:up:

It doesn't make sense to invite secondary sources for the determination of one's stances on primary sources.

When you say that Nietzsche is not anti-science, do you have this group of postmodernists in mind as being truly anti-science ? — Joshs

I don't know.

Do you know of any philosopher who is actually anti-science in the way you mean it? — Joshs

Perhaps Wittgenstein. Although it may be more of an attack on scientism.

Whatever meaning we find is a meaning we create. — Fooloso4

That makes a lot of sense. But when that meaning, however inadequate, becomes the worldview of a culture and all institutions and values are built around it for many centuries there may be a magnificent price to pay for its diminution or cessation.

Do you know of any philosopher who is actually anti-science in the way you mean it?
— Joshs

Perhaps Wittgenstein. Although it may be more of an attack on scientism. — Fooloso4

Paul Feyeraband comes to mind.

It seems to me that only a theorist could potentially write off science as they cheerfully embrace all of its fruits and technologies in their congenial universities. In life theory doesn't much matter. No one worries about the problem of induction when they are parking their car in the supermarket lot.

But when that meaning, however inadequate, becomes the worldview of a culture and all institutions and values are built around it for many centuries there may be a magnificent price to pay for its diminution or cessation. — Tom Storm

Nietzsche said something to the effect that creators destroy.

In some ways Nietzsche and Socrates are the same in that they undermine the foundations of their society. In Socrates case too, things were already on shaky grounds.

But the creation of a new worldview owes more to Plato than to Socrates. So what does Nietzsche create and what is left to "the philosopher of the future"? His answer is he creates creators. [Edit: This is from Zarathustra. I don't have time now to find it in the text] He frees the philosopher from the shackles of the past.

It seems to me that only a theorist could potentially write off science as they cheerfully embrace all of its fruits and technologies in their congenial universities. In life theory doesn't much matter. No one worries about the problem of induction when they are parking their car in the supermarket lot. — Tom Storm

In life everything we do, no matter how trivial,
is guided and informed by overarching goals that themselves belong to to normative , valuative worldviews. That’s a fundamental aspect of Nietzsche’s philosophy and why he critiques the idea of science as search for truth. He not only argued, as did Feyerabend and Kuhn, that science functions as worldview, but that there is no direction toward a ‘more correct’ worldview or theory. His lesson about the death of God and nihilism wasnt to avoid worldviews but to revel in them and their destruction. He hoped the death of God would herald the rise of his kind of man, who posits an endless series of worldviews and doesn’t become attached to any of them.

To say that cars work and planes fly is to say no more than that each era’s philosophical system ‘works’ in its one pragmatic way. Deriding science isnt deriding its results, its saying that when science ‘progresses’ it works differently , not simply better , as if we were approaching a better approximation to what sits out there independent of our own aims and worldviews.

That would be is antithetical to Nietzsche’s thinking.

That would be is antithetical to Nietzsche’s thinking. — Joshs

Could be. I've not been much interested in Niezsche's thinking to be honest. I find his style grandiose and turgid and (for me) thoroughly unreadable. Tried several of his books and never got more than about a third though any of them.

But all my life people have been throwing the Death of God at me (some of these where highly qualified academics I have known) I was curious what people thought about the thesis. And I recently noticed J B Peterson flogging the idea too so I figure the pop-culture is toying with it. I have read the relevant chapters in Zarathustra and The Gay Science and find them typically flamboyant. I think a sympathetic reading of his idea, however, is not without merit.

In relation to science - is there any method of acquiring reliable knowledge better than methodological naturalism? People can talk about contemplative insights or meditation all they want but where are the results, other than in personal experience? Good science is just a tool for providing us with the best models we currently have, it should not make higher truth proclamations.

Can we find some passages that directly speak about this? — baker

The other idiosyncrasy of the philosophers is no less dangerous; it consists in confusing the last and the first. They place that which comes at the end -- unfortunately! for it ought not to come at all! -- namely, the "highest concepts," which means the most general, the emptiest concepts, the last smoke of evaporating reality, in the beginning, as the beginning. This again is nothing but their way of showing reverence: the higher must not grow out of the lower, must not have grown at all. Moral: whatever is of the first rank must be causa sui [“self-caused”]. Origin out of something else is considered an objection, a questioning of value. All the highest values are of the first rank; all the highest concepts, that which has being, the unconditional, the good, the true, the perfect -- all these cannot have become and must therefore be causes. All these, moreover, cannot be unlike each other or in contradiction to each other. Thus they arrive at their stupendous concept, "God." That which is last, thinnest, and emptiest is put first, as the cause, as ens realissimum [“the most real being”]. Why did mankind have to take seriously the brain afflictions of sick web-spinners? They have paid dearly for it!

And in India, as in Greece, the same mistake was made: "We must once have been at home in a higher world (instead of a very much lower one, which would have been the truth); we must have been divine, for we have reason!" Indeed, nothing has yet possessed a more naive power of persuasion than the error concerning being, as it has been formulated by the Eleatics, for example. After all, every word and every sentence we say speak in its favor. Even the opponents of the Eleatics still succumbed to the seduction of their concept of being: Democritus, among others, when he invented his atom. "Reason" in language -- oh, what an old deceptive female she is! I am afraid we are not rid of God because we still have faith in grammar. — Twilight of the Idols

My view is, these 'thinnest and emptiest concepts' are indeed of a higher order of reality, but unless you're able to comprehend them properly, they do indeed become empty words. As they were handed down and ossified into theoretical dogma, they lost all connection to reality, but that is a flaw in their exponents.

is there any method of acquiring reliable knowledge better than methodological naturalism? — Tom Storm

Btw, please don’t tell me you prefer Jordan Peterson to Nietzsche. I will have to come to your house and hurt you. However one wants to define methodological naturalism, it is not description that can apply to the entirety of the past 400 as as a approach that science practitioners across that entire span of time would have considered as what they were doing. One can only apply it retroactively to the science of Galileo’s or Newton’s era.
The reason is that everything about how science
characterizes what it is doing changes in subtle ways in parallel with changes in philosophical worldviews. In today’s era, methodological naturalism may be incontrovertible among physicists , who are realists anyway, but not among all psychologists, some of who have ventured beyond realist and representational models of meaning.
I guess the short answer is that methodological naturalism is a help rather than a hindrance depending on how richly intricate and unified one wants one’s description of the world to be. Methodological naturalism gives the natural sciences it’s semi-arbitrary objectively causal models of things, but those are only useful up to a point. At some point physicists will realize that for the purposes of their own advancement of knowledge they will have to integrate their models with the psychology of perception.

What methodological naturalism is particularly unsuitable for , I would argue , is the understanding of myriad psychological phenomena ( consciousness , affect, empathy, language , sociality , etc). For these domains I prefer a radical constructivism.

Btw, please don’t tell me you prefer Jordan Peterson to Nietzsche. — Joshs

Why do people assume someone supports Peterson just because he's referenced? I think the JP phenomenon is very interesting. I have not read anything by him but watched several lectures and interviews. I am interested in popular culture and what gains traction. I also think with Peterson many people are terribly jealous and resentful that someone like him has come along and become huge when they think they are so much smarter and better informed than Peterson. It's like all those amateur musicians who hate the success of popular artists and disparage them wherever possible. Pop-culture throws up some odd things. JP is one of the oddest I've seen.

What methodological naturalism is particularly unsuitable for , I would argue , is the understanding of myriad psychological phenomena ( , etc). For these domains I prefer a radical constructivism. — Joshs

I hear you. I take the view that consciousness , affect, empathy, language , sociality, take care of themselves and can be measured and understood. The hard problem of consciousness... I suspect science will resolve this one day and may already have come close, but people seem to absolutely hate and revile physicalist understandings of subjects they prefer to remain mysterious and connected to, shall we call it, God? The hatred for Daniel Dennett's theories (and I have no capacity to judge whether he is correct or not) is astonishing. Read some of David Bentley Hart's wonderfully vituperative reviews of Dennett's ideas. I love DBH even though I'm not in the worship business. He's a profoundly smart and flexible thinker with a tendency towards Hitchens-style polemics - coming from the other direction.

No one worries about the problem of induction when they are parking their car in the supermarket lot. — Tom Storm

:point:

They probably don't even worry about it as they write a paper on it.

My view is, these 'thinnest and emptiest concepts' are indeed of a higher order of reality, but unless you're able to comprehend them properly, they do indeed become empty words. As they were handed down and ossified into theoretical dogma, they lost all connection to reality, but that is a flaw in their exponents. — Wayfarer

Are you then suggesting that Nietzsche didn't properly comprehend those higher concepts?

( ;) )

Well I’ve never thought so but it is a terribly unpopular thing to say so I generally remain shtum.

people seem to absolutely hate and revile physicalist understandings of subjects they prefer to remain mysterious and connected to, shall we call it, God? — Tom Storm

It’s interesting that you perceive this criticism as ‘hatred’. Says something, I think.

It’s significant that you perceive this criticism as ‘hatred’. Says something, I think. — Wayfarer

It is significant but not the way you insinuate. :smile: It's not me perceiving animosity any more than you are perceiving dogmatic reductionism every time someone says Daniel Dennett. Well, actually - I think you are... did you not call his life's work a schtick recently? Nevertheless, as I've written, I have kicked around with a lot of people who embrace a range of what I will call New Age beliefs (for want of a better umbrella term). They almost all hate science and anything which (as one woman I know unironically and memorably stated) 'robs the world of magic.' My philosophy tutor (a Gnostic as it happens) many years back called science 'a pseudo-religion for dumb-arses'. I think I've seen some of that language here. The vitriol and hatred I have heard for Dawkins and Sam Harris over the years is enthusiastic. And I don't even like them much myself. I posit that the hatred is because they rob the world of magic. And yes, I figure you will probably argue, if it is hatred it's because of their poorly reasoned philosophy. :wink: Could they both mean the same thing?

