Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: metmom
Yes, of course. But science is the doing. There is no science in and of itself. Science in and of itself is an old dusty something in a basement, practically non-existent.
84 posted on 10/28/2006 8:38:45 PM PDT by cornelis
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 79 | View Replies ]


To: cornelis; metmom; Alamo-Girl; hosepipe
There is no science in and of itself.

I think it's easy to lose sight of this. Neils Bohr's take on the issue is fascinating to me:

...We realize the simple fact that natural science is not nature itself but a part of the relation between man and nature, and therefore is dependent on man.

Man, in his relation to nature, is "suspended in language" when he attempts to articulate that relation. And that gets complicated; for as Bohr noted,

"A word is such a complicated thing that we couldn't possibly hope to represent it by a mathematical symbol. A mathematical symbol [the language of natural science] can only represent that discrete aspect of the word which is at the center of our thoughts. However, I need hardly stress that the word itself raises something into the full light of consciousness, but at the same time, it raises many other things which are only in a shaded light. And all these things enter into our consciousness at the same time. What surrounds the word provides it with meaning. And so we are suspended in language in such a way that we cannot say what is "up" and what is "down."

Which to me gives the lie to the idea of science as an independent "thing in itself." The reduction of science to doctrine -- as is evidently the case with, say, neo-Darwinism -- denies the irremedial contingency and indeterminacy that characterizes man's relation to nature. It seems to me "the observer problem" is alive and well here. Yet it seems to me there must be some Truth "beyond" nature that does not depend on man in order for the world to hold together, thus to make science possible in the first place.

To me, another name for that Truth is ... Logos -- in the sense of Saint John's Gospel. FWIW.

Thank you for your great posts, cornelis!

102 posted on 10/29/2006 10:00:41 AM PST by betty boop (Beautiful are the things we see...Much the most beautiful those we do not comprehend. -- N. Steensen)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 84 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson