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Science Unlimited?: The Challenges of Scientism
All too often in contemporary discourse, we hear about science overstepping its proper limits—about its brazenness, arrogance, and intellectual imperialism. The problem, critics say, is the privileging of science over all other ways of knowing. Science, they warn, cannot do or explain everything, no matter what some enthusiasts believe. In Science Unlimited? , noted philosophers of science Maarten Boudry and Massimo Pigliucci gather a diverse group of scientists, science communicators, and philosophers of science to explore the limits of science and this alleged threat of scientism.
In this wide-ranging collection, contributors ask whether the term scientism in fact (or in belief) captures an interesting and important intellectual stance, and whether it is something that should alarm us. Is scientism a well-developed position about the superiority of science over all other modes of human inquiry? Or is it more a form of excessive confidence, an uncritical attitude of glowing admiration? What, if any, are its dangers? Are fears that science will marginalize the humanities and eradicate the human subject—that it will explain away emotion, free will, consciousness, and the mystery of existence—justified? Does science need to be reined in before it drives out all other disciplines and ways of knowing? Both rigorous and balanced, Science Unlimited? interrogates our use of a term that is now all but ubiquitous in a wide variety of contexts and debates. Bringing together scientists and philosophers, both friends and foes of scientism, it is a conversation long overdue.
In this wide-ranging collection, contributors ask whether the term scientism in fact (or in belief) captures an interesting and important intellectual stance, and whether it is something that should alarm us. Is scientism a well-developed position about the superiority of science over all other modes of human inquiry? Or is it more a form of excessive confidence, an uncritical attitude of glowing admiration? What, if any, are its dangers? Are fears that science will marginalize the humanities and eradicate the human subject—that it will explain away emotion, free will, consciousness, and the mystery of existence—justified? Does science need to be reined in before it drives out all other disciplines and ways of knowing? Both rigorous and balanced, Science Unlimited? interrogates our use of a term that is now all but ubiquitous in a wide variety of contexts and debates. Bringing together scientists and philosophers, both friends and foes of scientism, it is a conversation long overdue.
- GenresPhilosophyScienceEssays
320 pages, Hardcover
Published January 12, 2018
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122 people want to read
About the author
Maarten Boudry
14 books94 followersMaarten Boudry (1984) is schrijver, wetenschapsfilosoof en was van 2019 tot 2023 houder van de leerstoel Etienne Vermeersch aan de Universiteit Gent. Hij schreef onder meer de bestseller Waarom de wereld niet naar de knoppen gaat (2019), waarover Marcel Hulspas schreef: ‘Strijdlustig. 340 pagina’s lang belijdt Boudry zijn onverwoestbare geloof in de vooruitgang’ (de Volkskrant, ****). Andere boeken zijn Illusies voor gevorderden (2015) en Waarom ons klimaat niet naar de knoppen gaat (als we het hoofd koel houden) (2021).
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
October 8, 2019
I decided to do something different. Instead of reviewing the book as a whole, I've reviewed each essay individually. The overall score is an average of the essays, rounded down. I will say, however, that this anthology has the widest variability in quality. Some essays are amazing, others are abysmal. This made for a confusing experience. Anyway, here are the reviews of each essay:
Chapter 1: Russell Blackford
Rate: 0/5
To be blunt, this is probably the worst essay I've read in years. Blackford claims to argue that humanistic scholarship can be sufficient and that we don't need derogatory terms like "scientism" to recognize that. Unfortunately, he provides no such argument. Instead he asserts his disagreement with various religious scholars who have written against scientism in the past. He provides very simplistic summaries of these thinkers' positions and rarely, if ever, provides a direct quotation. It is pretty clear that Blackford has uncritically adopted the position that science is inherently antagonistic toward religion. For example, he always pairs the word "supernatural" with the descriptor "and nonrational" as if the former was necessarily the latter. As a result the bulk of his essay reads like a complaint against religious thinkers and adds absolutely nothing of value to the discussion of scientific limitations.
Chapter 2: Maarten Boudry
Rate: 1/5
Boudry has some interesting thoughts. But not many. This essay adds limited value to the discussion of scientific limitations by distinguishing between practical limitations of science and epistemological limitations of science. He affirms the former but rejects the latter. The latter, of course, is what we're interested in in this discussion. Unfortunately, Boudry is also overtly anti-religious and that severely colors his argumentation. The only two areas of epistemological limitations he considers are the supernatural and the moral. He rejects the notion that these are epistemological limitations because, according to him, there is no supernatural reality and there are no moral facts. What attempted justification he provides is nothing more than begging the question. He only holds those positions because he already assumes that all aspects of reality can be discovered by scientific-type investigations. But nowhere does he defend that assertion, and unfortunately that means he fails to actually defend his answer to what was supposed to be the central question of the book.
