Scientism

Empiricism
Science-tm

Nature

Scientism is the view that scientific, inductive methods must be employed to obtain factual data. It rejects intuitive or deductive approaches. Because data collections are not comprehensive and must be carefully related to context, the apparent evidence of scientism denies spiritual existence as an integral aspect of human experience. It tends towards elitism and technocracy.

Background

A strong argument can be made that societies cannot function without some type of unifying faith or spirituality (particularly since in the absence of one, people will frequently seek out one to adopt). Because of this, much of science gradually morphed into the society’s religion, resulting in it claiming to be an objective arbiter of truth, but in reality, frequently being highly dogmatic and irrational as it seeks to establish its own monopoly over the truth (which has led to many labeling the current societal institution of science as “scientism”).

Incidence

As a product of advanced science and technology, scientism is most marked in industrialized countries. It may be combined with another ideology or even with religion, particularly in relation to ethics. A rather peculiar situation has emerged where religion was cast out by broad swaths of the society and replaced with science, under the belief it would create a fairer and more rational society, but the underlying need for a widespread faith was never addressed. As such, when science is discussed, religious terminology is often used by its proponents: e.g., “I have faith in science,” “I believe in vaccines,” “anyone who denies climate change is reprehensible and must be silenced”.

Notably, medicine, by claiming dominion over life and death (and creating modern miracles like reviving the dead with cardiac resuscitation or awing the public with their ability to see through flesh with x-rays) has come to function as the foundation of the new religion of science. Dr. Mendelsohn in his 1979 book Confessions of a Medical Heretic (1979) argued that medicine was a dogmatic institution that prioritized authority, control and ritualistic practices (which were treated as infallible doctrines requiring blind obedience from patients) over patient well-being, data transparency and evidence-based care.

Claim

Another threat to be reckoned with is scientism. This is the philosophical notion which refuses to admit the validity of forms of knowledge other than those of the positive sciences; and it relegates religious, theological, ethical and aesthetic knowledge to the realm of mere fantasy. In the past, the same idea emerged in positivism and neo-positivism, which considered metaphysical statements to be meaningless. Critical epistemology has discredited such a claim, but now we see it revived in the new guise of scientism, which dismisses values as mere products of the emotions and rejects the notion of being in order to clear the way for pure and simple facticity. Science would thus be poised to dominate all aspects of human life through technological progress. The undeniable triumphs of scientific research and contemporary technology have helped to propagate a scientistic outlook, which now seems boundless, given its inroads into different cultures and the radical changes it has brought. Regrettably, it must be noted, scientism consigns all that has to do with the question of the meaning of life to the realm of the irrational or imaginary. No less disappointing is the way in which it approaches the other great problems of philosophy which, if they are not ignored, are subjected to analyses based on superficial analogies, lacking all rational foundation. This leads to the impoverishment of human thought, which no longer addresses the ultimate problems which the human being, as the animal rationale, has pondered constantly from the beginning of time. And since it leaves no space for the critique offered by ethical judgement, the scientistic mentality has succeeded in leading many to think that if something is technically possible it is therefore morally admissible. (Papal Encyclical, Fides et Ratio, 14 September 1998).