Sunday, July 06, 2014

There is no science, only sciences

Is this an accurate statement?

5 comments:

B. Prokop said...

Interesting article on the inherent limitations of science, specifically cosmology, HERE.

B. Prokop said...

As to Victor's question, I'd go with "science" as long as one includes ALL branches of the quest for knowledge under the term. But once you start excluding any particular discipline, such as sociology, history, psychology, or theology, then I would argue for "sciences".

The singular term must be all-inclusive.

Greg said...

I try to refer to "the sciences" rather than merely "science" since the latter term fails to capture the diversity and epistemic limitations of the disciplines.

Furthermore, the term "science" is often used synonymously with "scientific community" (as in "Science has found..."), scientific community referring of course to only the findings approved by orthodox naturalism. Instead of allowing the opponent to define "science" and use the term so he can discard conclusions he doesn't like, it is better to think of the natural sciences as part of the larger framework of human knowledge--knowledge which should not be ultimately concerned with whether or not something is "science" but rather whether or not something is true.

William said...

If I say "There is no language, only languages," does that let me include Pig Latin?

Richard said...

How about "There are as many sciences as there are people thinking scientifically"?