Chapter 3: Filip Buekens
Rate: 5/5
Buekens explores the possibility that nonreductive monism is consistent with the claim that physical facts determine all facts. This is a highly technical essay. I think I underlined more than I left blank. Nevertheless, it was a fascinating read. In effect, Buekens demonstrated that even if we grant scientism, it doesn't follow that all facts about something are determined by the physical identity of that thing. In other words, even if the physics of a system determines all facts about that system, it doesn't follow that the physics explains everything about that system.
Chapter 4: Taner Edis
Rate:4/5
Edis contributes an overall interesting essay. His position seems to be fair and modest. He defends scientism to a point by insisting that all valuable forms of inquiry will be continuous with the methods of science, but he strongly criticizes physicists like Lawrence Krauss who ignorantly dismiss the fields like philosophy which are not narrowly defined as scientific. While he made it clear that he was writing from a secular and politically liberal perspective, he occasionally defended the internal reasonableness of understandings coming from opposing perspectives. Nevertheless, he still appears dismissive of religious thinkers, yet provides no justification why this is appropriate.
Chapter 5: Justin Kalef
Rate: 4/5
Kalef's essay makes two main contributions to the dialogue. The first, is he demolishes the naive moral systems developed by scientism proponents Sam Harris and Michael Shermer. In both cases they fail to eliminate the philosophical assumptions that they need to. Instead, those assumptions are smuggled in using semantic tricks. The second contribution is the consideration of stronger moral approaches consistent with scientism. Here is where I think the essay falls short a bit. Kalef claims that many of these approaches are viable alternatives, but his essay reads more like a refutation of each of them. As a reader, it is hard to see why he considers these alternatives viable after his discussions of their respective challenges.
Chapter 6: Philip Kitcher
Rate: 3/5
Kitcher argues that scientism fails because real knowledge is gained in fields like history and the liberal arts. He begins by outlining some challenges to this notion, and then he goes down the line and discusses why those challenges aren't surprising, and therefore don't actually undermine the legitimacy of these non-science fields as forms of knowledge. This is a good essay, but it is a bit shallow at times. I don't think much of what Kitcher wrote would convince anyone leaning toward scientism that they ought to reconsider.
Chapter 7: Stephen Law
Rate: 2/5
Law broadly argues that while there certainly are questions that science cannot answer, this ultimately is not helpful to those wishing to justify religous or otherwise supernatural beliefs. But his essay is all over the place. Some sections are very thoughtfully crafted. One such section is his examination of the philosophical questions that seem out of the reach of science. Other sections, however, are embarrassingly shallow. Most of the second half of this essay is devoted to discussing various responses to Richard Dawkins' arguments against the existence of God. During this section, Law shows an incredible amount of ignorance about theological doctrines central to classical theism as he repeatedly claims that certain theological doctrines have been investigated by science, yet anyone familiar with the relevant doctrines will be able to spot his failed understanding instantly. So half the essay is good, while the other half is abysmal.
Chapter 8: Thomas Nickles
Rate: 4/5
Nickles provides a refreshingly interesting critique of strong realism. He argues that there are many reasons to think that the scientific models we have today are factually incorrect depictions of reality, but ultimately that doesn't matter. For Nickles, science isn't about truth; it's about reliably producing fruitful research programs. Most of the essay is well argued, however it seems Nickles takes his arguments too far when he concludes that we should have little to no confidence in the truth of our current theories. Just as he criticizes the immodesty of strong realists, I think Nickels takes his anti realism to the point of immodesty as well.
Chapter 9: Rik Peels
Rate: 5/5
Peels presents an argument that if scientism is true, it would follow that science should be discarded. In essence, he shows how science relies on non-scienctific knowledge and if that knowledge must be thrown out then science itself must also be thrown out. Peels writes with an incredible amount of clarity and precision. He presents his argument in a formal syllogism, which really helps map out his thinking for the reader. He then considers alternative understandings of scientism that arguably are not susceptible to his main argument. In his response, he is concise and modest. This is an excellent essay.
