Gods and Monsters: The Scientific Method Applied to the Human Condition - Book II
Page 30
Chapter 26:
Distinction between the sciences of cosmic nature and the sciences of reality structural historical
Duns Scotus had distinct between the knowledge “abstractive” or the scientific knowledge universal, and knowledge “intuitive”, namely the knowledge of the existence, or of the contingent historical reality (1). There was, thus, a distinction between: the sciences of nature and the sciences of structural reality. Kant recognized as the “pure mathematics” and the “general physics” are sciences a priori (2). They are, namely, the natural sciences, or extraneous to the structural logic. They had considered, therefore, that a few sciences were exempted from structural conditioning, even in their essence. The “new-utilitarians” express the need to make scientific morals, looking for a link between the natural sciences and the human and social sciences (3).
Karl R. Popper had clearly distinguished between the “Statements true, strictly universals”, having a character “accidental”, from the “true universal laws of nature”, giving only at to the second the “Principles of necessity” and the “Principles of impossibility” (4). It is, therefore, obvious how the first is worthy of the reality historical structural, which has, precisely, an accidental universality or subject to chance, while the second are inherent in the nature cosmic universal human and in particular.
If science pre-Galilean had a close relationship with the human and social sciences, the science post-Galilean has refused, for centuries, every attempt to analysis of historical reality. This, if on the one hand, allowed to the science not to be getting hooked at the ideologies, however, it restricted the its scope of action and had ended for not meet its own purpose, that is the knowledge of everything that concerns the being human (5).
The apparent absurdity of the persistent lack of knowledge of the evolution of the structural reality and of the human condition (within this social reality), in general, despite the degree of development reached by science, can be explained by the lack of a real alternative and practicable, to the same reality structural statual. Only the emergence, or the prospection, of a such an alternative, will dissipate the so-called “veil of ignorance” and it is realized a knowledge really scientific of social reality and human. The unity of the cosmic universe implies a reciprocal influence between the physical sciences, human and social, being the science necessarily univocal, as unitary is the cosmic universe, although in multiple stages of organization. The physical sciences are, often, used to interpret social reality, using, in ideological way, the same physical laws, in order to justify the social ideologies, as for example the ideological use of relativism and the “law of indetermination” for the anthropology and the epistemology. You can, however, propose a similarity between cosmology and analysis of structural reality historic. Thus, some astronomers hypothesize a cyclicity of expansion and contraction of the Cosmic Matter, disproving the hypothesis of the entropy and proposing a new cosmological hypothesis, incorporating the recent discovery of the acceleration of the Cosmic Matter. You can draw a parallel with the aforementioned cosmological hypothesis with the need to overcome the organizational level of the structures statual, causing a qualitative leap of organizational capacity, namely of the expression of the sociality of individuals, making them able to create a society that is consistent with the will aware of the human beings.
As in the physical-mathematical sciences the verification of the proposed theory, with the comparison method with the reality, is not always immediate, but is deduced from postulates widely tested. In other fields is possible there are theories not based on immediate comparison with reality, but falsifiable, in some way, for example, in relation to future events planned. The scientific validity of a theory does not result solely from the method with which it is formulated, as for example the possession of the means to demonstrate the falsity of the theory, or by the its alleged compliance with the reality that wants to study (that it is impossible to determine at first glance, or instantaneously), but also from the its correspondence with the progressive nature of science. A theory it will be considered scientific, when allows further processing. The scientificity, or less, of a theory is, therefore, determinable in relation to its opening to further progress. Of some theories, conducted in ideological forms, is immediately evident the lack of scientific value. Of other theories, the scientificity, or less, will emerge only after completing the necessary verifications, namely by comparison with the reality. For these latter theories you can propose the definition of provisional scientificity. The science, being, by definition, progressive, cannot that be characterized by the intrinsic progressivity of every single theory. The foundations of science are identified, from Galileo onwards, in the verifiability and repeatability of the proof, expanded, recently, by the concept of falsifiability, which may seem redundant, but is useful to better clarify the boundaries of science. These principles do not ensure the validity of the starting point, but are limited to ensure the consistency of the theory with the consequences envisaged, with the abandonment of the theory formulated, if it is not found this consistency.
The starting point of the human sciences is the nature or essence of man, from which you can discern all that is alien to this essence. The so-called social sciences, being sciences of the structures, namely of the structural reality historic, belong to a field clearly distinguished by the natural sciences. You can locate, therefore, two scientific fields, different with respect to the physical sciences - Mathematics; on the one hand there are the sciences natural human, that comprise the natural sciences, applied to the study of the human species; on the other side there are the structural sciences, which include: the history, the anthropology, the sociology, the philosophy, the economics and part of psychology. Only with the understanding, at full, of the essence of the historic structures, and of the structures of the states, in particular, can we talk of structural sciences, with status of scientific laws.
