At the risk of flogging a dead horse with "me too" mails ...

These sentences from Nick, say it for me.

"Science is indeed neurotic. It suffers, that is, from what I call
"rationalistic neurosis", a methodological condition that involves
suppressing, or failing to acknowledge, real, problematic aims, and
instead acknowledging an apparently unproblematic "false" aim.
Rationalistic neurosis inevitably has bad consequences. The more
rationally the false aim is pursued, the worse off one is from the
standpoint of achieving one's real aim. Reason seems to become
counterproductive."

That last sentence is the "Cath-22" of our problem.
We "seem" to be promoting "irrationality" even though, quite clearly,
we are trying very hard not to. Hence its Catch-22 like qualities.
It's a loopy world.

I shall publicise Nick's words more widely in the blogosphere.
Regards,
Ian

On 5/24/06, Nicholas Maxwell <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Dear Karl,
>
> I agree with what you say about technological innovation and
> the development of new scientific instruments. That technological
> developments can make major contributions to scientific progress is
> something that I have stressed too, in my writings. It is integral to the
> basic idea of aim-oriented empiricism, namely that, as we improve our
> knowledge, we improve our methods for improving knowledge, that is, we
> improve knowledge about how to improve knowledge. New technology may lead
> the way. As I say in my paper "Can Humanity Learn to Become Civilized"
> (http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00001709/) "There
> is a long-standing debate as to whether technology emerges from science, or
> develops independently, or actually contributes to science (as in the case
> of the steam engine leading to the development of thermodynamics). I
> sidestep this debate, here, and assume, merely that, as far as modern
> science is concerned, science and technology developed in tandem with each
> other, each contributing to the development of the other."
>
> Concerning your more general point, that modern science "is
> implicitly based upon visions of the ideal society, an artificial world
> within which human being are free from the capriciousness of Nature", this
> is a danger, although I would have thought that the impending threat of
> global warming has made all of us aware, including those inclined to think
> along the lines you indicate, that it is not so easy to create a safe
> artificial world free of the capriciousness of Nature. In my "From
> Knowledge to Wisdom", incidentally, one of my criticisms of social science
> was its tendency to carry over from the natural sciences the idea that new
> knowledge enables one to manipulate what one has knowledge of. Manipulating
> inanimate matter, to create dams, aeroplanes, power stations, etc., may have
> its initially unforeseen undesirable consequences. Manipulating people via
> the application of social science, in advertising and spin for example, is a
> quite different matter. (Within wisdom-inquiry, social inquiry is, not
> science primarily, but rather social methodology, concerned to promote
> increasingly cooperative tackling of problems of living by means of
> aim-oriented rationality.)
>
> In "Is Science Neurotic?" I argue that science is indeed
> neurotic. It suffers, that is, from what I call "rationalistic neurosis", a
> methodological condition that involves suppressing, or failing to
> acknowledge, real, problematic aims, and instead acknowledging an apparently
> unproblematic "false" aim. Rationalistic neurosis inevitably has bad
> consequences. The more rationally the false aim is pursued, the worse off
> one is from the standpoint of achieving one's real aim. Reason seems to
> become counterproductive. Furthermore, as a result of suppressing the real
> aims, the problems associated with these aims cannot be tackled and solved.
> In my book I show how science - and we - suffer from all these adverse
> consequences of the rationalistic neurosis of science. The real aims of
> science make problematic assumptions concerning metaphysics, values and
> politics. What you have identified in your book - the aim of creating a
> safe artificial world for us to live in - is just the sort of problematic
> aim that can lurk within the scientific enterprise unacknowledged and
> unexamined, because of the current neurosis of science. Hence the urgent
> need to transform science so that it explicitly acknowledges its real,
> problematic aims and begins to tackle the problems associated with its aims.
> Aim-oriented empiricism - the philosophy of science I argue for - is
> designed precisely to encourage and facilitate such sustained imaginative
> and critical scrutiny of problematic aims. And its generalization -
> aim-oriented rationality - is designed to facilitate such sustained and
> critical scrutiny of problematic aims in all other contexts where worthwhile
> aims are problematic - in politics, industry, education, the law, the media,
> international relations, one's own individual life. Aim-oriented
> rationality is designed to help us, in increasingly cooperative ways,
> realize what is of value to us - what is genuinely of value often being
> problematic.
