of that fake scientist religion, its media-clergy, and how the manipulative political class seeks to handsomely benefit from further deceiving the already delusional unwashed masses.
So, yes, the fake religion of scientism is incredibly widespread.
Richard Dawkins is dead now. So, one of the popes of scientism is no longer advocating their scientism faith. As Richard M. Stallman said on Steve Jobs: "I'm not glad he's dead, but I'm glad he's gone."
Another search term yields some more interesting results: how widespread is scientism?
So, yes, the fake scientism religion is literally everywhere. Wherever you find the delusional, unwashed masses, you will be able to admire the artifacts, ceremonials, and rituals of scientism. They simply believe it. They don't care that they shouldn't, because they find solace in the false promise of the omnipotence of science.
Unfortunately, my wife falls for these snake oil vendors frequently. I haven’t been immune myself in the past. This is an important thread that you’ve started here.
No he isn't.
O sorry, you are right. He is still there. He must have paperwork problems with Satan's immigration office. They will let him through some day. They always do! ;-)
Yes yes yes, and that scientism runs deep. Look at this link from Richard Dawkins' website: https://www.richarddawkins.net/2013/09/why-i-dont-believe-in-scienceand-students-shouldnt-either/
Why I Don’t Believe In Science…And Students Shouldn’t Either
I don’t believe in science. So why am I so passionate about something I don’t believe in?
At first glance it would then seem that Dawkins is not an adept of scientism, but let's keep reading:
"I don’t believe in evolution – I accept the evidence for evolution." The believing isn’t what makes evolution true or not, it’s that there is evidence that supports it.
Ok so they don't believe in science, they accept the evidence for science. Now what does 'accept' mean? Let's look at the dictionary https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/accept : one of the definitions is "to recognize as true: believe".
So they don't believe in science, they believe in the evidence for science. Dawkins says evolution is true because there is evidence that supports it, so he believes that evidence proves scientific theories are true. Which is scientism in disguise. An observation can be interpreted in many different ways, it can be seen as evidence for many different theories, yet he believes observations prove scientific theories.
That's probably why many people don't see scientism as widespread, because it usually isn't explicit, usually it isn't stated explicitly like "I believe in science" (even though there are plenty of examples of people saying that as you mentioned), rather it is implicit, they don't say they believe in science or in scientific theories, they say they accept the evidence or the facts, but then they don't realize or don't say that they believe that this evidence or those facts prove that some scientific theories are true.
In the religion of scientism people believe in some facts. But what makes something a fact? That's where the belief resides. Scientism has been defined for instance as "the view that the characteristic inductive methods of the natural sciences are the only source of genuine factual knowledge and, in particular, that they alone can yield true knowledge about man and society". They believe that their facts are the true facts, the ones people ought to believe. They believe that the things they call evidence prove that such or such scientific theory is true. And so fundamentally they believe in scientific theories, contrary to what they claim. And that is really, really widespread.
I think that you yourself believe that observations can prove a theory, or at least that observations can falsify a theory, but that's not the case either, any theory can be saved from falsification as I explained in other threads. There is always belief involved in what we call knowledge or truth, and science doesn't escape that.
Is the answer just a google search away? That seems odd to me. At least it's unconvincing for myself because, supposing a google search finds me an example of scientism this would not then support the inference that scientism is widespread. It would just be an example of scientism.
But let's take your notion of scientism -- that there is only one knowledge-justification method -- and look at these examples.
Quoting alcontali
Believing in science, or as this person puts it, believing that global warming is a real phenomena is not the same thing as believing that there is only one knowledge-justification method. I believe that anthropocentric caused global warming is real. I also believe that there is more than one knowledge-justification method. This isn't inconsistent. So it is possible to believe a scientific thesis while at the same time not subscribing to scientism, and therefore simply stating "I believe in science" to mean "I believe global warming is real" is not evidence of scientism.
The same analysis applies here, though with other scientific theories. These come closer to your notion of scientism because they don't express just one proposition with the phrase, but at the same time both of these persons exhibit a belief that there are more ways of knowing than science only. They are also a politician and an actor, and know how to go about their profession in those fields -- they have a knowledge of their field which is not-scientific. So I don't think that these qualify as scientism as you describe it.
That's just a bias of the authors. "I believe in science" does not imply that the author cannot be a believer in God, even in the examples cited.
I'd say "widespread" is a large chunk of the population. It doesn't have to be a majority, but let's just say 20% of people believe in scientism is the benchmark for widespread. We can restrict our claim to, say, Europe, North America, and Australia because that's where a lot of us come from and that's the sort of culture we're trying to analyze. Now a google search might supply examples of scientism, but it does not demonstrate that 20% of the people believe that science is the only knowledge-justification method.
So how do you get from some examples of scientism to widespread?
