Your videos are absolutely excellent. Undoubtedly one of the best philosophy channels on youtube, filled with rigorous and balanced consideration of arguments. Well done.
Hi Kane B, I did my master's thesis on scientism. But first of all, thanks for your video! One of the problems is a definition of scientism and its negative connotations, that's certainly true. After surveying some of the definitions, I proposed the following one (which also, I believe, answered the objections of Krauss and Carroll): Scientism is "a domain-expansionist tendency on the part of scientists whose aim is to stretch the explanatory scope of science beyond its traditionally understood boundaries, often encompassing non-scientific aspects of human life." If you ever made a second part, I would suggest dividing the scientism into different categories as is done, for example (and primarily), in the works of M. Stenmark. When you do that, it brings more clarity to the discussion, and one of the results is that scientism will stop being, under at least some versions, self-defeating.
Hi Dr Kane B. Great video. I am wondering though whether you have read the recently published short paper titled *”How Not to Criticise Scientism”* by Johan Hietanen? It can be found for free online. The reason why I ask is because this paper distinguishes between four types of scientism: *1:* Strong-Narrow Scientism: The *natural sciences* are the *only* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like. *2:* Strong-Broad Scientism: The *sciences* are the *only* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like. *3:* Weak-Narrow Scientism: The *natural sciences* are the *best* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like. *4:* Weak-Broad Scientism: The *sciences* are the *best* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like. This paper I think shows that it is only the first option of ‘Strong-Narrow Scientism’ (1) as defended by Alexander Rosenberg (the definition of scientism you used at the start of this video) that suffers from the problems you have presented in this video. This is especially with the “science cannot stand alone” argument (number 2) and the self-refuting argument (number 3). However, it would appear that the other three varieties of scientism can escape these objections as brilliantly explained in that paper I mentioned earlier. I was therefore wondering do you consider the other three categories of/variations of scientism to be plausible theories or do you think they also fall victim to the other problems presented in your video (if not more)? Cheers 🥂
What do you think about the response to the self-defeating objection that scientism is not a belief, but rather a practical commitment, and so it’s not inconsistent to not demand scientific evidence for scientism, because that would be a category error, since evidence can only be gathered for beliefs, not attitudes and commitments? Van Fraassen says basically this about empiricism as I’m sure you know.
What is the distinction between a belief and a practical commitment? What is to stop people from declaring all of their beliefs to be practical commitments and thereby rendering scientism vacuous? Scientism makes a claim that science is the only reliable way to secure knowledge. If scientism doesn't involve a belief in its own claim, then scientism is meaningless. "Evidence can only be gathered for beliefs, not attitudes and commitments?" Evidence can be gathered for _propositions._ Whether people believe those propositions or whether they are committed to those propositions is irrelevant to whether we can gather evidence for them.
If you google the names and the article titles you'll be able to find links. Unfortunately some of them probably won't be accessible unless you have a university library account.
This is very informative. Thank you. If I am confronted by a theist claiming I believe in scientism, the best response would be that it is more reliable than religious superstition. If I release this pen, what direction is it likely to go? If I released my quill with a fan blowing from below, what direction would it travel? The theist is into scientism, too. Sorry, you have to have at least one half-wit comment here.
Could you please do a series of videos about these subjects: David Gauthier´s contractarianism, hobbes´s moral and theory, insights of game theory in ethics, the prisoner´s dilemma, the ethics of nuclear deterrence, decision theory, theory of rational choice, I know that you already made a couple of videos on ethical egoism but if you could talk about the relation of that with the said subjects I´d appreciate it. Thanks.
Hi Kane - I shot you an email but thought I'd try my luck here too. You mentioned 'Revised Scientism' as a concept at the 19:55 mark. Would you be able to point me in the direction on any papers on it, please? It would be massively helpful for my post-grad work. I had a look online but couldn't find anything on the topic. All the best.
What about a much weaker statement like "The most reliable path to world knowledge is empirical bayesian reasoning (updating beliefs with evidence in a systematic way) alongside the minimum ammount of assumptions required for empiricism to operate"
Modern scientism can be summed up in Stephen Hawking’s claim that “philosophy is dead.” I was wondering though whether modern scientism can be seen as the heir or modern day version of logical positivism of the early twentieth century. Are there any similarities or only differences between them?
