Physicalism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In philosophy, physicalism is the ontological thesis that "everything is physical", that there is "nothing over and above" the physical, or that everything supervenes on the physical. Physicalism is a form of ontological monism—a "one substance" view of the nature of reality as opposed to a "two-substance" (dualism) or "many-substance" (pluralism) view. Both the definition of "physical" and the meaning of physicalism have been debated.

Physicalism is closely related to materialism. Physicalism grew out of materialism with advancements of the physical sciences in explaining observed phenomena. The terms are often used interchangeably, although they are sometimes distinguished, for example on the basis of physics describing more than just matter (including energy and physical law). Common arguments against physicalism include both the philosophical zombie argument and the multiple observers argument, that the existence of a physical being may imply zero or more distinct conscious entities.

Definition of physical

The word "physicalism" was introduced into philosophy in the 1930s by Otto Neurath and Rudolf Carnap.

The use of "physical" in physicalism is a philosophical concept and can be distinguished from alternative definitions found in the literature (e.g. Karl Popper defined a physical proposition to be one which can at least in theory be denied by observation^[6]). A "physical property", in this context, may be a metaphysical or logical combination of properties which are physical in the ordinary sense. It is common to express the notion of "metaphysical or logical combination of properties" using the notion of supervenience: A property A is said to supervene on a property B if any change in A necessarily implies a change in B.^[7] Since any change in a combination of properties must consist of a change in at least one component property, we see that the combination does indeed supervene on the individual properties. The point of this extension is that physicalists usually suppose the existence of various abstract concepts which are non-physical in the ordinary sense of the word; so physicalism cannot be defined in a way that denies the existence of these abstractions. Also, physicalism defined in terms of supervenience does not entail that all properties in the actual world are type identical to physical properties. It is, therefore, compatible with multiple realizability.^[8]

From the notion of supervenience, we see that, assuming that mental, social, and biological properties supervene on physical properties, it follows that two hypothetical worlds cannot be identical in their physical properties but differ in their mental, social or biological properties.^[2]

Two common approaches to defining "physicalism" are the theory-based and object-based approaches. The theory-based conception of physicalism proposes that "a property is physical if and only if it either is the sort of property that physical theory tells us about or else is a property which metaphysically (or logically) supervenes on the sort of property that physical theory tells us about".^[2] Likewise, the object-based conception claims that "a property is physical if and only if: it either is the sort of property required by a complete account of the intrinsic nature of paradigmatic physical objects and their constituents or else is a property which metaphysically (or logically) supervenes on the sort of property required by a complete account of the intrinsic nature of paradigmatic physical objects and their constituents".

Physicalists have traditionally opted for a "theory-based" characterization of the physical either in terms of current physics,^[9] or a future (ideal) physics.^[10] These two theory-based conceptions of the physical represent both horns of Hempel's dilemma^[11] (named after the late philosopher of science and logical empiricist Carl Gustav Hempel): an argument against theory-based understandings of the physical. Very roughly, Hempel's dilemma is that if we define the physical by reference to current physics, then physicalism is very likely to be false, as it is very likely (by pessimistic meta-induction^[12]) that much of current physics is false. But if we instead define the physical in terms of a future (ideal) or completed physics, then physicalism is hopelessly vague or indeterminate.^[13]

While the force of Hempel's dilemma against theory-based conceptions of the physical remains contested,^[14] alternative "non-theory-based" conceptions of the physical have also been proposed. Frank Jackson (1998) for example, has argued in favour of the aforementioned "object-based" conception of the physical.^[15] An objection to this proposal, which Jackson himself noted in 1998, is that if it turns out that panpsychism or panprotopsychism is true, then such a non-materialist understanding of the physical gives the counterintuitive result that physicalism is, nevertheless, also true since such properties will figure in a complete account of paradigmatic examples of the physical.

David Papineau^[16] and Barbara Montero^[17] have advanced and subsequently defended^[18] a "via negativa" characterization of the physical. The gist of the via negativa strategy is to understand the physical in terms of what it is not: the mental. In other words, the via negativa strategy understands the physical as "the non-mental". An objection to the via negativa conception of the physical is that (like the object-based conception) it doesn't have the resources to distinguish neutral monism (or panprotopsychism) from physicalism.^[19]

Supervenience-based definitions of physicalism

Adopting a supervenience-based account of the physical, the definition of physicalism as "all properties are physical" can be unravelled to:

1) Physicalism is true at a possible world w if and only if any world that is a physical duplicate of w is also a duplicate of w simpliciter.^[20]

Applied to the actual world (our world), statement 1 above is the claim that physicalism is true at the actual world if and only if at every possible world in which the physical properties and laws of the actual world are instantiated, the non-physical (in the ordinary sense of the word) properties of the actual world are instantiated as well. To borrow a metaphor from Saul Kripke (1972), the truth of physicalism at the actual world entails that once God has instantiated or "fixed" the physical properties and laws of our world, then God's work is done; the rest comes "automatically".