>
> Best wishes,
>
>
> Nick
>
> ps I think I agree, too, with what you said about the need for pluralism in
> an earlier email. I would only add that we need aim-oriented rationality as
> well. As a result of requiring us to represent our problematic aims
> (ideals, values) in a hierarchy, the aims becoming less specific and less
> problematic as one goes up the hierarchy, we can disentangle what we agree
> about from what we disagree about. We create a framework of relatively
> unproblematic, agreed aims within which diverse more specific, problematic
> aims and methods can be tried out, explored and assessed. Aim-oriented
> rationalism is specifically designed to help us improve aims-and-methods
> (policies, philosophies, political programmes, even religious views) as we
> live; and it is designed to help us resolve conflicts in increasingly
> cooperative ways. In a recent article, "Do Philosophers Love Wisdom?"
> (http://www.philosophersnet.com/magazine/article.php?id=670)
> I remarked, quoting from "From Knowledge to Wisdom", that aim-oriented
> rationality:-
>
>
>
> "provides a framework within which diverse philosophies of value – diverse
> religions, political and moral views – may be cooperatively assessed and
> tested against the experience of personal and social life. There is the
> possibility of cooperatively and progressively improving such philosophies
> of life (views about what is of value in life and how it is to be achieved)
> much as theories are cooperatively and progressively improved in science.
> In science diverse universal theories are critically assessed with respect
> to each other, and with respect to experience (observational and
> experimental results). In a somewhat analogous way, diverse philosophies of
> life may be critically assessed with respect to each other, and with respect
> to experience – what we do, achieve, fail to achieve, enjoy and suffer – the
> aim being so to improve philosophies of life (and more specific philosophies
> of more specific enterprises within life such as government, education or
> art) that they offer greater help with the realization of value in life"
> (From Knowledge to Wisdom, p. 254).
>
>
>
> This presupposes, of course, that science puts aim-oriented empiricism into
> practice, something it does not, at present, do (or only very imperfectly,
> and not in an explicit, conscious fashion).
> www.nick-maxwell.demon.co.uk
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Karl Rogers
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 23, 2006 7:56 PM
> Subject: Re: Science and Wisdom-Inquiry
>
> Dear Nick,
>
> Even though it epistemologically grounds itself in experimental results, the
> empricist philosophy of science is flawed because it presupposes explanatory
> accounts of how experimental apparatus and instruments work in order to
> obtain the results in the first place. At basic levels, empiricism
> presupposes scientific realist interpretations of the experiment in terms of
> causal accounts of how the experiment works.
>
> Scientific realist and positivistic philosophies of science have both
> presupposed the same operational metaphysics: that natural phenomena and
> machine performances are consequences of the same natural principles, laws,
> and mechanisms.
>
> This metaphysics allows the ongoing technological activities of
> experimentation to disclose natural phenomena in terms of mechanistic models
> that are tested by their implementation in future technological innovation.
>
> Hence, both empiricists and realists appeal to the practical value of
> science in terms of its technological successes when arguing for the
> epistemological validity of the so-called natural sciences, such as physics,
> chemistry, and genetics.
>
> However, the tradition within the philosophy of science is to completely
> neglect the role of technology in the development of theories and
> observations within experimental sciences. The traditional view of the use
> of scientific instruments, such as telescopes and microscopes, is that they
> are designed to increase our perceptual possibilities and see what is "out
> there". The use of detectors, such as X-ray scanners, electron microscopes,
> and the Geiger counter has supposedly allowed us to understand phenomena in
> the visible world in terms of otherwise invisible entities. The practical
> value of such instruments clearly "proves" that science has made
> considerable advances and progressed. The traditional view is that
> technology has no further relevance to the philosophy of science.
