Merits and Limits of Applying
the Scientific Method to Human Society
by
Herbert Pietschmann
Institut für Theoretische Physik
der Universität Wien
Summary
Modern science has developed a
method based on a "frame of thinking" which has proven to be so
fruitful that it is applied in all possible fields including human society and
the notion of health and illness. However, this "frame of thinking"
is based on several prerequisites, which lead to limits of scientific knowledge
often not duly recognized. It is most successful for the description of matter
in space and time, but aspects which may be essential for the human individual
have to be taken in a reductionist view. (For example only causal, no final
reasoning). Therefore, modern health systems are in a dilemma: they have to
base their notion on science because of its obvious success but they cannot
reduce themselves to science because of obvious needs of the human existence.
1. The Scientific Frame of
Thinking
Before we address the more
difficult problem of applying the scientific method to human society, let us
recall the basis and the origin of this method which was completed in the 17th
century (1). Scientific method is based on three roots: The first is
Aristotelian logic, one of the founding stones of our culture. It is based in
turn on the famous three axioms of logic (axiom of identity, axiom of
contradiction and axiom of the excluded third - tertium non datur). In short,
it requires the uniqueness of notions and the absence of contradictions between
all statements.
The second root stems from the
first half of the 17th century, it is the "experiment" as founded by
Galileo Galilei. We recognize an experiment by three requirements:
reproducability, quantification and analysis. The third requirement, analysis,
requests, that experimental results must refer to phenomena which are simple
enough to be elements for theoretical descriptions. In other words, the
Aristotelian physics, which referred to the motion of bodies within the
atmosphere, was too complicated to give a quantitative description. The success
of Galileo Galilei was the analysis of such a motion into the two elements:
motion in the vacuum plus disturbance of this motion by atmospheric resistence.
Only this analysis led to simple enough laws for the motion under the influence
of gravity. It is what we may call "atomistic thinking", which is the
result of analysis. This applies not only to the elements of matter (the true
atoms and their constituent particles), but to all fields of science.
The third root of the
scientific method was formulated in the second half of the 17th century and I
will call it "scientific reasoning". It states, that only causal reasoning
(as opposed to final reasoning) is adequate for the scientific method. In other
words each effect is based on a cause and we have the relation of cause and
effect as the third root of our thinking. We should recall, that the two
contemporates (who also exchanged letters), Kepler and Galilei, can be
associated with final and causal thinking. Though Kepler had the correct laws
for planetary motion, Galilei is considered the father of scientific method.
Galilei did not have the correct laws (he was still using circles instead of
ellipses), but he used the causal argumentation, whereas Kepler explained the
ellipses by the will of God to express the harmony of the world in the
planetary system (2).
These three roots of the
scientific method (logic, experiment and causal reasoning) form what I call
"the scientific frame of thinking". In a way, this frame is a limit
to scientific knowledge, which I call the ontological limit (3). Let us now ask
the question, what lies beyond this limit, i.e. what lies outside the frame of
scientific thinking. In order to find this out, let us simply list the
essential axioms of the scientific method and confront them with their
opposites.
Ontological Limit
Science Non
scientific entities
Reproducable
Unique
Quantification
Qualities
Analysis Holistic
Uniqueness Vague,
colourful
No Contradictions "LIFE"
Causal Reasoning Final
Reasoning, Interweaving
It is clearly due to the
success of the scientific method, that what lies within the frame, i.e. within
the ontological limit, is well defined, whereas everything else is only vague
and loose. However, we should acknowledge that there is an essential part of
our world, which cannot be reached by scientific investigation as a matter of
principle. An example is the uniqueness of the individual, which can never be
replaced as a whole, even if transplantations of part of the body (including
the heart and maybe even including the brain) may be possible.
I should explain why I used
the term "LIFE" as opposite of contradictionfree descriptions. It is
obviously not "life" in the biological sense, which is of course
defined within the scientific method, and therefore free from contradictions.
But if we speak of a "lively person" or "alive in his
mind", we refer to a state, which we can all recognize, but which we
probably could not define accurately within the frame of logic and experiment.
I mean "LIFE" in the
sense of Hegel, who claimed that "something is alive only insofar as it
contains contradictions". (But I also mean it in the sense of the great
religious teachers of all cultures who insisted in a similar distinction).
2.