Numbers have no causal consequences? The 4 digits I enter to the ATM though give me access to my bank account. And if a digitally encode a piece of digital artwork that is protcted under copyright law as a very large number, I can not give you that number without causing copyright enfringment. In this age of information tecnology, numbers have gotten less abstract then you might otherwise think....
Shouldn't we also consider denying the is-ought gap? Why should we accept that you can't infer an ought-statement from and is-statement? It depends upon what we take the word "ought" to mean and how we interpret ought statements. From a consequentialist perspective, saying that we ought to do something is just making a claim about what sort of consequences we will get from doing that as opposed to other things we might do. In other words, an ought-statement is just a statement about what will be the case in the future depending on what we do now, therefore we certainly can infer an ought-statement from an is-statement, and making these sorts of is-statements about the future is a standard part of the scientific method. Do many proponents of scientism actually take it to include analytical facts like facts about math? Often when people talk about knowing things, they are implicitly only talking about synthetic propositions, because knowing a synthetic proposition is far different from knowing an analytic proposition. 11:36 "If you were to adopt some sort of anti-realism about mathematics, that would immediately raise the question of why wouldn't that anti-realism extend to other features of scientific theories." We don't need mathematical realism in order to have knowledge about mathematics. Mathematics is analytic and therefore entirely based on the definitions of the words and concepts involved. The is nothing real in mathematics; it is purely a matter of the relationships between ideas, and if we can prove some fact about such a relationship then we can have knowledge of a mathematical proposition. There is no way for such anti-realism in mathematics to spread to areas that are concerned with real things, like physics or chemistry, because these areas involve more than just relationships between ideas.
You still accept the is-ought gap by believing you believe an ought: one ought to maximize utility (how do you know? Science doesn't tell you that). The logical positivists believed that all mathematics is analytical, but Quine's Two Dogmas of Empiricism has been quite a challenge to that view.
Hi Ansatz66, I completely agree with what you have written. However, many people claim that sentences like "you should do x" or "doing x is good" can't possibly be analyzed as something like "doing x maximizes expected aggregate utility in society". Why such an analysis (or a similar one) should be taken as impossible I have never quite understood. Our task is to provide arguments why we think that such an analysis is indeed possible. I also agree that the only way to explain why mathematical (and logical) truths are true and necessarily so, and why we can know about this, is to regard them as analytic. If their truth doesn't depend on how the world is, it must depend on their meaning alone. However, to explain how this works for mathematics in detail is extremely difficult. (Neologicism is a movement which tries to reduce mathematics to analytic axioms, but with very little success.) Also, many people doubt the validity of the analytic/synthetic distinction itself, mainly because of some problems posed by Quine which occur when you try to define analyticity as "synonymous to a logical tautology". I strongly doubt that this is enough reason to doubt the analytic/synthetic distinction, because analyticity ("truth in virtue of meaning alone") is the only way to plausibly explain why some truths are necessarily true and why we can know them _a priori_. However, our task is too give arguments for this. But good to know that I'm not alone! :)
@Trurl You not only have to show that such an analysis is possible, but also that it is the only sensible without depending on an axiomatic ought-statement like "Morality ought only to be concerned about utility". I have never seen a coherent case for this. (This is basically the same objection Roland Kristo stated)
@@hallotschuss8097 My point was only that an analysis is possible, not that one particular analysis in terms of utilitarianism is correct. This was just an example. If a metaethical argument shows that an analysis of moral terms is possible, then it is left to normative ethics what kind of analysis is the correct one. E.g. if thought experiments favor deontology instead of utilitarianism, then the analysis for "you should do x" would go something like "not to do x isn't universalizable". (This examples are simplifying of course.)
I've just realized something very important about Scientism. It seems practically EVERYONE is missing this. Scientism IS what you described. But it's also more than that. If you look at the well-sourced Wikipedia page for Scientism, it says *It includes the excessive deference to the claims of scientists and the uncritical eagerness to accept anything described as scientific* A better way to express this manifestation of Scientism, which is actually much MORE common than people believing science is the only way to knowledge would be: *Scientism causes people to falsely believe anything within the current consensus MUST actually be scientifically verified, a.k.a knowledge* For example, Evolutionists erroneously assume the process of information being added to the genome has been observed just because it's within the current consensus. It hasn't been. And they believe this without the need/ability to verify OR even present an observation of this process. So the much bigger problem with Scientism is being missed, I think, by people focusing on the form of Scientism in which people believe science is the only way to knowledge. The manifestation I mentioned is much, much more common AND much more problematic because it leads to the illusion of knowledge. It's also just anti-scientific as opposed to just science applied in excess. The former is much worse because it leads to the illusion of knowledge where it doesn't actually exist. It causes people to think their faith-based beliefs are actually facts. Our biggest enemy isn't ignorance, it's the illusion of knowledge.
