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Single Idea 6844

[filed under theme 1. Philosophy / G. Scientific Philosophy / 3. Scientism ]

Full Idea

Scientism is the belief that all phenomena can be explained through the methodology of the natural sciences, and the belief that, therefore, all phenomena are capable of a causal explanation.

Gist of Idea

Scientism is the view that everything can be explained causally through scientific method

Source

Simon Critchley (Interview with Baggini and Stangroom [2001], p.196)

Book Ref

Baggini,J/Stangroom,J: 'New British Philosophy' [Routledge 2002], p.196

A Reaction

He links two ideas together, but I tend to subscribe fully to the second idea, but less fully to the first. Scientific method, if there is such a thing (Idea 6804), may not be the best way to lay bare the causal network of reality.

Related Idea

Idea 6804 There is no agreement on scientific method - because there is no such thing [Bird]

The 24 ideas from Simon Critchley

7075 To meet the division in our life, try the Subject, Nature, Spirit, Will, Power, Praxis, Unconscious, or Being [Critchley]
7067 Food first, then ethics [Critchley]
7068 If infatuation with science leads to bad scientism, its rejection leads to obscurantism [Critchley]
7069 The French keep returning, to Hegel or Nietzsche or Marx [Critchley]
20446 Philosophy begins in disappointment, notably in religion and politics [Critchley]
20449 Science gives us an excessively theoretical view of life [Critchley]
20448 Phenomenology uncovers and redescribes the pre-theoretical layer of life [Critchley]
20447 The problems is not justifying ethics, but motivating it. Why should a self seek its good? [Critchley]
20452 Anarchism used to be libertarian (especially for sexuality), but now concerns responsibility [Critchley]
20450 The state, law, bureaucracy and capital are limitations on life, so I prefer federalist anarchism [Critchley]
20451 Belief that humans are wicked leads to authoritarian politics [Critchley]
20454 Wallace Stevens is the greatest philosophical poet of the twentieth century in English [Critchley]
20455 Philosophy really got started as the rival mode of discourse to tragedy [Critchley]
20456 Interesting art is always organised around ethical demands [Critchley]
6835 German idealism aimed to find a unifying principle for Kant's various dualisms [Critchley]
6837 Since Hegel, continental philosophy has been linked with social and historical enquiry. [Critchley]
6836 Continental philosophy fights the threatened nihilism in the critique of reason [Critchley]
6838 Continental philosophy is based on critique, praxis and emancipation [Critchley]
6843 Perceiving meaninglessness is an achievement, which can transform daily life [Critchley]
6844 Scientism is the view that everything can be explained causally through scientific method [Critchley]
6845 Continental philosophy has a bad tendency to offer 'one big thing' to explain everything [Critchley]
6846 Phenomenology is a technique of redescription which clarifies our social world [Critchley]
6848 Humour is practically enacted philosophy [Critchley]
6847 Humour can give a phenomenological account of existence, and point to change [Critchley]