Unfortunately, statement 1 fails to capture even a necessary condition for physicalism to be true at a world w. To see this, imagine a world in which there are only physical properties—if physicalism is true at any world it is true at this one. But one can conceive physical duplicates of such a world that are not also duplicates simpliciter of it: worlds that have the same physical properties as our imagined one, but with some additional property or properties. A world might contain "epiphenomenal ectoplasm", some additional pure experience that does not interact with the physical components of the world and is not necessitated by them (does not supervene on them). To handle the epiphenomenal ectoplasm problem, statement 1 can be modified to include a "that's-all" or "totality" clause^[23] or be restricted to "positive" properties.^[24] Adopting the former suggestion here, we can reformulate statement 1 as follows:

2) Physicalism is true at a possible world w if and only if any world that is a minimal physical duplicate of w is a duplicate of w simpliciter.^[20]

Applied in the same way, statement 2 is the claim that physicalism is true at a possible world w if and only if any world that is a physical duplicate of w (without any further changes), is duplicate of w without qualification. This allows a world in which there are only physical properties to be counted as one at which physicalism is true, since worlds in which there is some extra stuff are not "minimal" physical duplicates of such a world, nor are they minimal physical duplicates of worlds that contain some non-physical properties that are metaphysically necessitated by the physical.^[25]

But while statement 2 overcomes the problem of worlds at which there is some extra stuff (sometimes referred to as the "epiphenomenal ectoplasm problem"^[26]) it faces a different challenge: the so-called "blockers problem".^[27] Imagine a world where the relation between the physical and non-physical properties at this world (call the world w₁) is slightly weaker than metaphysical necessitation, such that a certain kind of non-physical intervener—"a blocker"—could, were it to exist at w₁, prevent the non-physical properties in w₁ from being instantiated by the instantiation of the physical properties at w₁. Since statement 2 rules out worlds which are physical duplicates of w₁ that also contain non-physical interveners by virtue of the minimality, or that's-all clause, statement 2 gives the (allegedly) incorrect result that physicalism is true at w₁. One response to this problem is to abandon statement 2 in favour of the alternative possibility mentioned earlier in which supervenience-based formulations of physicalism are restricted to what David Chalmers (1996) calls "positive properties". A positive property is one that "...if instantiated in a world W, is also instantiated by the corresponding individual in all worlds that contain W as a proper part."^[28] Following this suggestion, we can then formulate physicalism as follows:

3) Physicalism is true at a possible world w if and only if any world that is a physical duplicate of w is a positive duplicate of w.^[29]

On the face of it, statement 3 seems able to handle both the epiphenomenal ectoplasm problem and the blockers problem. With regard to the former, statement 3 gives the correct result that a purely physical world is one at which physicalism is true, since worlds in which there is some extra stuff are positive duplicates of a purely physical world. With regard to the latter, statement 3 appears to have the consequence that worlds in which there are blockers are worlds where positive non-physical properties of w₁ will be absent, hence w₁ will not be counted as a world at which physicalim is true.^[30] Daniel Stoljar (2010) objects to this response to the blockers problem on the basis that since the non-physical properties of w₁ aren't instantiated at a world in which there is a blocker, they are not positive properties in Chalmers' (1996) sense, and so statement 3 will count w₁ as a world at which physicalism is true after all.^[31]

A further problem for supervenience-based formulations of physicalism is the so-called "necessary beings problem".^[20] A necessary being in this context is a non-physical being that exists in all possible worlds (for example what theists refer to as God). A necessary being is compatible with all the definitions provided, because it is supervenient on everything; yet it is usually taken to contradict the notion that everything is physical. So any supervenience-based formulation of physicalism will at best state a necessary but not sufficient condition for the truth of physicalism.^[20]

Additional objections have been raised to the above definitions provided for supervenience physicalism: one could imagine an alternate world that differs only by the presence of a single ammonium molecule (or physical property), and yet based on statement 1, such a world might be completely different in terms of its distribution of mental properties.^[32] Furthermore, there are differences expressed concerning the modal status of physicalism; whether it is a necessary truth, or is only true in a world which conforms to certain conditions (i.e. those of physicalism).^[2]