This applies to your gathering of more search terms as well, and is a response to this:
Quoting alcontali
Even the quotes you supply don't say scientism religion is literally everywhere. They qualify that there are "strands of thought", or "good many scientists and some philosophers" or something along those lines. They certainly don't make claims about the "delusional, unwashed masses" -- a phrase that I don't particularly like, but hey, we all have to be the target of insults sometimes. ;)
Also I'd say that your second post is more in line with what @Metaphysician Undercover is calling scientism, which is different from what you started out calling scientism. Would you agree with him in saying there are at least two kinds of scientism?
That doesn't follow at all. I believe "X" because there is evidence that supports it does not imply that evidence proves "X" is true.
Is it scientism to believe that a scientific theory is true because the evidence is convincing?
Exactly. I say that plenty of things are true because there is supporting evidence, but I wouldn't say that any empirical claim is provable.
So I believe that global warming is real and it is caused by humans.
But that's not what he said. He said "X" is true because there is evidence that supports it:
The believing isn’t what makes evolution true or not, it’s that there is evidence that supports it.
Another quote from him, in case you think he sees himself as believing:
Evolution is a fact. Beyond reasonable doubt, beyond serious doubt, beyond sane, informed, intelligent doubt, beyond doubt evolution is a fact. The evidence for evolution is at least as strong as the evidence for the Holocaust, even allowing for eye witnesses to the Holocaust. It is the plain truth that we are cousins of chimpanzees, somewhat more distant cousins of monkeys, more distant cousins still of aardvarks and manatees, yet more distant cousins of bananas and turnips…continue the list as long as desired. That didn’t have to be true. It is not self-evidently, tautologically, obviously true, and there was a time when most people, even educated people, thought it wasn’t. It didn’t have to be true, but it is. We know this because a rising flood of evidence supports it. Evolution is a fact, and this book will demonstrate it.
If you characterize Dawkins as a believer then I think it's fair to call him a religious fundamentalist.
I think I'd say I believe "X" because there is evidence that supports it implies that the evidence supports "X" is true.
But then I'd ask again: Is it scientism to believe that a scientific theory is true because the evidence is convincing?
What would it mean to say that a scientific theory is true? That its predictions are confirmed by observation or something more than that?
It would mean that the propositions of a theory are true. I'd also qualify that any proposition could actually be false. That's part of the whole kit and caboodle. So at some later point, with more evidence, it may be shown that the propositions of evolution are not true -- but it's warranted to believe they are true given what we know at the moment.
True, but with fallabalism "Baked in" so to speak.
It's not a lab, but it's still science. It's just a different kind of science than many of the physical sciences.
A physical science that kind of mirrors this approach is actually astronomy, now that I think of it -- not that I know much of astronomy. But they don't exactly perform experiments in a lab either.
Which is still not what he says, he says "X" is true because evidence supports "X", not that he believes "X" is true.
Quoting Moliere
No I wouldn't say that. However if you start saying that a scientific theory is true because the evidence is convincing, or you start saying that the evidence only supports that theory, or that if it's not scientific then it can't be true or real, or that a scientific consensus is truth or the closest thing to truth, or that something is true because scientists say it, or that if scientists have refuted or falsified something then it's false, or that knowledge can only be gained through the scientific method, or that there are no beliefs in science, I would say it's scientism.
So, I would say that propositions in science are on a spectrum from more to less testable. So, for example, how exactly evolution happened is not directly observable being in the past, whereas the proposition that water boils at 100 degrees at sea level can be tested by direct observation in the present using a thermometer.
Those all seem very different to me. I would agree that if we say something is true just because a scientist says it's true that that seems to be a solid example of scientism in the pejorative sense, as something to be avoided. But I don't see how saying that a scientific theory is true because the evidence is convincing is an example -- I also don't see what removing "belief" from the statement changes. In the sentence I gave I am referring to my relationship to a statement, but if I do believe such and such a statement it's not like I have a problem simply stating that the statement is true too.
So I believe my keys are on the desk. "My keys are on the desk" is true.
I believe evolution is true. Evolution is true.
What's the difference?
What does this notion of testability do for our understanding of scientism? Or is it more a matter of evaluating the truth of theories? Or what?
If that's your relationship with truth then okay. But plenty of people do not equate "I believe X is true" with "X is true". In "X is true" there is implicit idea that X is infaillible, that it cannot possibly be false, that it is something that applies to everyone even if they don't believe in it, whereas in "I believe X is true" one at least acknowledges a belief and presumably the idea that X is possibly faillible.
Which is why belief in any scientific model should explicitly say, “I believe X is true.” It’s not the same as “I believe my keys are on the table” when one is looking at the table and sees keys on it. There’s no need for “I believe” in this latter case because it is evident. Scientific models are not evident. So, yes, I agree with you.