As far as I know (a) that discipline we name science consist of performance of exhaustive due diligence in one's testimony of observation(specific fact) [sense], action(sequence of operations) [transformation], and proposition(general rule of declared precision) [speech]. (b) That science evolved from the ancestral european common law of tort (sovereignty, reciprocity, duty of truthful testimony before the thang/jury/senate/people, resulting in markets rather than monopolies in all aspects of life.) (c) And that this is the reason that reason, empiricism, physical science, and the evolution of western science into the world standard of truthful speech were unique to western civilization. It is not an accident that Aristotle, Bacon/locke/smith/hume/adams/Jefferson studied law and debated or wrote constitutions. The law applied to material(property) disputes under sovereignty, Science applied to information(knowledge) disputes under sovereignty. Science consists in the positive application of the law to promissory (testimonial) speech. Science and law are the same discipline, the first in defense of the private interest, and the second to defense of the public interest.
The Propertarian Institute Of course that would be great. It will probably be a lot of going over the basics since I am fairly new, but if you don’t mind a rather than introductory conversation that would be great. I am particularly interested and in the overlap of Propertarianism and Wittgenstein if that is of interest to you.
@@Dan-ox7fy It is better to invest in one intellectually honest person than to counter signal ten intellectually dishonest. So sure. Pick any day after 4pm eastern time. I'll record it. We'll have fun.
that's don't have any sense. what about the ancients scientists of india, latin america and other parts of the world? they just investigated and find things that the western world discover later in linguistics and mathematics, etc. they did not have any relation with the so called western world and they did science anyway
Hi. Good compilation of views and definitivos, but unconvincing arguments and conclusions for a good scientism practioner like me :). For example you said in the beginning something like normative statements can not be derived from descriptive statements and science is limited to descriptive statements. Science does normative statements every time. For example the laws of physics are normative statements like the law of energy conservation that are applied to particles up to society and cognition. Normative statements are indeed a subset of descriptive statements. The whole talk did not presented any serious problem to scientism. The scientism worldview gave mote knowledge advancement by orders of magnitude compared to any other worldview. It was a phase transition from previous worldviews that had some valid but very limited contribution compared to modern sciences. It is the same as comparing eucariot to procariot etc
A statement of laws of physics is not a normative statement. "F = ma" does not involve judgement of values. Typical examples of normative statement would be "We should not kill each other.", "Hitler is evil." I don't think that normative statements cannot be derived from descriptive statements, just to clarify. On the other hand, it is not "scientism" that gives mote knowledge but the scientific methods. Hardly anyone argues against the utility of scientific methods. However, scientism either thinks that non scientific methods useless or that all problems can be completely addressed by scientific methods. It is belief that contradicts most of other "-ism".
@@clementdato6328 , science says "you should not create or destroy energy", it's a normative statement like "you should not do X". There is not a serious reason to differ normative and descriptive statements. Norms are descriptions of what can be done or not. Scientism says that the scientific method is the best knowledge tool we have. And it's been proved so far. Scientism says that others methods did not showed the same capability of research and discovery and it has been proved so. Scientism tries to explain all researchble phenomenon with the scientific method, and has been successful so far. Sorry to say, but you appointments are folks misconceptions about science and scientism propagated by useless ideological dispute. Scientism is not more than the recognition that the scientific method is the best we have up to now others views on scientism are straw man, exaggerations to try to show scientism as a bad or extremist position. One characterístic of ideological dispute is to try to exaggerate others worldviews (straw man). The majority of scientism people are non extremist science method advocators. It's imature to try create an artificial dispute between scientism and others worldviews
@@gilbertodpaiva Really happy to have your response for a discussion. About normative statement: I think there is no science saying that we should not create or destroy energy. (Actually, theoretically, conservation of energy does not strictly hold in a global scale, I believe, in modern physics, but that is not the point.) It says we CANNOT do it. A normative statement is like a response to this kind of questions: Why do you think scientism is "good"? More generally, why is anything good? We often answer these questions by a value judgement, which I think is the core concept of normative description. That is, it is not the "should" that matters, it's about the category (right word? sorry for the English) being discussed. About scientism: I think the word scientism is created negative, as is explained by wiki and most of the resources I can find. So it IS BY DEFINITION a bad and extremist position. Not