Re: language, meaning and nature

[Toby Hemenway <hemenway@jeffnet.org>]

Title: Re: language, meaning and nature

on 11/28/01 7:17 AM, souscayrous at souscayrous@wanadoo.fr wrote:

 I do question the ŒIdea of Progress¹ implicit in the scientific paradigm.

I think there are two different "ideas of progress" being discussed here. I agree with Bob that people aren't any kinder, more creative, less vicious, and the like, than they were a century or a millennium ago. But that's overall "human" progress (excuse my sloppy terminology), not the same as scientific progress. Philosophers of science like Popper, Kuhn, and Mayr talk about the progressive nature of science (the discipline of "science," if I may reify) as opposed to art. Their point is that scientists collect and compound data, build on the knowledge and theories of previous scientists, etc, and have an ever-enlarging structure that is continually revising and throwing out old theories (the ether, phlogiston, vitalism). We can say we know more about certain scientific subjects than we did 100 years ago. They contrast this with art, where we don't "throw out" Da Vinci's work, and where Greek sculpture--but not science--is still regarded as some kind of epitome. 

I don't completely agree with this; I think the "discovery" and use of perspective in painting represents a kind of progress, and I don't think the work of, say, Picasso, would have been possible without the representational art that preceded it. But the point is that science, as a body of knowledge, accumulates knowledge and constantly winnows out what has been superseded by new discoveries. Darwin's ideas of inheritance prevented him from fully formulating an effective evolutionary theory; that work had to wait for genetics to catch up. And 100 years from now, evolutionary theory will have even more explanatory power. I guess that's what scientific progress is: ever-increasing power to explain physical phenomena. But this, of course, doesn't translate into happier, kinder people, since that involves politics, morals, and all those messy human traits that have nothing to do with science.

It does, however, translate into reduced infant mortality, fewer deaths from infectious disease, higher fuel efficiency, etc.  I am very happy that my sister's asthma didn't kill her when she was young, and am I sad that a now-easily diagnosed cancer did kill her when she was 44. To me, reducing disease increases human happiness, and I think that is progress for humanity as a whole.

1000 or even 300 years ago nearly all of of humanity lived in slave states, died before age 10, was hungry most of the time, and had no recourse when the strong preyed on the weak. For about 1/3 of humanity, if not more, none of that is true any more, and I think that's progress. I don't think have become more moral or "better" as humans, but (key point) we have imposed upon ourselves mechanisms that improve our lives and make it more difficult for the ugly part of our nature to predominate. Would you want to live 300 (or 1000 or 10,000) years ago, with no teeth by age 40 (if you lived that long), 5-10 dead siblings, in raw sewage and smoke, never leaving your village, under a monarchy or strongman, with famine and plague striking every few years (see Braudel for the data)? Not me, boss. 

Toby