Chapter 10: Massimo Pigliucci
Rate: 4/5
Pigliucci takes a middle of the road approach to scientism. He structures his essay as an assessment of Susan Haack's six signs of scientism. Some he agreed with. Others he disagreed with. The content of his assessment focuses on the demarcation between science and pseudoscience, and how discussing that demarcation provides insight into how to think about scientism. In the end, he agrees that scientism is a problem when used by scientists who want to expand their influence beyond what is appropriate. But he also holds that that scientism is too often used as a baseless accusation by those who subscribe to traditionally pseudoscientific positions. In the end, this is a fair and thoughtful discussion.
Chapter 11: Alex Rosenberg
Rate: 3/5
I was pleasantly surprised by this essay. I have heard Rosenberg in speeches and debates, and I've always been unimpressed. His arguments were weak and he lacked professionalism. With that said, I was not looking forward to this essay. However, Rosenberg does an excellent job outlining the problems that proponents of scientism have to solve. In fact, I plan on using much of what he wrote in my presentations against scientism. He really made scientism seem like an intellectually bankrupt position that one needs to force themselves to believe despite all logic and reason. The confusing part is that Rosenberg is a proponent of scientism. In the final paragraphs he sketches a couple of options for resolving to the problems he raised earlier. But these are all really weak. What is worse, he hand waves all the problems with scientism away as not real problems. Instead, he just asserts, without defense, that these are simply the foundations of science scientism's research program. It comes off as though Rosenberg only holds to scientism because he wants it to be true, and he's willing to pay any intellectual sacrifice to do so. Had this essay been written to show the absurdity of scientism, it would have been excellent. But since Rosenberg at least thinks he did a service for scientism, it ends with a confusing feeling.
Chapter 12: Don Ross
Rate: 2/5
This essay is boring. That's about the only impression I have of it. It also seems out of place most of the time. In effect, Ross spends the entire essay discussion economics as a case study for why fear of scientism is misplaced. But his argument is confusing and hard to follow. It is also hard to see why economics is relevant to scientism. Ultimately, by the end, I was left feeling as though no significant point was made anywhere in the essay. It was a waste of 20 or so pages, so far as I can tell.
Chapter 13: Michael Ruse
Rate: 3/5
I've always liked Ruse. I think he's fair and reasonable most of the time. With that said, this is an okay essay, but it's a bit underwhelming. Ruse effectively argues why we should expect good science to have limits. He does so by explaining the significance of metaphor in scientific theories. Metaphors by their nature have limitations, but that doesn't make them any less useful for their intended purpose. For science, Ruse explains that science will never be able to answer questions of ultimate origins, morality, consciousness, and purpose. This much is a good discussion. The essay ends on a poor note, however, with a superficial discussion of why Christianity isn't a good alternative. Given the limited space Ruse spent, it'd have been better for his essay had he never discussed Christianity in the first place.
Chapter 14: Tom Sorell
Rate: 4/5
Sorell argues that it is misguided to endorse the view that the only valid practice of philosophy is the practice that engages in experimentation. Much of his essay is spent arguing why this is an unjustified position both historically and philosophically. However, the end of the essay outlines how, in some cases, it may be necessary for philosophers to engage with the empirical data as well as with those may be affected by the implications of the philosophy. Here he largely discusses the field of applied ethics, arguing that philosophers must engage with concrete rather then abstract arguments, otherwise the intended audience will find the argument useless. Though I disagree with parts of his examples (specifically his implication that Thomson's violinist analogy actually works), I found this to be an overall insightful essay.
Chapter 15: Mariam Thalos
Rate: 4/5
Thalos makes a two-part argument. One part of her argument focuses on criticizing the fallacy of reductionism that underpins much of scientistic reasoning. For example, there is the tendency within scientism to take statements like, "humans are biological" to mean "humans are biological, and nothing more." The second part of the argument, however, argues against attempts to erect and enforce strict borders between science and philosophy, allowing little to no transmission between the two. Overall, it is an interesting essay.
Chapter 1: Russell Blackford
Rate: 0/5
To be blunt, this is probably the worst essay I've read in years. Blackford claims to argue that humanistic scholarship can be sufficient and that we don't need derogatory terms like "scientism" to recognize that. Unfortunately, he provides no such argument. Instead he asserts his disagreement with various religious scholars who have written against scientism in the past. He provides very simplistic summaries of these thinkers' positions and rarely, if ever, provides a direct quotation. It is pretty clear that Blackford has uncritically adopted the position that science is inherently antagonistic toward religion. For example, he always pairs the word "supernatural" with the descriptor "and nonrational" as if the former was necessarily the latter. As a result the bulk of his essay reads like a complaint against religious thinkers and adds absolutely nothing of value to the discussion of scientific limitations.