all scientists are scientism-ist. I agree with your point that scientific methods are proved again and again great, but they are not always the best for all scenarios. Examples: maths, morals, laws. Maths: needless to explain, except some recent development of experimental maths, like study of chaos, most development of maths cannot be reduced to scientific methods, if there is any component of it. I would rather take "mathematism" more seriously, if it exists, as science heavily relies on knowledge of maths. Morals and laws: A possible way I see to reduce them to scientific methods is utilitarianism, which has been criticised from all directions. Even if we admit that utilitarianism is the right way to think (if there is a way to establish that), we still have the question of how to establish the utility function, which is, again, about those normative descriptions. What should we deem as "good"? Scientism, to become an -ism, unavoidably has some conflicts to say with other "-ism"s, otherwise worthless, so the dispute is real. "Science is good" is almost a tauntology as we try to define science and good. Few worldview denies it. By the way, I don't think you are a scientism-ist. Underneath the discussion we are making, where words are used differently, we almost agree on everything, although I won't say that scientific methods are the "best knowledge tool we have", because it is the maths that is the best. (Viva mathematism. :))
hmm .. if you quote people/paper/books you should somewhere put the source. Either into the power point (so we can pause and google) or in the Video description.
@@tomasbickel58 I don't write the sources down. I say what they are. For example, right at the beginning I say, "Alex Rosenberg, in the Atheist's Guide to Reality..." and later when discusses responses to the second argument I say, "Rik Peels, in The Fundamental Argument Against Scientism". So you should be able to find the sources just from listening.
Mathematics isn’t a problem for scientism. Mathematics is just a specific collection of formal systems derived from a set of axioms. All knowledge (theorems) in these systems is contingent upon the axioms that define that system. These systems need not have anything at all to do with our universe or our reality, but we can nevertheless explore these universes because we have created them by choosing the axioms. Classical mathematics is merely one of these infinitely many formal systems that has evolved over time as humans carefully chose the axioms precisely because the consequences of those axioms produce a universe that seems to correlate with our universe. We can reason all we want about these formal systems but we can never prove that our universe is perfectly described by any of these systems due to the limits of induction. The fact that mathematics is useful for science simply suggests that the axioms of our mathematical universe seem to be similar to the axioms of our universe, but we cannot claim that the knowledge we gain from our mathematical universe is anything other than a consequence of the axioms of classical mathematics.
You say that if you expand the meaning of "science" to cover any kind of reasoned argument from plausible premises, then you get a scientism that's defensible but trivial. I don't think it is trivial. Beliefs that fall outside this expanded sense of "science" are in fact widespread; people often believe things because they've tied their personal identity to that belief, because that's what most of their community believe, because it was presented to them in a charismatic and emotionally appealing way, because they find the alternative morally suspect etc. Also, a lot of these beliefs are clearly damaging, think climate skepticism, young Earth creationism, the anti-vaccination movement etc. So, it seems to me there is plenty of value in defending this kind of expanded "scientism", if you want to call it that. BTW I don't think I would describe the idea that we should reject beliefs that aren't grounded in some kind of evidence or argumentation as "scientism", mainly because it IS stretching the meaning of "science" well beyond its normal usage. Then again there doesn't seem to be any obvious alternative name for this view; "rationalism", "skepticism", and "empiricism" are kind of used this way sometimes, but they all have other, more specific, meanings.
Being both an anti-realist AND a fallibilist is by far the most aids and disappointing thing I've ever heard you opine, Kane. Boo to your glorified quasi-noncognitivism!
Dude I love your vids and applaud the organization of the information. This is probably the best video on scientism on UA-cam.
Your videos are absolutely excellent. Undoubtedly one of the best philosophy channels on youtube, filled with rigorous and balanced consideration of arguments. Well done.
Hi Kane B, I did my master's thesis on scientism. But first of all, thanks for your video! One of the problems is a definition of scientism and its negative connotations, that's certainly true. After surveying some of the definitions, I proposed the following one (which also, I believe, answered the objections of Krauss and Carroll): Scientism is "a domain-expansionist tendency on the part of scientists whose aim is to stretch the explanatory
scope of science beyond its traditionally understood boundaries, often encompassing non-scientific aspects of human life." If you ever made a second part, I would suggest dividing the scientism into different categories as is done, for example (and primarily), in the works of M. Stenmark. When you do that, it brings more clarity to the discussion, and one of the results is that scientism will stop being, under at least some versions, self-defeating.
Hi Zemi - I'd be grateful if you could send me your thesis to read. It would be a great help for my studies. Let me know if that's possible, please.
Is there anywhere where you can read your Masters thesis? It sounds really interesting!
Hi Dr Kane B. Great video. I am wondering though whether you have read the recently published short paper titled *”How Not to Criticise Scientism”* by Johan Hietanen? It can be found for free online.
The reason why I ask is because this paper distinguishes between four types of scientism:
*1:* Strong-Narrow Scientism: The *natural sciences* are the *only* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like.
*2:* Strong-Broad Scientism: The *sciences* are the *only* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like.
*3:* Weak-Narrow Scientism: The *natural sciences* are the *best* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like.
*4:* Weak-Broad Scientism: The *sciences* are the *best* sources of knowledge, justification, rational beliefs, or the like.
This paper I think shows that it is only the first option of ‘Strong-Narrow Scientism’ (1) as defended by Alexander Rosenberg (the definition of scientism you used at the start of this video) that suffers from the problems you have presented in this video. This is especially with the “science cannot stand alone” argument (number 2) and the self-refuting argument (number 3). However, it would appear that the other three varieties of scientism can escape these objections as brilliantly explained in that paper I mentioned earlier.
I was therefore wondering do you consider the other three categories of/variations of scientism to be plausible theories or do you think they also fall victim to the other problems presented in your video (if not more)? Cheers 🥂
What do you think about the response to the self-defeating objection that scientism is not a belief, but rather a practical commitment, and so it’s not inconsistent to not demand scientific evidence for scientism, because that would be a category error, since evidence can only be gathered for beliefs, not attitudes and commitments?
Van Fraassen says basically this about empiricism as I’m sure you know.
What is the distinction between a belief and a practical commitment? What is to stop people from declaring all of their beliefs to be practical commitments and thereby rendering scientism vacuous? Scientism makes a claim that science is the only reliable way to secure knowledge. If scientism doesn't involve a belief in its own claim, then scientism is meaningless.
"Evidence can only be gathered for beliefs, not attitudes and commitments?"
Evidence can be gathered for _propositions._ Whether people believe those propositions or whether they are committed to those propositions is irrelevant to whether we can gather evidence for them.
I like your videos very much👍
Very basic and touched every aspect👍
From India
Please provide links for the sources. Thank you.
If you google the names and the article titles you'll be able to find links. Unfortunately some of them probably won't be accessible unless you have a university library account.
This is very informative. Thank you. If I am confronted by a theist claiming I believe in scientism, the best response would be that it is more reliable than religious superstition.
If I release this pen, what direction is it likely to go?
If I released my quill with a fan blowing from below, what direction would it travel?
The theist is into scientism, too.
Sorry, you have to have at least one half-wit comment here.
Could you please do a series of videos about these subjects: David Gauthier´s contractarianism, hobbes´s moral and theory, insights of game theory in ethics, the prisoner´s dilemma, the ethics of nuclear deterrence, decision theory, theory of rational choice,
I know that you already made a couple of videos on ethical egoism but if you could talk about the relation of that with the said subjects I´d appreciate it. Thanks.
What is your academic background? Have watched a lot of your videos and was just wondering.
I have a BA and an MA in philosophy. Currently doing a philosophy PhD. My main area of interest is philosophy of science.
Hi Kane - I shot you an email but thought I'd try my luck here too.
You mentioned 'Revised Scientism' as a concept at the 19:55 mark. Would you be able to point me in the direction on any papers on it, please? It would be massively helpful for my post-grad work. I had a look online but couldn't find anything on the topic. All the best.
What about a much weaker statement like "The most reliable path to world knowledge is empirical bayesian reasoning (updating beliefs with evidence in a systematic way) alongside the minimum ammount of assumptions required for empiricism to operate"
Modern scientism can be summed up in Stephen Hawking’s claim that “philosophy is dead.” I was wondering though whether modern scientism can be seen as the heir or modern day version of logical positivism of the early twentieth century. Are there any similarities or only differences between them?
Numbers have no causal consequences? The 4 digits I enter to the ATM though give me access to my bank account. And if a digitally encode a piece of digital artwork that is protcted under copyright law as a very large number, I can not give you that number without causing copyright enfringment. In this age of information tecnology, numbers have gotten less abstract then you might otherwise think....