There is a conception “realistic” and one “instrumental”, of science. The foundations of science can only be realistic, because they are based on the analysis and conceptualization of certain plans of the real. Having to, however, analyze and predict the evolution of the real, the analysis of the real must be instrumental with respect to the prediction of the concrete possibility of the realization of a new evolutionary stage of human society. How much more will be “realistic”, namely, capable of grasping the roots and the essence of the real, the more it will be really useful, on the plane “instrumental”, as a source of forecast and address on the fields: social and human (6). Umberto Eco had established as the science is not such if not considering the its application outcomes or by its applicability (7). The scientific value of each single social theory derives from the usefulness of this theory in relation to solving social problems, as occurs for any other science. In fact the scientific value of a given theory is given by the usefulness of that date theory, for the solution of problems, cognitive or practical, of whom the theory relates. The problem of social and human sciences consists in the possibility to compare correctly theories and problems in their actual essence, to the solution of which the theory itself gives an effective contribution. The full scientificity of the Social Sciences, in analogy with the physical-mathematical sciences, will be realized, and demonstrated, only when the above mentioned social sciences will make possible a true and satisfactory progress of humanity.
Alfred Reginald Radcliffe-Brawn spoke of: description “Synchronic” (or static) of the “forms of social life” (8) and of description “Diachronic” (or dynamic) of the same “forms of social life”. Evidently, with the term of description “Synchronic” of the “forms of social life”, he was referring to the analysis of the various partitions or joints of structural reality historic, while, for description “Diachronic” he was referring to the evolution and at the pace of succession of those partitions. Radcliffe-Brawn, despite being convinced of the need to use the scientific method in the study of society and not the historical
method, had stated, however, that the various components of social systems should be classified typologically and not on the basis of groupings in: species and genera (9). This demonstrates how he was aware of the unnaturalness of the structural reality historic. Radcliffe-Brown stated that the method of historical survey (or ideographic) serves for identify the structural dynamics (and is used, in fact, mainly, in ethnology), while the functionalist method it studies the static namely the social physiology (and is used from the social anthropology). Radcliffe-Brown had compared two methods of anthropological analysis, which he defined as respectively: the “History conjectural” and the “sociological analysis or structural” (10). Had defined as history conjectural, the analyzes of structures, conducted on general considerations and/or particular (citing, for example, the works of McLennan and of Morgan). He had blamed such method, thinking it to was nonscientific, being conjectural, and stated that to give value to the conjectures advanced (on facts that would have occurred, by placing them in connection with the facts established), would be necessary to know the laws of historical development, and not allowing that this latter derived by the conjectures. It remains to be determined, whether and how much Morgan has derived laws of historical development from conjectures, and if they were not, however, simple observations of real events. Radcliffe-Brown recognized, finally, that that which he defined as the “history conjectural”, possesses sufficient characters of scientificity to enable it to define the same: inductive history. The above mentioned inductive history is also definable as: inductive analysis of structural evolution. He has proposed for himself, the aim, merely, of determine how to operate the social systems, ignoring that the complete knowledge of the how (or: of the modes) allows to establish, at least in part, the because (or: the causes).
Contemporary science, clearly distinguishes, between the stochastic phenomena, namely, based on calculations of the probabilities, by the deterministic phenomena, namely based on a rigid consequentiality between cause and effect. It is clear that the structural sciences and human sciences, for the multiplicity of causes in game and to the difficulty of separating the causes close (in time) from those more distant, you can only have one science based on probabilistic calculation (11).
Karl Popper had proposed, as scientific method, the triad:
- Problems,
- Theories (or the hypothesis),
- Criticism (or discussion of the experimentation or analysis of the errors) (12).
Popper had identified the logic, with the scientific methodology (13), stating that the various logics are not contradictory, but more or less suitable to realize out the scientific progress, being more or less valid scientifically. He expounded his logic in these terms: “The transmission of truth and the retransmission of the falsity”. The transmission of the truth is intended as a means of “doing tests” (14) and the retransmission of the falsity, for falsify the basics of same theory, when occur consequences fake, realizes the falsification of the basics of same theory.
Arnobio of Sicca stated that a “man remained from birth in complete solitude would have the spirit empty” (15), but he recognized that “the feeling is the only source of all human knowledge”. In this last sentence had demonstrated to know that the origin of the human spirit is, at least in part, in its instincts and innate needs, developed through the acquired knowledge, with the development of sociality.
It is essential to consider the possibility of the knowledge last of things, which is, in fact, the purpose or ultimate object of science, as well as of the natural evolution.
The scientific inquiry must be based on:
1 – the consistency between the assumed and the data derived from reality,
2 – the internal consistency of the assumed same,
3 – the internal consistency of the theory, of which the assumption is part,
4 – the correlation of the proposed theory with the knowledge acquired, in the scientific field specific.