>
> However, as I argue in my book On The Metaphysics of Experimental Physics,
> technological innovation has not only made new observations and experiments
> possible, but it has also transformed our experience and conception of
> reality. Using a microscope or a Geiger counter does not merely involve
> seeing or detecting what is there. One must interpret the behaviour of the
> instrument in terms of an understanding of how it works. Making observations
> using novel instruments is bound up with making novel techniques of
> representing what one sees and how the instrument works. These techniques
> are ordered into procedures and operations within a technological framework
> that orders how we use and understand instruments. These instruments did not
> fall from the sky ready-made with an instruction book. They were innovated
> as a result of complex labour processes and protracted efforts against a
> historical background of expectations, challenges, demands, and the results
> of previous research and technological innovation.
>
> Technological innovation makes new research, observations, and
> representations possible; it also brings with it new challenges to achieve
> the anticipated possibilities of future innovation and investigation. New
> technologies create observational possibilities and conceptions of the
> criteria for the possibility of possessing knowledge of natural laws and
> mechanisms. They produce new phenomena, data, and change how we understand
> the world. The history of physics shows that technological innovation has
> changed conceptions of Nature and knowledge considerably in the experimental
> sciences. It is just as much a history of the innovation of new machines,
> instruments, and techniques, as it is a history of ideas, theories, and
> discoveries.
>
> By examining the ways that the world, and the interactions between beings in
> the world, have been understood and communicated by physicists in terms of a
> technological framework of innovative technological objects, it is evident
> that observations and experiences emerge from within a technological
> framework in which technological objects obtain agency through interaction
> with each other. The meaning of agency is closely connected to its context
> of emergence and cannot be divorced from the purposes it was intended to
> satisfy. Observation is an activity within a technological framework of
> interventions, interpretations, expectations, possibilities, and purposes.
>
> The artifice in designing, building, using, and interpreting novel
> technological instruments to make observations through interventions is a
> particularly important feature of the novel dimension of scientific
> discovery in experimental physics. It allows the technological objects
> within experiments to acquire an agency of their own and become autonomous
> as the means to innovate and disseminate new experiences, techniques, and
> instruments. It is this autonomy that allows techniques and instruments to
> be metaphysically understood and represented as the means to experience and
> explain the facts of the natural world. It is this autonomy that allows both
> empricist and realist interpretations of the experimental sciences to be
> possible.
>
> Hence, once we take the centrality of technological innovation into account,
> then we can see how the experimental sciences, from their onset in the
> sixteenth century, have been bound together with the civic, military, and
> commercial ambitions of those who fund the research. Once we examine how
> modern science has transformed our understanding and representations of
> Nature into something technological, in order to transform natural phenomena
> into technological object available for experimental investigation, and also
> transform theories into forms that translate into technological functions,
> then we can see how the totality of experimental science is completely
> directed to understand the world in technological terms. Modern science is
> implicated in the construction of a technological society which promises to
> improve upon our natural state by providing us with greater power,
> certainty, and control.
>
> In my book, Modern Science and the Capriciousness of Nature, I describe how
> this societal gamble is premised upon the presupposition of specific forms
> of the goodness and rationality of science. Modern science is implictly
> based upon visions of the ideal society, an artificial world within which
> human beings are free from the capriciousness of Nature (such as natural
> disasters, disease, premature death, birth defects, etc.), and it is
> implicitly placed in confrontation with Nature. Modern science is directed
> to the pacification of the natural world, transforming it into a "better"
> artificial world, and it finds its meaning and value in terms of its
> function within the societal project of constructing this technological
> society.
>
> Thus, in my opinion, it is more the case that we need to question the wisdom
> of this societal gamble and the vision of the ideal world upon it is
> premised. Would such a world be actually good for humanity? Or is it only
> good for a social elite? And where such a vision is lacking, then we need to
> question the rationality of the whole societal project of constructing the
> technological society and the vision of goodness (given in terms of power,
> certainty, and control over our material conditions) that it presupposes. It
> may well be the case that the positivistic interpretation of science is
> nothing more than an irrational, unthinking mode of conformity to the
> societal project of constructing a technological society.
