It is plainly open that the major subject matters of science and philosophy are analyzing what is in life (objects and relations) and world, say the nature of energy, atomic particles, their behavior etc for science and consciousness, nature of objects in the world like 'particulars and universals' etc for philosophy. This is an attempt to list the reasons why it might be a futile intellectual exercise for them to do so. This short paper is meant to explain that life might be merely a 'means' of existence to equip life in a particular way. By the above said exercise, science and philosophy do not touch life as such, to understand what it is and why it is, but only analyse its various objects and relations, a kind of superfluous job.
If we compare this act with that of a community of Androids, perhaps its futility will become more clear to us. If an android community develop a science based on their experience of external world, they might perhaps analyse all objects around them, their so called consciousness and hundreds of such items and relations they encounter in their tenure of life. But we know its futility; till they could find the role of human community and our science that has resulted in their existence, their knowledge on the above described lines will be, no doubt, futile. Can we distinguish our knowledge system of today from that of these android communities?
Another example could be that of a group of long distance travelers; the various entertainment programs arranged by the journey operator during the travel, if foolishly taken by the travelers as the SUBSTANCE of the travel? How the passengers spend their travel tenure has nothing to do with the purpose of the journey of each traveler. As the journey is too long, there should naturally be various events during the tenure to keep the travelers engaged.
Let the evolution theory be there in tact, only on its intellectual angle. We know, during the transition from the animal stage to intelligent human level, the central development was not our hi-tech telephones, cars, space journey or air travel. It was the development of our intelligence; if animals still blindly remain victims of their animal drives, though we too, we do it with acute self-awareness. We know what we are doing and why. Yes, the central aspect of evolution was our intellectual development.
Let us attempt to list below, why human-life and existence could be on the lines depicted above.
1. Human logic, our exclusive weapon to arrive at sensible conclusions, is based on universals, that is, analyzing and concluding on some thing on the basis of some other thing we had already observed and known. Bertrand Russell was very clear on this point. He wrote in his paper 'Logic as the essence of philosophy':
'we wish to argue from what has been observed, which can only be done by means of (comparing) some known relations of the observed and the unobserved'.
As life as a phenomenon has no known precedence to compare with, assessing life with the help of Logic was impossible. So, it was fallacious to conclude life as a survival game on the Darwinian argument line, though he produced many evidences to prove his point. But we must remember what another intellectual giant of our times, Dr. Alfred North Whitehead had stated in one of his famous lecture series given at 'Harvard business school' and later published as a book named 'Business adrift',about experiments and collecting evidence; ( Foresight, chapter 1V, part -1)
'discussions on the method of science wander off onto the topic of experiment. But experiment is nothing else than a mode of cooking the facts for the sake of exemplifying the the law'.
So, we need not give much centrality to experiments and collecting evidence as this act covers only the narrow purpose of exemplifying the subjectively chosen hypotheses.
So, life could be much beyond our judgement on what it is. When we look at life on the light of the universal premise that it is a physical phenomenon, naturally we tend to conclude it on those lines, looking at its visible features and analyzing them, again to exemplify them on the already premised lines.
2. Are we victims of a sense of 'scholasticism' about knowledge and intelligence? Perhaps yes, if one looks at the present trend of various university level knowledge seeking and studies. Aren't our top universities organize their knowledge materials taking them from the works of old and current masters? Isn't this method straight away reduces our knowledge pursuit, a study of the history of human knowledge? Doctorate level mandatory paper writing has become centered around a hell lot of REFERENCES. Each sentence of modern philosophy and science papers contains quotes from other, established writers/thinkers. Slight changes our scholars invent gets usually supported by a new 'ism' or 'logy', and the next generation scholars willingly quote such new 'isms; and 'logies', keeping the base spirit and system alive.
While for logical continuity, reference of past ideas are essential, there should be genuine, intellectual contribution of the scholars themselves to make the knowledge store constantly richer. If all these scholars keep the same existing, fundamental UNIVERSAL, like the 'matter-central' concept of science, origin of new knowledge becomes impossible.
This author has attempted to analyse our existing logical system with the intention of showing the above explained draw back, and love to share it here at link: http://thesparkleofhumanreason.blogspot.com/2016/07/why-our-understanding-of-logic-needs.html
3. As I have already listed all major arguments against the 'philosophy of science', I prefer to give a detailed paper link here, instead of repeating the exercise. All arguments against the stand of our PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE are here in the following link:
http://argumentsagainstscientificpositivism.blogspot.com/2018/12/a-rational-sensible-review-of.html
Authored by: Abraham J. Palakudy
He is an independent thinker, and an ardent seeker of truth on life and existence. His chief subjects of interest are mind, sense of self, relation between selves and existence, democracy and human rights.