I'm guessing you're reading "belief" in a sense that it often appears in Internet religion debates, where you'll run into atheists who want to say that they don't believe anything, because they're taking belief to only refer to faith (where that's being separated from empirical evidence, logic, etc.), and they want to claim to not buy anything on faith.
That's not how belief is used in epistemology when we talk about knowledge being justified true belief.
And then you make a breakthrough when you realize that many of the people who criticize man-made global warming or the theory of evolution are not ignorant and that the evidence is not overwhelming, it's rather the people pushing them who are overwhelming :wink:
I'm more concerned about the destruction of fauna and flora. it is said that humanity has wiped out 60% of vertebrate animals since 1970, insect populations are in great decline, we're polluting the environment, that's much more certain than man-made global warming for which there are alternative explanations in which the human impact is small. However it's pretty clear we're destroying the ecosystem.
I don't see a fundamental difference between belief and faith, dictionaries define belief as "acceptance that something is true", and faith as "something that is believed with strong conviction", so there is only a difference of degree between the two.
Faith could be said to be a belief that is hard to change. However I'm not sure anything could make Dawkins change his belief, it's easy to interpret all evidence in a way that it fits one's own beliefs.
As I just wrote " faith (where that's being separated from empirical evidence, logic, etc.), "
And belief is also separated from empirical evidence and logic to some extent, saying "theory X is true" basically ignores the problem of induction. An observation can be seen as evidence for many different theories, it's a matter of belief (or faith) to pick one theory as the true one.
Not in epistemology when we're talking about knowledge in terms of justified true belief for example.
So it turns out that you are using the sense of belief that I suggested. But that's not the sense that I'd use or that Moliere was using.
In the common epistemic sense, it's incoherent for anyone to assert something like, "2 + 2 = 4 is true" while also asserting, "I do not believe that 2 + 2 = 4." In the common Internet religion debate sense, you'll often run into atheists who'll say "2 + 2 = 4 is true, but I don't believe that 2 + 2 = 4, I know that 2 + 2 = 4," where among other things, they're obviously ignorant of the jtb characterization of knowledge.
How do you define belief then, if not by "acceptance that something is true"?
If you believe that the Sun is going to rise tomorrow, you might say it's based solely on empirical evidence and logic, but it's also based on faith, because of the problem of induction.
The issue isn't that. The issue is that the common Internet religion discussion sense of belief (at least as promoted by some atheists) is that belief necessarily is faith-oriented.
The common epistemological sense of belief is NOT that belief is necessarily faith-oriented. Belief is often empirical evidence, logic, etc. oriented.
The dichotomy here doesn't allow that something can be BOTH empirical evidence-based and faith-based.
The common Interneet religion debate sense of belief has it that faith only pertains when there is NO empirical evidence or logic to back something up.
But I'm not sure that's a useful distinction. For instance, someone can claim their faith in God is based on experiences they have had or on some argument for the existence of God, which can be construed as based on empirical evidence or logic.
I'm not claiming that belief is not based on empirical evidence or logic, but that empirical evidence and logic are not enough to prove that a theory is true, so even if it is rooted in empirical evidence or logic I don't see it as stating something more certain than faith.
Well, the "if I know something I don't believe it" sense of "believe" is just stupid, yeah. So I don't think it's very useful, either, aside from understanding some stupid stuff that some people say. I'm not endorsing the distinction. I'm pointing out that some people make it, and you appeared to be using it.
Empirical claims are not provable, by the way. Anyone who took Science Methodology 101 should know this. This doesn't imply that we don't know anything, or that we can't know things with conviction, etc.
Ok I understand you agree that knowing something is at least partly believing it. But when we say "X is true" we're not even saying "I know X is true", so it could be interpreted as saying "X is proven to be true" and that can be prone to confusion. And when Dawkins says "evolution is true" I doubt he says "I believe evolution is true", and if he says "I know evolution is true" I doubt he means "I believe evolution is true".
Those who have investigated the matter, as thoroughly as human scientists are able, are convinced that global warming is real, is happening, and is the direct result of human activity (i.e. burning fossil fuels). 99% of scientists agree with this. Proof it ain't, but convincing? Yes, it is.
The ("overwhelming") people who are pushing are frightened. They see it's almost too late for our species. So they push those who don't seem to want to help; those who don't seem to care. :chin:
This isn't a matter for objective certainty, and nothing less will do, because the consequences are so serious. A mere 99% convincing-rate among scientists should be enough for us all to think very carefully about what to do, and then do it.
Are people frightened because they have analyzed the evidence and the assumptions behind the predictive models used and concluded that there is very little doubt that man is responsible and the consequences will be disastrous, or because they are told to be frightened because they are told to believe in the scientific consensus and because they are told that the scientific consensus is right?
As I said there is a lot more room for errors in their models than they would admit, there are plausible alternative explanations which are not properly considered, there is a lot of groupthink going on. Maybe it is right that man is mostly responsible, but what's more certain is that man is responsible for the destruction of the ecosystem regardless of global warming, and we continue destroying it while everyone is getting alarmed over global warming. And that destruction is mostly not due to global warming.
In this case, divide-and-conquer is a recipe for disaster. All human damage to our environment is connected, and mainly down to the burning of fossil fuels and other pollution. We need to address it all, not neglect one thing (global warming) in favour of another (e.g. plastic pollution). All of them will kill us, but perhaps global warming will do it the fastest? :chin:
If only we could address even one thing. It's not just plastic pollution or air pollution, it's our ever-growing consumption and destruction of natural habitats, going for clean energy won't change that, we see ourselves as the masters of the world, the Earth is our toy, we have become disconnected from nature, we spend so much energy and resources to protect ourselves from one another and to be more powerful than the other, we spend so much energy and resources going to jobs whose purpose is to make people addicted to what we sell so that they will spend a lot of energy and resources to get it no matter the costs to everything else, we make people enslaved to money and debt which destroy human relationships, we educate our children to perpetuate this system, the whole thing is rotten to the core, yea we would have to address all of that and I really don't see how. Maybe it's all a consequence of materialism becoming widespread, we focus on the appearences, everything becomes a tool to use and we become disconnected from other life, and then we destroy it and we don't even notice.
Alright so you're just saying if someone states that a scientific theory is infallible then that is an example of scientism.
I don't think Dawkins made that claim about evolution in your quote. Not that I'm a big fan of Dawkins, but he's talking about how evolution is very well supported -- not that it's proven and infallible. And it is very well supported. So well supported that calling it a fact is warranted.
Quoting leo
Here he is talking about common descent, one of the novel predictions of evolution. Now it could be the case that we discover, say, two or three or five or whatever common ancestors -- that the tree of life does not come down to a single point. That would be a modification to the original prediction, but we'd still be related to chimpanzees. And it would be a fact. This would be a warranted statement because of the evidence we have now to make that inference.
Now, in accord with the problems of induction, naturally we could be wrong about all this. Science is fallabalistic, by my lights, always open to revision -- does Dawkins believe that? I don't know. He honestly doesn't say in these quotes, though it would surprise me if he, when pressed, said that evolution is infallible. Biology gets a lot more blowback than, say, chemistry and its theory of the atom, so I can understand frustration when others are given respect but you're always in the spotlight. But, then again, I think that biology is better for it -- I can just understand feeling frustrated.
What is a better explanation for global warming than the one I’ve given? I might want to debate this. Also, what is a better explanation for the variety of life on the planet than evolution? I might want to debate this as well.
So we could have the same belief -- that evolution is true -- but one person does so simply because a scientist said it was so, and another does so because they had a look at the argument and found it persuasive?
Not much I guess, unless you believe it is necessary to define what science is before you can say what scientism is. Is scientism itself a testable "theory"?
Again, anyone with a decent science or philosophy of science education is going to know that empirical claims aren't provable, and we're no longer doing science if a claim isn't at least hypothetically open to revision.
I don't think scientism is a testable "theory", and I don't think we have to define science before understanding it either. At the very least we can clarify what a speaker means, of course, and move on from there.
But then if the speaker of those statements does not define what she thinks science is, then we don't know exactly what it is that she thinks will answer all our questions and solve all our problems, or what she thinks it is that can answer any coherent question and why she thinks a question that cannot be answered by it is incoherent.
I certainly agree with you that scientism is not a testable "theory". :smile:
It's not that simple though. Some days water will boil at 100, and other days not, in the same location, depending on air pressure. And even if you allow for differences in air pressure, all you'd be testing is the accuracy of the measuring instruments.
Quoting Noah Te Stroete
I'm surprised you would celebrate pedantry, but perhaps you were being sarcastic?
(Shit, got to stop checking the phone!)
These two scientism utterances are hypocritical, since they are conclusions arrived at not via science. I think this is a common feature of scientism. It is hypocritical.
Your point was the testability of the proposition "water boils at 100 degrees at sea level". You said, we could just take a thermometer and test this. My point is that such a test is impossible. Some days you will see that water boils at 100, some days it will not. You cannot test such a proposition in this way, because "sea level" is not the proper variable, "air pressure" is. Now that you see the need to properly account for the variables, you will see that other variables, such as the physical constitution of the water, also make a difference. Dissolved elements make a difference (ever boil sugar water?). And have you ever heard of heavy water?
Clearly, your claim about how easy it is to test such propositions is way off base. .
True. What do you think of the broader definition of science with this consideration? That basically all empirical thinking is a kind of scientific thinking? Would those statements count as scientism with science broadly construed?
I'm tempted to say it would not, but that the understanding of science is too broad.