(no subject)

Steve Clark (ssclark@facstaff.wisc.edu)
Tue, 13 Oct 1998 10:35:41 -0500

At 09:04 AM 10/13/98 -0600, Kevin wrote:
>Actually, empiricism is not discredited. It's most basic concept is that
the data should dictate conclusions, not biases or paradigms or
metaphysical preconceptions. This is still the basic view of science
today. However, the form of empiricism you describe - called empirical
literalism by SJ Gould - has been discredited because it was too limited.
In Gould's own words ("The Stinkstones of Oeningen," _Hen's Teeth and
Horse's Toes_, pg. 105), it advocated that scientists only "believed what
they saw, interpolated nothing, and read the record of the rocks directly
[his article dealt primarily with geology]." However, since "[r]aw
empirical literalism will not adequately map a complex and imperfect
world", it often becomes necessary to employ "a more subtle and _less_
empirical method: use reason and inference to supply the missing
information that imperfect evidence cannot record." In other words, if we
believed only what we saw in creation, we would miss or ignore most of what
creation had to tell us.

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for your feedback. In my message, I attempted to distinguish
between "empiricism" and "empirical". Of course science is empirical.
However, empiricism or positivism is a philosophical position that was big
in the 19th and early 20th centuries, but you would be hard pressed to find
a philosopher today who gives it much credence (intrestingly, scientists
themselves often talk as philosophical empiricists, but then scientists are
generally poor philosophers).

Steve
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Steven S. Clark, Ph.D. Ph: 608-263-9137
Associate Professor FAX: 263-4226
Dept. of Human Oncology ssclark@facstaff.wisc.edu
University of Wisconsin
School of Medicine
600 Highland Ave
Madison, WI 53792

http://www1.bocklabs.wisc.edu/profiles/Clark,Steven.html