He tweets by the name: Voice of philosophy@jopan1
His profile and other blogs are at link: https://www.blogger.com/profile/14249415589712707293
If we compare this act with that of a community of Androids, perhaps its futility will become more clear to us. If an android community develop a science based on their experience of external world, they might perhaps analyse all objects around them, their so called consciousness and hundreds of such items and relations they encounter in their tenure of life. But we know its futility; till they could find the role of human community and our science that has resulted in their existence, their knowledge on the above described lines will be, no doubt, futile. Can we distinguish our knowledge system of today from that of these android communities?
Another example could be that of a group of long distance travelers; the various entertainment programs arranged by the journey operator during the travel, if foolishly taken by the travelers as the SUBSTANCE of the travel? How the passengers spend their travel tenure has nothing to do with the purpose of the journey of each traveler. As the journey is too long, there should naturally be various events during the tenure to keep the travelers engaged.
Let the evolution theory be there in tact, only on its intellectual angle. We know, during the transition from the animal stage to intelligent human level, the central development was not our hi-tech telephones, cars, space journey or air travel. It was the development of our intelligence; if animals still blindly remain victims of their animal drives, though we too, we do it with acute self-awareness. We know what we are doing and why. Yes, the central aspect of evolution was our intellectual development.
Let us attempt to list below, why human-life and existence could be on the lines depicted above.
1. Human logic, our exclusive weapon to arrive at sensible conclusions, is based on universals, that is, analyzing and concluding on some thing on the basis of some other thing we had already observed and known. Bertrand Russell was very clear on this point. He wrote in his paper 'Logic as the essence of philosophy':
'we wish to argue from what has been observed, which can only be done by means of (comparing) some known relations of the observed and the unobserved'.
As life as a phenomenon has no known precedence to compare with, assessing life with the help of Logic was impossible. So, it was fallacious to conclude life as a survival game on the Darwinian argument line, though he produced many evidences to prove his point. But we must remember what another intellectual giant of our times, Dr. Alfred North Whitehead had stated in one of his famous lecture series given at 'Harvard business school' and later published as a book named 'Business adrift',about experiments and collecting evidence; ( Foresight, chapter 1V, part -1)
'discussions on the method of science wander off onto the topic of experiment. But experiment is nothing else than a mode of cooking the facts for the sake of exemplifying the the law'.
So, we need not give much centrality to experiments and collecting evidence as this act covers only the narrow purpose of exemplifying the subjectively chosen hypotheses.
So, life could be much beyond our judgement on what it is. When we look at life on the light of the universal premise that it is a physical phenomenon, naturally we tend to conclude it on those lines, looking at its visible features and analyzing them, again to exemplify them on the already premised lines.
2. Are we victims of a sense of 'scholasticism' about knowledge and intelligence? Perhaps yes, if one looks at the present trend of various university level knowledge seeking and studies. Aren't our top universities organize their knowledge materials taking them from the works of old and current masters? Isn't this method straight away reduces our knowledge pursuit, a study of the history of human knowledge? Doctorate level mandatory paper writing has become centered around a hell lot of REFERENCES. Each sentence of modern philosophy and science papers contains quotes from other, established writers/thinkers. Slight changes our scholars invent gets usually supported by a new 'ism' or 'logy', and the next generation scholars willingly quote such new 'isms; and 'logies', keeping the base spirit and system alive.
While for logical continuity, reference of past ideas are essential, there should be genuine, intellectual contribution of the scholars themselves to make the knowledge store constantly richer. If all these scholars keep the same existing, fundamental UNIVERSAL, like the 'matter-central' concept of science, origin of new knowledge becomes impossible.
This author has attempted to analyse our existing logical system with the intention of showing the above explained draw back, and love to share it here at link: http://thesparkleofhumanreason.blogspot.com/2016/07/why-our-understanding-of-logic-needs.html
3. As I have already listed all major arguments against the 'philosophy of science', I prefer to give a detailed paper link here, instead of repeating the exercise. All arguments against the stand of our PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE are here in the following link:
http://argumentsagainstscientificpositivism.blogspot.com/2018/12/a-rational-sensible-review-of.html
Authored by: Abraham J. Palakudy
He is an independent thinker, and an ardent seeker of truth on life and existence. His chief subjects of interest are mind, sense of self, relation between selves and existence, democracy and human rights.
He tweets by the name: Voice of philosophy@jopan1
His profile and other blogs are at link: https://www.blogger.com/profile/14249415589712707293