Advantages of Scientific Rationality
As a matter of fact, the
scientific frame of thinking (scientific rationality) is so much dominant in
western societies, that any other way of argueing or thinking is usually
considered "exotic". This is simply a consequence of the overwhelming
advantage in using the scientific method because of its obvious success. We
have already pointed out in the last section, that one of the reasons is that
it is well-defined and free from contradictions. As a consequence, one can
define "right or wrong" by a set of laws and hence no responsibility
(in the true sense of the word) rests on the decision-maker. Rather, he or she
has to be very careful to avoid errors, whereas genuine responsibility has to
be taken only in the domain of "LIFE", where not all contradictions
can be eliminated in an intersubjective way and the consequences of a decision
cannot be predicted from any kind of "theory".
Scientific rationality is
universal and generally applicable in the following sense: its primary goal is
to formulate laws of nature which "hold" at all times in all space
and for everybody. This is the reason, why modern technology was so
successfully based on scientific rationality. Based on this universality, we
can for instance build complicated machines like airplanes or computers which
can be operated by virtually everyone who is willing to learn the relatively
simple rules. The behaviour of these machines (in the absence of defects or
faults) can be predicted precisely from the laws of nature.
Aristotelian logic is one of
the roots of scientific rationality; since it defines all upcoming contradictions
to be mistakes or errors, it functions smoothly and - ordinarily - there should
be no conflict which cannot be resolved by reason. As Werner Heisenberg once
put it (4): Physics deals with those statements about the world, with which everybody
must necessarily agree! If unanimous agreement cannot be achieved
eventually, it is simply not physics. (Quantum Mechanics may be an exception!).
Consequently, problems can be delegated to experts because a solution is either
right or wrong and does not depend on personal or subjective preferences. (It
is obvious, that all this is oversimplified for brevity, but the essence should
be acceptable).
To avoid contradictions and to
assure uniqueness in definitions, Aristotelian logic orders notions in hierarchies.
On top of the hierarchy is "being" as the most general term and at
the very bottom are the individual notions (for instance propernames designing
a specific individual or colours, pitches and the like). The definition is made
by reference to the next level in the hierarchy and the specific
difference to the other notions on the same level. (Notice in passing, that
this kind of definition is restricted to pure logic, even in science we have to
utilize a different kind of definition, we define a notion by the method to
measure it and by its units). As a consequence, it is also one of the
advantages of scientific rationality, that it suggests large hierarchical
structures as the best means to organize a multitude of elements.
The object of the scientific
method is matter in space and time. It is in this part of "reality",
that it has produced its astounding success. Therefore, we have to raise the
question can scientific rationality be applied to social structures?
(i.e. human beings rather than matter in space and time).
It is imperative, to
recognize, that this is not a question of reality, but a
decision of acceptance!
History has proven, that it is
possible to apply scientific rationality also to social structures, in
other words, to organize human beings in hierarchical structures, to con-sider
conflicts as errors of communication and to try to consider human beings as
ex-changeable. The advantages in particular for building large industrial
complexes has been considerable. However, there is a price. The question we
have to ask at this particular point in history, is whether we are willing to
pay this price also in the future. In other words, do the advantages of
applying the scientific rationality to social structures warrant the price we
have to pay for it.
In order to approach this
question, we have to go back to the roots of scientific rationality and
contemplate the distinction between mind and matter.
3. Descartes Division of the
World
The distinction between res
cogitans and res extensa (mind and matter), which is the basis of Descartes
description of the world (5), can well be considered as a prerequisite for the
success of the scientific method. For science allows us to find the "laws
of nature", which refer only to matter in space and time. Therefore,
Descartes division corresponds also to the ontological limit (see section 1),
because the scientific method applies to res extensa exclusively.
Just as we have given both sides of the ontological
limit with typical notions in section 1, we shall now try to design typical
notions to both sides of Decartes' division, i.e. to res extensa and res
cogitans.
Descartes Division
Res Extensa (Matter) Res Cogitans (Mind)
Scientific World View ("Weltbild") Communication
("Understanding")
Action Meaning
Description Understanding
Predictions Decisions
(based on knowledge) (based
on values)
This scheme hardly needs any
further elaboration. However, in view of our central topic, let me explain a
little bit the distinction between "description" and
"understanding". Matter in space and time is described by the laws of
nature given by the scientific method. These laws allow for predictions, they
may even "explain" parts of our material world, but we should not
call it "understanding" in the true sense. I shall reserve the term
"understanding" for human communication. I can understand the
decision or the action of a person to whom I am close, I cannot understand the
law of gravitation in the sense that I have emotional response to the need of a
falling rock. Understanding does not even require consense. If I see a father
or a mother with a large number of children in a bus, say, getting out of
control and hitting one of the children, I will strongly disagree with the
action, but I may still understand the behaviour, for it may remind me on
similar feelings which I have had myself (hopefully not leading to the same
action!).
Let me try to put this
difference between description and understanding again in a scheme:
Description: Explanation Understanding
Logical May
be contradictoy
Rational ambivalent
(You
can even understand,
what you detest)
Static Dynamic (ever changing)
Parmenides
Heraclit
Let me try to clarify my view
by quoting from the great psychotherapist and educator Carl Rogers, who - from
a different starting point, arrives at very similar conclusions (6): "If
we choose to utilize our scientific knowledge for free men, then it will demand
that we live openly and frankly with the great paradox of the behavioral
sciences. We will recognize that behavior, when examined scientifically, is
surely best understood as determined by prior causation. This is the great fact
of science. But responsible personal choice, which is the most essential
element in being a person, which is the core experience in psychotherapy, which
exists prior to any scientific endeavor, is an equally prominent fact in our
lives. We will have to live with the realization that to deny the reality of
the experience of responsible personal choice is as stultifying, as
closed-minded, as to deny the possibility of a behavioral science. That these
two important elements of our experience appear to be in contradiction has
perhaps the same significance as the contradiction between the wave theory and
the corpuscular theory of light, both of which can be shown to be true, even
though incompatible. We cannot profitably deny our subjective life, any more
than we can deny the objective description of that life".
4. On Human Dignity
It should be clear by now,
that the application of scientific rationality to human society means its
reduction to matter in space and time. This can be of benefit also to human
beings, if we think of the great achievements of surgery and the like. Since
every human being is the unity of body, soul and mind, any help to the body
(matter in space and time) is at the same time a help to the human being.
In summarizing the above
developments, let us now ask the specific question what we lose, if we apply
this reduction. In so doing, I would like to follow Immanuel Kant (7), who
pointed out very clearly, that there is something very special in the human
realm ("Reich der Zwecke"). It is the uniqueness of the individual
human being, the "ego" (or I), which cannot be replaced, which is not
reproducible. Again, it should be admitted, that there is also a reproducible
part in any human individual; otherwise large hierarchical structures in the
industry, say, would not work. As far as the "working force" of human
individuals is concerned, there is exchangeability. However, insofar a human
being can be the "object of love", it is unique and not replaceable.
Immanuel Kant has pointed out,
that in the human realm everything has either a price or dignity.
What is exchangeable has a price, what is unique, constitutes dignity. Although
this may be a philosophical differentiation, it has immediate and far-reaching
consequences in everyday life. Take for example sexuality. If in a sexual act
your partner is exchangeable, you have to pay a price. If in the same
situation, which may be identical as far as matter in space and time (that is
to say the scientific description) is concerned, the partner is meant as an
individual, it has dignity.
We can now conclude our
considerations by observing, that any health system has to take into account
the great achievements of scientific rationality, otherwise it violates the
right of human society for the best possible treatment of illnesses. On the other
hand, if this health system restricts itself to the frame of scientific
thinking (to scientific rationality), it violates human dignity! Therefore we
reach the conclusion, that a health system, which sets out to be of benefit for
human beings in their totality has to find a synthesis (or at least a balance)
of these two seemingly contradictory poles.
References
1. H. Pietschmann: Phänomenologie der Naturwissenschaft,
Springer Verl., Berlin
(1966)
2. e.g. R. Haase: Keplers Weltharmonik heute, Param Verl., Ahlerstedt
(1989)
3. H. Pietschmann: Three Limits of Scientific
Knowledge, Univ. Vienna preprint
UWThPh-1995-25, to be published
4. W. Heisenberg: Collected Works, Philosophical and Popular
Writings
(eds. W.
Blum et al.) Piper Verl., München (1984)
5. R. Descartes: Discours de la
méthod, Meiner Verl., Hamburg (1990)
6. C. Rogers: On Becoming a
Person, Constable Ltd., London (1961) p. 400
7. I. Kant: Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten. Phil. Bibl. Bd. 41, Hamburg
(1965)
This article first appeared
in: Achtung vor Anthropologie (Hrs. J. Rupitz, E. Schőnberger, C.
Zehetner) Verl. Turia u. Kant, Wien, 1998, p177-182.