Realisation physicalism

Closely related to supervenience physicalism, is realisation physicalism, the thesis that every instantiated property is either physical or is realised by a physical property.^[33]

Token physicalism

Token physicalism is the proposition that "for every actual particular (object, event or process) x, there is some physical particular y such that x = y". It is intended to capture the idea of "physical mechanisms".^[2] Token physicalism is compatible with property dualism, in which all substances are "physical", but physical objects may have mental properties as well as physical properties. Token physicalism is not however equivalent to supervenience physicalism. Firstly, token physicalism does not imply supervenience physicalism because the former does not rule out the possibility of non-supervenient properties (provided that they are associated only with physical particulars). Secondarily, supervenience physicalism does not imply token physicalism, for the former allows supervenient objects (such as a "nation", or "soul") that are not equal to any physical object.

Reductionism and emergentism

Reductionism

There are multiple versions of reductionism.^[2] In the context of physicalism, the reductions referred to are of a "linguistic" nature, allowing discussions of, say, mental phenomena to be translated into discussions of physics. In one formulation, every concept is analysed in terms of a physical concept. One counter-argument to this supposes there may be an additional class of expressions which is non-physical but which increases the expressive power of a theory.^[34] Another version of reductionism is based on the requirement that one theory (mental or physical) be logically derivable from a second.^[35]

The combination of reductionism and physicalism is usually called reductive physicalism in the philosophy of mind. The opposite view is non-reductive physicalism. Reductive physicalism is the view that mental states are both nothing over and above physical states and reducible to physical states. One version of reductive physicalism is type physicalism or mind-body identity theory. Type physicalism asserts that "for every actually instantiated property F, there is some physical property G such that F=G".^[2] Unlike token physicalism, type physicalism entails supervenience physicalism.

A common argument against reductive physicalism is multiple realizability, the possibility that a psychological process (say) could be instantiated by many different neurological processes (even non-neurological processes, in the case of machine or alien intelligence).^[32][36] For in this case, the neurological terms translating a psychological term must be disjunctions over the possible instantiations, and it is argued that no physical law can use these disjunctions as terms.^[36] Type physicalism was the original target of the multiple realizability argument.^[37]

Emergentism

There are two versions of emergentism, the strong version and the weak version. Supervenience physicalism has been seen as a strong version of emergentism, in which the subject's psychological experience is considered genuinely novel.^[2] Non-reductive physicalism, on the other side, is a weak version of emergentism because it does not need that the subject's psychological experience be novel. The strong version of emergentism is incompatible with physicalism. Since there are novel mental states, mental states are not nothing over and above physical states. However, the weak version of emergentism is compatible with physicalism.

We can see that emergentism is actually a very broad view. Some forms of emergentism appear either incompatible with physicalism or equivalent to it (e.g. posteriori physicalism),^[38] others appear to merge both dualism and supervenience. Emergentism compatible with dualism claims that mental states and physical states are metaphysically distinct while maintaining the supervenience of mental states on physical states. This proposition however contradicts supervenience physicalism, which asserts a denial of dualism.

A priori versus a posteriori physicalism

Physicalists hold that physicalism is true. A natural question for physicalists, then, is whether the truth of physicalism is deducible a priori from the nature of the physical world (i.e., the inference is justified independently of experience, even though the nature of the physical world can itself only be determined through experience) or can only be deduced a posteriori (i.e., the justification of the inference itself is dependent upon experience). So-called "a priori physicalists" hold that from knowledge of the conjunction of all physical truths, a totality or that's-all truth (to rule out non-physical epiphenomena, and enforce the closure of the physical world), and some primitive indexical truths such as "I am A" and "now is B", the truth of physicalism is knowable a priori.^[39] Let "P" stand for the conjunction of all physical truths and laws, "T" for a that's-all truth, "I" for the indexical "centering" truths, and "N" for any [presumably non-physical] truth at the actual world. We can then, using the material conditional "→", represent a priori physicalism as the thesis that PTI → N is knowable a priori.^[39] An important wrinkle here is that the concepts in N must be possessed non-deferentially in order for PTI → N to be knowable a priori. The suggestion, then, is that possession of the concepts in the consequent, plus the empirical information in the antecedent is sufficient for the consequent to be knowable a priori.

An "a posteriori physicalist", on the other hand, will reject the claim that PTI → N is knowable a priori. Rather, they would hold that the inference from PTI to N is justified by metaphysical considerations that in turn can be derived from experience. So the claim then is that "PTI and not N" is metaphysically impossible.

