As a student in the field of science, I have been taught that the scientific process cannot prove ideas with absolute certainty. The scientific method begins with the formation of a hypothesis (in layman's terms an "educated guess") about the mechanisms (the how) of observed phenomena in the natural world. These hypotheses are tested by quantitative experiments (those in which the results can be expressed in numerical form), and the resulting data are subjected to statistical tests to determine the validity of the original hypothesis. Such statistical tests reveal whether or not the hypothesis was supported within a 5% margin of error. In other words, if a hypothesis is supported by the data, that means there is at most a 5% chance that there is a mistake in the data great enough to refute the hypothesis. By repeating experiments which produce additional supporting data, a hypothesis then becomes a theory. However, all scientists should know that every theory is still subject to criticism if data contradicting the theory is discovered. As such, nothing in the scientific realm can be proven without a doubt. However, science's strength is shown in that its assumptions are always supported with a 5% margin of error.
Philosophy on the other hand has little certainty in its ideas. This is because the great question of science is "How?", whereas the great question of philosophy is "Why?". The scientific method provides a quantitative means to analyze the validity of its ideas in which the vernacular is mathematics (a language in which numbers are concrete and absolute), but philosophy doubts the validity of all things and has no such method to verify its suppositions. So if asking "how?" produces more reliable answers than asking "why?", then why even study philosophy? As they say, "knowledge is power." Since philosophy seeks to clarify the nature of all things, it is my opinion that I'd rather know than not know, and so seeking knowledge is better than not. Of course, others say "ignorance is bliss." To them I say fine, you can be as ignorant as an infant if for all I care, but who's really happier, me or an infant? And since infants don't even have a concept of happiness, it really would take an ignorant fool to cling to such a notion.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
I like the thoroughness of your account here. But I'm not sure if you're saying that you'd rather study science than philosophy because philosophy can't give you a straight answer.
Have some questions though. Would you agree with the following:
If scientific theories are always open to being disproven, then one must admit, given this premise, that one must always allow for the possibility that any given theory is somehow faulty. In other words, one cannot say with absolute certainty that a particular state of affairs that science discribes theoretically is as science describes. At best, one can say that such a state of affairs is very likely. This seems to me a kind of provisional sense of knowledge of something and not actual knowledge of something.
So my next question is, in light of the short discussion, how is it that a scientist knows and a philosopher doesn't know?
I have a sinking feeling, however, that I'm missing your point. Help.
Post a Comment