Chapter 2: Maarten Boudry
Rate: 1/5
Boudry has some interesting thoughts. But not many. This essay adds limited value to the discussion of scientific limitations by distinguishing between practical limitations of science and epistemological limitations of science. He affirms the former but rejects the latter. The latter, of course, is what we're interested in in this discussion. Unfortunately, Boudry is also overtly anti-religious and that severely colors his argumentation. The only two areas of epistemological limitations he considers are the supernatural and the moral. He rejects the notion that these are epistemological limitations because, according to him, there is no supernatural reality and there are no moral facts. What attempted justification he provides is nothing more than begging the question. He only holds those positions because he already assumes that all aspects of reality can be discovered by scientific-type investigations. But nowhere does he defend that assertion, and unfortunately that means he fails to actually defend his answer to what was supposed to be the central question of the book.
Chapter 3: Filip Buekens
Rate: 5/5
Buekens explores the possibility that nonreductive monism is consistent with the claim that physical facts determine all facts. This is a highly technical essay. I think I underlined more than I left blank. Nevertheless, it was a fascinating read. In effect, Buekens demonstrated that even if we grant scientism, it doesn't follow that all facts about something are determined by the physical identity of that thing. In other words, even if the physics of a system determines all facts about that system, it doesn't follow that the physics explains everything about that system.
Chapter 4: Taner Edis
Rate:4/5
Edis contributes an overall interesting essay. His position seems to be fair and modest. He defends scientism to a point by insisting that all valuable forms of inquiry will be continuous with the methods of science, but he strongly criticizes physicists like Lawrence Krauss who ignorantly dismiss the fields like philosophy which are not narrowly defined as scientific. While he made it clear that he was writing from a secular and politically liberal perspective, he occasionally defended the internal reasonableness of understandings coming from opposing perspectives. Nevertheless, he still appears dismissive of religious thinkers, yet provides no justification why this is appropriate.
Chapter 5: Justin Kalef
Rate: 4/5
Kalef's essay makes two main contributions to the dialogue. The first, is he demolishes the naive moral systems developed by scientism proponents Sam Harris and Michael Shermer. In both cases they fail to eliminate the philosophical assumptions that they need to. Instead, those assumptions are smuggled in using semantic tricks. The second contribution is the consideration of stronger moral approaches consistent with scientism. Here is where I think the essay falls short a bit. Kalef claims that many of these approaches are viable alternatives, but his essay reads more like a refutation of each of them. As a reader, it is hard to see why he considers these alternatives viable after his discussions of their respective challenges.
Chapter 6: Philip Kitcher
Rate: 3/5
Kitcher argues that scientism fails because real knowledge is gained in fields like history and the liberal arts. He begins by outlining some challenges to this notion, and then he goes down the line and discusses why those challenges aren't surprising, and therefore don't actually undermine the legitimacy of these non-science fields as forms of knowledge. This is a good essay, but it is a bit shallow at times. I don't think much of what Kitcher wrote would convince anyone leaning toward scientism that they ought to reconsider.
Chapter 7: Stephen Law
Rate: 2/5
Law broadly argues that while there certainly are questions that science cannot answer, this ultimately is not helpful to those wishing to justify religous or otherwise supernatural beliefs. But his essay is all over the place. Some sections are very thoughtfully crafted. One such section is his examination of the philosophical questions that seem out of the reach of science. Other sections, however, are embarrassingly shallow. Most of the second half of this essay is devoted to discussing various responses to Richard Dawkins' arguments against the existence of God. During this section, Law shows an incredible amount of ignorance about theological doctrines central to classical theism as he repeatedly claims that certain theological doctrines have been investigated by science, yet anyone familiar with the relevant doctrines will be able to spot his failed understanding instantly. So half the essay is good, while the other half is abysmal.
Chapter 8: Thomas Nickles
Rate: 4/5
Nickles provides a refreshingly interesting critique of strong realism. He argues that there are many reasons to think that the scientific models we have today are factually incorrect depictions of reality, but ultimately that doesn't matter. For Nickles, science isn't about truth; it's about reliably producing fruitful research programs. Most of the essay is well argued, however it seems Nickles takes his arguments too far when he concludes that we should have little to no confidence in the truth of our current theories. Just as he criticizes the immodesty of strong realists, I think Nickels takes his anti realism to the point of immodesty as well.
Chapter 9: Rik Peels
Rate: 5/5
Peels presents an argument that if scientism is true, it would follow that science should be discarded. In essence, he shows how science relies on non-scienctific knowledge and if that knowledge must be thrown out then science itself must also be thrown out. Peels writes with an incredible amount of clarity and precision. He presents his argument in a formal syllogism, which really helps map out his thinking for the reader. He then considers alternative understandings of scientism that arguably are not susceptible to his main argument. In his response, he is concise and modest. This is an excellent essay.