I try and refrain from emotive language. Yes, I do think that Ditchkins, as Terry Eagleton named the composite figure of Dawkins and Hitchens, is a lumbering dimwit in respect of philosophical analysis. But there are also lumbering dimwits in religious and new-age circles. It doesn’t discriminate. :-)

//the difference being that the loon left are not bestowed with the Great White Coat of scientific prestige.

I posit that the hatred is because they rob the world of magic — Tom Storm

How about asking them?

I don't think the New Atheists "rob the world" of magic. I feel the same way about them as I do about religion. Both are dogmatic, and in both cases, the lowly person in the pew/academic hall has no say in the matter. It makes no difference to me whether I go to church or to a science lecture at a university: in both cases, I'm expected to bow my head, unquestioningly believe what I'm told, and, for heaven's sake, keep my mouth shut. Oh, and pay them, the more, the better. To both of them, I'm just a faceless number, and at best, a source of money. This makes me feel redundant and unwilling to take seriously what they say.

But they do have that Darwinistic, Nietzschean Übermensch power of presence to them.

But then again, maybe we're the ones making that power of their presence possible to begin with, by giving our attention to them.

But there are also lumbering dimwits in religious and new-age circles. It doesn’t discriminate. :-) — Wayfarer

I don't think we'd ever disagree on that. But hey, let's not let a little thing like the meaning of life come between us. :pray:

I do want to make the point, though, that the pop-intellectual-science types wrongly appeal to the prestige of science in support of their generally lousy arguments. The way I put it is that religious fundamentalists appeal to science to prove the existence of God. Scientific materialists appeal to science to argue the non-existence of god. One side are religious fundamentalists, the other side are anti-religious fundamentalists. They’re both mistaken, in ways that neither side can fathom. If they could fathom it, they’d no longer be fundamentalists.

Oh, and yes that is emotive language. :yikes:

I posit that the hatred is because they rob the world of magic — Tom Storm

In social science, disenchantment (German: Entzauberung) is the cultural rationalization and devaluation of religion apparent in modern society. The term was borrowed from Friedrich Schiller by Max Weber to describe the character of modernized, bureaucratic, secularized Western society. In Western society, according to Weber, scientific understanding is more highly valued than belief, and processes are oriented toward rational goals, as opposed to traditional society, whereby "the world remains a great enchanted garden”. — Wikipedia, ‘Disenchantment’

(Returning to the Nietzschean theme.)

What do people think about Nietzsche’s Death of God? — Tom Storm

Did God ever live?

In Western society, according to Weber, scientific understanding is more highly valued than belief, and processes are oriented toward rational goals, as opposed to traditional society, whereby "the world remains a great enchanted garden”. — Wikipedia, ‘Disenchantment’

What studies did Weber base such assessments on?

I was going to riff on Weber myself... this and charismatic authority are by two standbys.

The way I put it is that religious fundamentalists appeal to science to prove the existence of God. Scientific materialists appeal to science to argue the non-existence of god. — Wayfarer

I've also made that point myself. Always reminded me of that last line in Animal Farm The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”

the pop-intellectual-science types wrongly appeal to the prestige of science in support of their generally lousy arguments. — Wayfarer

I get this. Problem is people also ignore climate science for similar professed reasons. I think science and the notion of the expert is very poorly tolerated these days. Elites and all that. And I certainly understand this impulse. There is a Nieszchian feel to all this.

Did God ever live? — baker

We answered that earlier. It's a metaphor.

Problem is people also ignore climate science for similar professed reasons. I think science and the notion of the expert is very poorly tolerated these days — Tom Storm

Incorrect. Climate science is clearly empirical. You have an explanatory hypothesis, and clearly observable results which confirm that hypothesis. If you think that the question of the reality of higher truths is like this, then you're not understanding the question, as it's not an empirical issue.

From what I have seen, it is true that intelligent design advocates are often climate-change deniers. This goes against them in my view.

What studies did Weber base such assessments on? — baker

Did you ever read or study Weber's classic work, The Protestant Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism?

Incorrect. Climate science is clearly empirical. — Wayfarer

No, my point is the denialists say and think similar things about science (not talking about factual accuracy). You only have to read Andrew Bolt in Australia (the Murdoch puppet) who disparages science on climate change in similar wording you used - pop-science/lousy arguments and borrowed prestige.

We answered that earlier. It's a metaphor. — Tom Storm

I have a hard time understanding the basic premise. The idea that there was once some kind of "golden era" or "an enchanted time" when people took religion seriously (including actually believing in God) seems alien to me.

I grew up among religious people in a monoreligious monoculture. Those people didn't take religion seriously. They took seriously the keeping up of appearance of religiosity, but beyond that, they were as indifferent toward their religion as they were to the air they breathed. It seems most likely to me that this is how it has been throughout history.

I started reading it, but it seemed too alien to me to continue. The way he describes Christians is nothing like what I've come to know Christians.