Shouldn't we also consider denying the is-ought gap? Why should we accept that you can't infer an ought-statement from and is-statement? It depends upon what we take the word "ought" to mean and how we interpret ought statements. From a consequentialist perspective, saying that we ought to do something is just making a claim about what sort of consequences we will get from doing that as opposed to other things we might do. In other words, an ought-statement is just a statement about what will be the case in the future depending on what we do now, therefore we certainly can infer an ought-statement from an is-statement, and making these sorts of is-statements about the future is a standard part of the scientific method.
Do many proponents of scientism actually take it to include analytical facts like facts about math? Often when people talk about knowing things, they are implicitly only talking about synthetic propositions, because knowing a synthetic proposition is far different from knowing an analytic proposition.
11:36 "If you were to adopt some sort of anti-realism about mathematics, that would immediately raise the question of why wouldn't that anti-realism extend to other features of scientific theories."
We don't need mathematical realism in order to have knowledge about mathematics. Mathematics is analytic and therefore entirely based on the definitions of the words and concepts involved. The is nothing real in mathematics; it is purely a matter of the relationships between ideas, and if we can prove some fact about such a relationship then we can have knowledge of a mathematical proposition. There is no way for such anti-realism in mathematics to spread to areas that are concerned with real things, like physics or chemistry, because these areas involve more than just relationships between ideas.
You still accept the is-ought gap by believing you believe an ought: one ought to maximize utility (how do you know? Science doesn't tell you that).
The logical positivists believed that all mathematics is analytical, but Quine's Two Dogmas of Empiricism has been quite a challenge to that view.
Hi Ansatz66, I completely agree with what you have written. However, many people claim that sentences like "you should do x" or "doing x is good" can't possibly be analyzed as something like "doing x maximizes expected aggregate utility in society". Why such an analysis (or a similar one) should be taken as impossible I have never quite understood. Our task is to provide arguments why we think that such an analysis is indeed possible.
I also agree that the only way to explain why mathematical (and logical) truths are true and necessarily so, and why we can know about this, is to regard them as analytic. If their truth doesn't depend on how the world is, it must depend on their meaning alone. However, to explain how this works for mathematics in detail is extremely difficult. (Neologicism is a movement which tries to reduce mathematics to analytic axioms, but with very little success.)
Also, many people doubt the validity of the analytic/synthetic distinction itself, mainly because of some problems posed by Quine which occur when you try to define analyticity as "synonymous to a logical tautology". I strongly doubt that this is enough reason to doubt the analytic/synthetic distinction, because analyticity ("truth in virtue of meaning alone") is the only way to plausibly explain why some truths are necessarily true and why we can know them _a priori_. However, our task is too give arguments for this.
But good to know that I'm not alone! :)
@Trurl You not only have to show that such an analysis is possible, but also that it is the only sensible without depending on an axiomatic ought-statement like "Morality ought only to be concerned about utility". I have never seen a coherent case for this. (This is basically the same objection Roland Kristo stated)
@@hallotschuss8097 My point was only that an analysis is possible, not that one particular analysis in terms of utilitarianism is correct. This was just an example. If a metaethical argument shows that an analysis of moral terms is possible, then it is left to normative ethics what kind of analysis is the correct one. E.g. if thought experiments favor deontology instead of utilitarianism, then the analysis for "you should do x" would go something like "not to do x isn't universalizable". (This examples are simplifying of course.)
Okay, but regarding the original comment: Why then does this suggest that we can deny the is-ought gap?
I've just realized something very important about Scientism. It seems practically EVERYONE is missing this.
Scientism IS what you described. But it's also more than that.
If you look at the well-sourced Wikipedia page for Scientism, it says *It includes the excessive deference to the claims of scientists and the uncritical eagerness to accept anything described as scientific*
A better way to express this manifestation of Scientism, which is actually much MORE common than people believing science is the only way to knowledge would be:
*Scientism causes people to falsely believe anything within the current consensus MUST actually be scientifically verified, a.k.a knowledge*
For example, Evolutionists erroneously assume the process of information being added to the genome has been observed just because it's within the current consensus. It hasn't been.
And they believe this without the need/ability to verify OR even present an observation of this process.
So the much bigger problem with Scientism is being missed, I think, by people focusing on the form of Scientism in which people believe science is the only way to knowledge.
