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- Volume 107, Issue 3, 2015
Algemeen Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Wijsbegeerte - Volume 107, Issue 3, 2015
Volume 107, Issue 3, 2015
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Wetenschap en sciëntisme in de populaire wetenschap
More LessAbstractScience and Scientism in Popular Science Writing
If one is to believe recent popular scientific accounts of developments in physics, biology, neuroscience, and cognitive science, most of the perennial philosophical questions have been wrested from the hands of philosophers by now, only to be resolved (or sometimes dissolved) by contemporary science. To mention but a few examples of issues that science has now allegedly dealt with: the origin and destiny of the universe, the origin of human life, the soul, free will, morality, and religion. My aim in this paper is threefold: (1) to show that these claims stem from the pervasive influence of a scientistic epistemology in popular science writing, (2) to argue that this influence is undesirable because it ultimately undermines not only the important role of popular science reporting in society but also the public’s trust in science, and (3) to offer suggestions on how popular science writing can be improved.1
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Sciëntisme, praat me er niet van
More LessAbstractScientism, Enough of That
In this paper I argue that it is not a good idea to employ the notion of scientism in public debates concerning issues like free will. Moreover, I claim that, also in philosophy proper, thinking through the notion of scientism is not an urgent task. It is better to reflect directly on notions like justification, evidence, authority of science and the like.1
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Het fundamentele argument tegen sciëntisme
By Rik PeelsAbstractThe fundamental argument against scientism
This paper presents and discusses a major worry for scientism, which I take to be the view that only natural science (reliably) delivers rational belief. The argument is that natural science itself is, in some sense of the word, based on the fundament of the deliverances of non-scientific sources of belief, such as auditory perception, metaphysical intuition, logical intuition, and memory, so that if we were to discard these non-scientific sources of belief, we would have to discard natural science as well. After spelling out what I mean by ‘scientism’, I lay out the Fundamental Argument in detail. Subsequently, I discuss three objections that might be leveled against the argument, namely that scientism suffers merely from a local rather than a global basing problem, that the results of natural science are confirmed or repeatable, whereas the deliverances of non-scientific belief sources are not, and that the results of natural science are inter-subjective, whereas the deliverances of non-scientific are not. I argue that each of these objections is unconvincing. I then consider two more sophisticated versions of scientism that are meant to sidestep the Fundamental Argument. On Scientism 2.0, only natural science and those non-scientific sources of belief that are presupposed by natural science deliver rational belief. On Scientism 3.0, only those propositions can be rationally believed that can in principle be known on the basis of natural science. I argue that both of these more sophisticated versions of scientism either fail to escape from the Fundamental Argument or become trivial and uninteresting claims.
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Een middenweg voor sciëntisme
Authors: Sander Verhaegh & Pieter van der KolkAbstractTowards a moderate scientism
Scientism, the view that only scientifically supported beliefs are epistemically justified, faces two influential problems: (1) scientism itself does not seem to be scientifically supported and hence self-referentially incoherent; and (2) scientism seems to dismiss many plausible ordinary beliefs as unjustified. In this paper, we show that both problems presuppose a needlessly narrow conception of science and that when scientism is based on a broader, more realistic conception of science neither problem arises. Furthermore, we argue that our variant of scientism is still strong enough to have philosophical bite.
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Sciëntisme en metafysica
More LessAbstractScientism and metaphysics
Who deals with scientism soon discovers that scientism can be interpreted in many different ways. Most interpretations of scientism are so radical that they can hardly be defended, or so modest that they are nothing more than trivial platitudes nobody would disagree with. This poses a dilemma for adherents of scientism. Yet, in this article I will propose a particular interpretation of scientism that does seem prima facie defensible, while at the same time cannot be put away as being merely a trivial platitude. Having such a maximally fruitful interpretation of scientism does not help the adherents of scientism, though. For it entails a falsehood, namely that metaphysics cannot give us insights in the overall structure and nature of reality. I shall argue for this by fleshing out an interpretation of metaphysics, on which we can certainly say that metaphysics enables us to acquire said insights. Finally, I will discuss and assess a number of objections against my refutation of the aforementioned maximally fruitful interpretation of scientism.
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Kennis en de wetenschappelijke methode
By Igor DouvenAbstractKnowledge and Scientific Method
According to scientism, our scientific knowledge is the best knowledge we have. But what exactly is it that is supposed to give this knowledge its special status? I defend the claim that scientific knowledge deserves its special status because it results from application of the scientific method.
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