>
> best regards,
> Karl
>
> Nicholas Maxwell <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Dear Bob,
>
> A part of what's wrong with science, in my view, is that the
> scientific community takes for granted an untenable view about what the aims
> and methods of science ought to be, which I have called "standard
> empiricism". According to standard empiricism, the basic intellectual aim
> of science is to improve knowledge of truth, the basic method being to
> assess claims to knowledge impartially with respect to evidence. But this
> seriously misrepresents the aims of science. Science both does, and ought
> to, seek explanatory truth (truth presupposed to be explanatory). More
> generally, science seeks truth deemed to be important or of value, in one
> way or another. There are, I have argued, problematic assumptions
> concerning metaphysics, values and politics inherent in the real aims of
> science which standard empiricism fails to acknowledge. The result of this
> orthodox misrepresentation of the actual aims of science is that science
> fails to subject the problematic assumptions associated with these aims to
> sustained critical scrutiny, in an attempt to improve them. And that in
> turn means that science fails to pursue aims in our best interests. (One
> has to remember that something like a third of all public funds devoted to
> research and development is devoted to military research. Is this really in
> our best interests?) We need a new conception of science - which I have
> called "aim-oriented empiricism" - which acknowledges the real, problematic
> aims of science, and requires science to represent its aims in the form of a
> hierarchy, the aims becoming less and less specific as one goes up the
> hierarchy, and so less and less problematic, in this way a framework of more
> or less unproblematic aims and methods being created (high up in the
> hierarchy) within which much more specific and problematic aims and methods
> (low down in the hierarchy) and be critically assessed and improved. For
> the detailed argument see my "Is Science Neurotic?" (2004); see also my "Can
> Humanity Learn to become Civilized?"
> (http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00001709/) and
> "The Need for a Revolution in the Philosophy of Science",
> (http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00002449/).
>
> This aim-oriented empiricist conception of the
> progress-achieving methods of science can be generalized to form an
> aim-oriented conception of rationality: whenever we are engaged in some
> worthwhile endeavour with problematic aims, we need to represent these aims
> in the form of such a hierarchy, so that we can improve specific,
> problematic aims and methods as we proceed. This aim-oriented conception of
> rationality is especially relevant when it comes to the endeavour to make
> progress towards a good, civilized, wise world - an aim that is inherently
> profoundly problematic.
>
> But the above is only the first step of my argument. It is
> not just science that needs to change, but even more important, the whole
> academic enterprise. We need, I have argued, a new kind of academic inquiry
> that takes as its basic aim to help humanity to realize what is of value in
> life. Academic inquiry needs itself to put aim-oriented rationality into
> practice, and needs to help humanity put it into practice in the rest of
> personal, institutional and social life. The argument is spelled out in
> some detail in my "From Knowledge to Wisdom" (Blackwell, 1984), and in my
> more recent "Is Science Neurotic?". For a summary see the article referred
> to above, "Can Humanity Learn to Become Civilized?"
> (http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00001709/ , first
> published in Journal of Applied Philosophy 17, 2000, 29-44).
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Nick
> www.nick-maxwell.demon.co.uk
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Isabel Adonis
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Sunday, May 21, 2006 10:37 AM
> Subject: Re: Wisdom and its definition
>
> Dear Nicholas,
> Are you saying that what's wrong with science is that it cannot deal with
> values? That is not a fault, merely a limitation, and one which is necessary
> to the (limited) success that it has. Take the field of medicine; there are
> overarching values which define and limit what is permissible in the pursuit
> of medical knowledge. Then there are the standards and values of good
> science which aim to produce reliable knowledge. And then there are the
> values of the doctor in the application of that knowledge to benefit
> patients. So a scientist evaluating a treatment needs to take steps to allow
> for and discount the placebo effect in order to arrive at reliable
> knowledge, but the practicioner may find that this is is the most effective
> part of the treatment. The fact/ value split is the very foundation of
> science, but science is merely a tool - the tool of tools perhaps - it can
> never be a guide to life. It has its own internal values and has value to
> humanity, but it does not deal with values; yet it takes a place in the
> heirarchy of values as any medical ethics committee will attest.