The manifestation I mentioned is much, much more common AND much more problematic because it leads to the illusion of knowledge. It's also just anti-scientific as opposed to just science applied in excess. The former is much worse because it leads to the illusion of knowledge where it doesn't actually exist. It causes people to think their faith-based beliefs are actually facts.
Our biggest enemy isn't ignorance, it's the illusion of knowledge.
As far as I know (a) that discipline we name science consist of performance of exhaustive due diligence in one's testimony of observation(specific fact) [sense], action(sequence of operations) [transformation], and proposition(general rule of declared precision) [speech]. (b) That science evolved from the ancestral european common law of tort (sovereignty, reciprocity, duty of truthful testimony before the thang/jury/senate/people, resulting in markets rather than monopolies in all aspects of life.) (c) And that this is the reason that reason, empiricism, physical science, and the evolution of western science into the world standard of truthful speech were unique to western civilization. It is not an accident that Aristotle, Bacon/locke/smith/hume/adams/Jefferson studied law and debated or wrote constitutions. The law applied to material(property) disputes under sovereignty, Science applied to information(knowledge) disputes under sovereignty. Science consists in the positive application of the law to promissory (testimonial) speech. Science and law are the same discipline, the first in defense of the private interest, and the second to defense of the public interest.
@@Dan-ox7fy good question. you wanna do a quick podcast this week to talk about it? 'Cause P is prax on steroids.
The Propertarian Institute
Of course that would be great. It will probably be a lot of going over the basics since I am fairly new, but if you don’t mind a rather than introductory conversation that would be great.
I am particularly interested and in the overlap of Propertarianism and Wittgenstein if that is of interest to you.
@@Dan-ox7fy It is better to invest in one intellectually honest person than to counter signal ten intellectually dishonest. So sure.
Pick any day after 4pm eastern time. I'll record it. We'll have fun.
The Propertarian Institute
Great I sent you an email (Daniel.babaian@gmail.com)
that's don't have any sense. what about the ancients scientists of india, latin america and other parts of the world? they just investigated and find things that the western world discover later in linguistics and mathematics, etc. they did not have any relation with the so called western world and they did science anyway
Hi. Good compilation of views and definitivos, but unconvincing arguments and conclusions for a good scientism practioner like me :). For example you said in the beginning something like normative statements can not be derived from descriptive statements and science is limited to descriptive statements. Science does normative statements every time. For example the laws of physics are normative statements like the law of energy conservation that are applied to particles up to society and cognition. Normative statements are indeed a subset of descriptive statements.
The whole talk did not presented any serious problem to scientism. The scientism worldview gave mote knowledge advancement by orders of magnitude compared to any other worldview. It was a phase transition from previous worldviews that had some valid but very limited contribution compared to modern sciences. It is the same as comparing eucariot to procariot etc
A statement of laws of physics is not a normative statement. "F = ma" does not involve judgement of values. Typical examples of normative statement would be "We should not kill each other.", "Hitler is evil." I don't think that normative statements cannot be derived from descriptive statements, just to clarify.
On the other hand, it is not "scientism" that gives mote knowledge but the scientific methods. Hardly anyone argues against the utility of scientific methods. However, scientism either thinks that non scientific methods useless or that all problems can be completely addressed by scientific methods. It is belief that contradicts most of other "-ism".
@@clementdato6328 , science says "you should not create or destroy energy", it's a normative statement like "you should not do X". There is not a serious reason to differ normative and descriptive statements. Norms are descriptions of what can be done or not.
Scientism says that the scientific method is the best knowledge tool we have. And it's been proved so far. Scientism says that others methods did not showed the same capability of research and discovery and it has been proved so. Scientism tries to explain all researchble phenomenon with the scientific method, and has been successful so far.
Sorry to say, but you appointments are folks misconceptions about science and scientism propagated by useless ideological dispute. Scientism is not more than the recognition that the scientific method is the best we have up to now others views on scientism are straw man, exaggerations to try to show scientism as a bad or extremist position.
One characterístic of ideological dispute is to try to exaggerate others worldviews (straw man). The majority of scientism people are non extremist science method advocators. It's imature to try create an artificial dispute between scientism and others worldviews
@@gilbertodpaiva Really happy to have your response for a discussion.
About normative statement:
I think there is no science saying that we should not create or destroy energy. (Actually, theoretically, conservation of energy does not strictly hold in a global scale, I believe, in modern physics, but that is not the point.) It says we CANNOT do it. A normative statement is like a response to this kind of questions: Why do you think scientism is "good"? More generally, why is anything good? We often answer these questions by a value judgement, which I think is the core concept of normative description.
That is, it is not the "should" that matters, it's about the category (right word? sorry for the English) being discussed.
About scientism:
I think the word scientism is created negative, as is explained by wiki and most of the resources I can find. So it IS BY DEFINITION a bad and extremist position. Not all scientists are scientism-ist. I agree with your point that scientific methods are proved again and again great, but they are not always the best for all scenarios. Examples: maths, morals, laws.
Maths: needless to explain, except some recent development of experimental maths, like study of chaos, most development of maths cannot be reduced to scientific methods, if there is any component of it. I would rather take "mathematism" more seriously, if it exists, as science heavily relies on knowledge of maths.
Morals and laws: A possible way I see to reduce them to scientific methods is utilitarianism, which has been criticised from all directions. Even if we admit that utilitarianism is the right way to think (if there is a way to establish that), we still have the question of how to establish the utility function, which is, again, about those normative descriptions. What should we deem as "good"?
Scientism, to become an -ism, unavoidably has some conflicts to say with other "-ism"s, otherwise worthless, so the dispute is real. "Science is good" is almost a tauntology as we try to define science and good. Few worldview denies it.
By the way, I don't think you are a scientism-ist. Underneath the discussion we are making, where words are used differently, we almost agree on everything, although I won't say that scientific methods are the "best knowledge tool we have", because it is the maths that is the best. (Viva mathematism. :))
Test castbox.fm/vb/154524470. Clement, I Will answer you soon by voice recording. I don't like to type :\
hmm .. if you quote people/paper/books you should somewhere put the source. Either into the power point (so we can pause and google) or in the Video description.
I do state what the sources are. I give the names and the article titles.
@@tomasbickel58 I don't write the sources down. I say what they are. For example, right at the beginning I say, "Alex Rosenberg, in the Atheist's Guide to Reality..." and later when discusses responses to the second argument I say, "Rik Peels, in The Fundamental Argument Against Scientism". So you should be able to find the sources just from listening.
@@KaneB , being not of the field and not anglophone - it's easier said than done.
@@tomasbickel58 I see. In that case let me know what's unclear and I will clarify.
Summary: The straw man fell down. Bad straw man! Let's beat him.
Mathematics isn’t a problem for scientism. Mathematics is just a specific collection of formal systems derived from a set of axioms. All knowledge (theorems) in these systems is contingent upon the axioms that define that system. These systems need not have anything at all to do with our universe or our reality, but we can nevertheless explore these universes because we have created them by choosing the axioms. Classical mathematics is merely one of these infinitely many formal systems that has evolved over time as humans carefully chose the axioms precisely because the consequences of those axioms produce a universe that seems to correlate with our universe. We can reason all we want about these formal systems but we can never prove that our universe is perfectly described by any of these systems due to the limits of induction. The fact that mathematics is useful for science simply suggests that the axioms of our mathematical universe seem to be similar to the axioms of our universe, but we cannot claim that the knowledge we gain from our mathematical universe is anything other than a consequence of the axioms of classical mathematics.
*DECIPHERING*
Karen took the kids
You say that if you expand the meaning of "science" to cover any kind of reasoned argument from plausible premises, then you get a scientism that's defensible but trivial.
I don't think it is trivial. Beliefs that fall outside this expanded sense of "science" are in fact widespread; people often believe things because they've tied their personal identity to that belief, because that's what most of their community believe, because it was presented to them in a charismatic and emotionally appealing way, because they find the alternative morally suspect etc. Also, a lot of these beliefs are clearly damaging, think climate skepticism, young Earth creationism, the anti-vaccination movement etc.
So, it seems to me there is plenty of value in defending this kind of expanded "scientism", if you want to call it that.
BTW I don't think I would describe the idea that we should reject beliefs that aren't grounded in some kind of evidence or argumentation as "scientism", mainly because it IS stretching the meaning of "science" well beyond its normal usage. Then again there doesn't seem to be any obvious alternative name for this view; "rationalism", "skepticism", and "empiricism" are kind of used this way sometimes, but they all have other, more specific, meanings.
Being both an anti-realist AND a fallibilist is by far the most aids and disappointing thing I've ever heard you opine, Kane.
Boo to your glorified quasi-noncognitivism!
Scientism?
Didn't you ask the devil? He knows exactly what scientism is.
Do you believe in God and do you think it's a defensible position in a scientific age?