Chapter 10: Massimo Pigliucci
Rate: 4/5
Pigliucci takes a middle of the road approach to scientism. He structures his essay as an assessment of Susan Haack's six signs of scientism. Some he agreed with. Others he disagreed with. The content of his assessment focuses on the demarcation between science and pseudoscience, and how discussing that demarcation provides insight into how to think about scientism. In the end, he agrees that scientism is a problem when used by scientists who want to expand their influence beyond what is appropriate. But he also holds that that scientism is too often used as a baseless accusation by those who subscribe to traditionally pseudoscientific positions. In the end, this is a fair and thoughtful discussion.
Chapter 11: Alex Rosenberg
Rate: 3/5
I was pleasantly surprised by this essay. I have heard Rosenberg in speeches and debates, and I've always been unimpressed. His arguments were weak and he lacked professionalism. With that said, I was not looking forward to this essay. However, Rosenberg does an excellent job outlining the problems that proponents of scientism have to solve. In fact, I plan on using much of what he wrote in my presentations against scientism. He really made scientism seem like an intellectually bankrupt position that one needs to force themselves to believe despite all logic and reason. The confusing part is that Rosenberg is a proponent of scientism. In the final paragraphs he sketches a couple of options for resolving to the problems he raised earlier. But these are all really weak. What is worse, he hand waves all the problems with scientism away as not real problems. Instead, he just asserts, without defense, that these are simply the foundations of science scientism's research program. It comes off as though Rosenberg only holds to scientism because he wants it to be true, and he's willing to pay any intellectual sacrifice to do so. Had this essay been written to show the absurdity of scientism, it would have been excellent. But since Rosenberg at least thinks he did a service for scientism, it ends with a confusing feeling.
Chapter 12: Don Ross
Rate: 2/5
This essay is boring. That's about the only impression I have of it. It also seems out of place most of the time. In effect, Ross spends the entire essay discussion economics as a case study for why fear of scientism is misplaced. But his argument is confusing and hard to follow. It is also hard to see why economics is relevant to scientism. Ultimately, by the end, I was left feeling as though no significant point was made anywhere in the essay. It was a waste of 20 or so pages, so far as I can tell.
Chapter 13: Michael Ruse
Rate: 3/5
I've always liked Ruse. I think he's fair and reasonable most of the time. With that said, this is an okay essay, but it's a bit underwhelming. Ruse effectively argues why we should expect good science to have limits. He does so by explaining the significance of metaphor in scientific theories. Metaphors by their nature have limitations, but that doesn't make them any less useful for their intended purpose. For science, Ruse explains that science will never be able to answer questions of ultimate origins, morality, consciousness, and purpose. This much is a good discussion. The essay ends on a poor note, however, with a superficial discussion of why Christianity isn't a good alternative. Given the limited space Ruse spent, it'd have been better for his essay had he never discussed Christianity in the first place.
Chapter 14: Tom Sorell
Rate: 4/5
Sorell argues that it is misguided to endorse the view that the only valid practice of philosophy is the practice that engages in experimentation. Much of his essay is spent arguing why this is an unjustified position both historically and philosophically. However, the end of the essay outlines how, in some cases, it may be necessary for philosophers to engage with the empirical data as well as with those may be affected by the implications of the philosophy. Here he largely discusses the field of applied ethics, arguing that philosophers must engage with concrete rather then abstract arguments, otherwise the intended audience will find the argument useless. Though I disagree with parts of his examples (specifically his implication that Thomson's violinist analogy actually works), I found this to be an overall insightful essay.
Chapter 15: Mariam Thalos
Rate: 4/5
Thalos makes a two-part argument. One part of her argument focuses on criticizing the fallacy of reductionism that underpins much of scientistic reasoning. For example, there is the tendency within scientism to take statements like, "humans are biological" to mean "humans are biological, and nothing more." The second part of the argument, however, argues against attempts to erect and enforce strict borders between science and philosophy, allowing little to no transmission between the two. Overall, it is an interesting essay.
March 9, 2018
Timely and relevant overview of the scientific and philosophical debate about the borders of science, its imperialist nature and the question to which extent it pre-empts other types of knowledge. Not low key, not practical. One for the geeks.
July 24, 2020
What is this beast called Scientism? This edited collection contains very diverse perspectives that in places gets technical. See my full review at https://inquisitivebiologist.com/2018...
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews