The unexamined life is not worth living for a man — Socrates.
For those interested in the fading of Western Civilization and the role higher education has played in this situation, here is a helpful study published by the National Association of Scholars. Although a few years old, it is still relevant.
Philosophy cannot be measured by the yardstick of science. – Martin Heidegger
[Note: I took the month of July off to spend time with my family. It has become a wonderful tradition for our home and I found that if I center life around the principles of faith, family, and vocation (in that order) everything else has a way of working out. Now that it is August, I am back in the metaphysical game and getting ready for a lot of new writing projects. Soon, I’ll be posting some articles regarding the thought of the early Enlightenment thinker Benedict Spinoza. And I’ll keep posting my thoughts on realism. For now, enjoy this video interview with Ken Samples. I’ll keep this post short so we can get to the video.]
Philosophy and science are often thought of as competing fields. I have even heard fellow philosophers explain that philosophy was once good at asking questions about reality, but now that science has found the essential answers, there is no longer any need for philosophy or metaphysics (the branch of philosophy that examines reality). To me, this seems like an odd position for a philosopher to take but, apparently, some philosophers have conceded that science has solved all the important questions about our world.
I disagree. Science itself rests on a foundation of metaphysical and philosophical assumptions or postulates—first principles that must be taken for granted in order for science to be successful. Here are just a few of the basic first principles that anyone working in the sciences must accept in order to work competently in their field.
1. The fundamental laws of logic. The law of identity, noncontradiction, and excluded middle. These are self-evident laws of being (reality) and can not be denied (to deny them would assume their truth.)
2. The principle of causality. Whatever comes to be has a cause. Everything that comes into being is caused or comes into being by virtue of something outside itself.
3. The principle of universality. The laws of nature are true everywhere in the universe and have been in force for all time.
4. The principle of predictive uniformity. A group of events will show the same degree of interconnection or relationship in the future as they showed in the past or show in the present.
5. The principle of analogy. Like produces like. An effect resembles its efficient cause. Being shares being.
6. The principle of objective reality. Also known as realism. Realism holds that physical objects exist independently of perception, the mind, or one’s theory of reality. This view includes three basic theses: 1. The world is made up of substantial beings really related to one another, which exist independently of any human opinions or desires. 2. These substances and relations can be known by the human mind as they are in themselves. 3. Such knowledge can offer sound and immutable guidance (the law of nature) for individual and social action.
These, and others, are the basic first principles that science must assume in order to get started. Many are not empirically discovered but are, in fact, the metaphysical underpinnings to all reality.
Enjoy this discussion regarding the intersection of philosophy and science with Ken Samples.
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