> But this is an idealised account. Doctors, scientists, and perhaps even
> friends of wisdom are not motivated solely by love of humanity, but also,
> and oten more, by desire for money, status, power, respect and particularly
> self-respect. I would like to say that I am not like this, but rationally I
> know that I am, though for much of the time I prefer to regard myself
> through rose tinted spectacles. Is this what you mean by undesirable
> desires? But I am not sure that the desire for self-respect is any 'higher'
> than any other desire - it just feels higher - and that is why I like it -
> in an older terminology it is one of the seven deadly sins - pride. In the
> end we, ourselves are the only problem confronting humanity; we are crippled
> by our desires and our fears and we have very little love. If we could learn
> to cooperate with each other, the practical problems of the world could be
> easily dealt with in a very short time, but we are all too greedy and
> fearful. Science cannot answer these problems, nor can psychology nor can
> even the non-scientific side of academia(I've heard that there are whole
> departments that deal in values, literature and art for example). I am
> fairly sure that the answer -call it wisdom or love or goodness or
> enlightenment - cannot be taught by any method, even by osmosis or example.
> Might it come by grace, when we learn to be honest to ourselves? I don't
> know, but I think that honesty is the first step.
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Nicholas Maxwell
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Sunday, May 21, 2006 12:34 AM
> Subject: Re: Wisdom and its definition
>
>
> Dear Tom,
>
> It was not at all the point of my email responding to the
> question "Can wisdom be learned and taught?" that defining wisdom is an
> important thing to do. On the contrary, with slight reservations, I agree
> with Karl Popper: setting out to define terms really is the wrong thing to
> do (see his "Open Society and Its Enemies", ch. 11, section 2). What I was
> really trying to point out was that, when judged from the standpoint of
> helping to promote human welfare or enhance the quality of human life,
> knowledge-inquiry - academic inquiry as, by and large, we have it at present
> - is harmfully irrational. We need a revolution in the aims and methods of
> academic inquiry. This point - really important if it is correct - can be
> made, and perhaps should be made, without appealing to the notion of
> "wisdom" at all. (In fact, when I first spelled the argument out, in my
> first book "What's Wrong With Science?" (1976), I did not use the word
> "wisdom " once. Instead I spoke of "delight and compassion". "Wisdom", for
> me, was very much an afterthought, merely shorthand for what I think really
> does matter, our capacity to create a world in which there is less
> unnecessary suffering and death than at present, a world in which more
> people are able to realize what is genuinely of value in their lives.)
>
> What are the main problems of living confronting humanity,
> and what do we need to do to resolve them? What kind of world should we be
> trying to create? What changes need to be made to academic inquiry if it is
> serve the best interests of humanity in the best way? How can academic
> inquiry best help humanity learn how to create a better world? How do we
> set about convincing our academic colleagues of the need for change? These
> are the kind of issues we ought, in my view, to be discussing, not the
> somewhat scholastic question of how one should define wisdom. "Wisdom" can,
> without doubt, be defined in a variety of ways, and one might pick on this
> definition or that, for this or that purpose. Any attempt to pin down the
> definition seems to me to be misguided.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Nick
> www.nick-maxwell.demon.co.uk
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Tom Milner-Gulland"
> Sent: Saturday, May 20, 2006 11:03 PM
> Subject: Wisdom and its definition
>
> > If we want to sort out the idea of wisdom by by definitions then I suggest
> > we have to take account of the fact (as I see it) that wisdom has two
> > fairly distinct definitions, one being the simple grammatical principle
> > that it is the nounal form of 'wise' (and therefore is subordinate to the
> > notion of being wise, which surely incorporates such concerns as the
> > intuition of the agent) and the other being the more tangible notion of a
> > body of ideas the astute appropriation of which constitutes being wise.
> >
> > Perhaps it would be wise for list members to consider that we basically
> > know what Nick Maxwell is trying to say, i.e. (IIUC) that knowledge should
> > point us in some kind of general direction as regards what is or should -
> > by some kind of intuition-based rationality, even if it is imperfect - be
> > our common human goals, and it is time to take steps in that direction.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Tom
> >
> >
>
>
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