One commonly issued challenge to a priori physicalism and to physicalism in general is the "conceivability argument", or zombie argument.^[40] At a rough approximation, the conceivability argument runs as follows:

P1) PTI and not Q (where "Q" stands for the conjunction of all truths about consciousness, or some "generic" truth about someone being "phenomenally" conscious [i.e., there is "something it is like"^[41] to be a person x] ) is conceivable (i.e., it is not knowable a priori that PTI and not Q is false).

P2) If PTI and not Q is conceivable, then PTI and not Q is metaphysically possible.

P3) If PTI and not Q is metaphysically possible then physicalism is false.

C) Physicalism is false.^[42]

Here proposition P3 is a direct application of the supervenience of consciousness, and hence of any supervenience-based version of physicalism: If PTI and not Q is possible, there is some possible world where it is true. This world differs from [the relevant indexing on] our world, where PTIQ is true. But the other world is a minimal physical duplicate of our world, because PT is true there. So there is a possible world which is a minimal physical duplicate of our world, but not a full duplicate; this contradicts the definition of physicalism that we saw above.

Since a priori physicalists hold that PTI → N is a priori, they are committed to denying P1) of the conceivability argument. The a priori physicalist, then, must argue that PTI and not Q, on ideal rational reflection, is incoherent or contradictory.^[43]

A posteriori physicalists, on the other hand, generally accept P1) but deny P2)--the move from "conceivability to metaphysical possibility". Some a posteriori physicalists think that unlike the possession of most, if not all other empirical concepts, the possession of consciousness has the special property that the presence of PTI and the absence of consciousness will be conceivable—even though, according to them, it is knowable a posteriori that PTI and not Q is not metaphysically possible. These a posteriori physicalists endorse some version of what Daniel Stoljar (2005) has called "the phenomenal concept strategy".^[44] Roughly speaking, the phenomenal concept strategy is a label for those a posteriori physicalists who attempt to show that it is only the concept of consciousness—not the property—that is in some way "special" or sui generis.^[45] Other a posteriori physicalists^[46] eschew the phenomenal concept strategy, and argue that even ordinary macroscopic truths such as "water covers 60% of the earth's surface" are not knowable a priori from PTI and a non-deferential grasp of the concepts "water" and "earth" et cetera. If this is correct, then we should (arguably) conclude that conceivability does not entail metaphysical possibility, and P2) of the conceivability argument against physicalism is false.^[47]

Other views

Strawsonian physicalism

Galen Strawson's realistic physicalism (or "realistic monism") entails panpsychism – or at least micropsychism. Strawson argues that "many—perhaps most—of those who call themselves physicalists or materialists [are mistakenly] committed to the thesis that physical stuff is, in itself, in its fundamental nature, something wholly and utterly non-experiential... even when they are prepared to admit with Eddington that physical stuff has, in itself, 'a nature capable of manifesting itself as mental activity', i.e. as experience or consciousness".^[48] Because experiential phenomena allegedly cannot be emergent from wholly non-experiential phenomena, philosophers are driven to substance dualism, property dualism, eliminative materialism and "all other crazy attempts at wholesale mental-to-non-mental reduction".^[48]

Real physicalists must accept that at least some ultimates are intrinsically experience-involving. They must at least embrace micropsychism. Given that everything concrete is physical, and that everything physical is constituted out of physical ultimates, and that experience is part of concrete reality, it seems the only reasonable position, more than just an 'inference to the best explanation'... Micropsychism is not yet panpsychism, for as things stand realistic physicalists can conjecture that only some types of ultimates are intrinsically experiential. But they must allow that panpsychism may be true, and the big step has already been taken with micropsychism, the admission that at least some ultimates must be experiential. 'And were the inmost essence of things laid open to us' I think that the idea that some but not all physical ultimates are experiential would look like the idea that some but not all physical ultimates are spatio-temporal (on the assumption that spacetime is indeed a fundamental feature of reality). I would bet a lot against there being such radical heterogeneity at the very bottom of things. In fact (to disagree with my earlier self) it is hard to see why this view would not count as a form of dualism... So now I can say that physicalism, i.e. real physicalism, entails panexperientialism or panpsychism. All physical stuff is energy, in one form or another, and all energy, I trow, is an experience-involving phenomenon. This sounded crazy to me for a long time, but I am quite used to it, now that I know that there is no alternative short of 'substance dualism'... Real physicalism, realistic physicalism, entails panpsychism, and whatever problems are raised by this fact are problems a real physicalist must face.^[48]

— Galen Strawson, Consciousness and Its Place in Nature: Does Physicalism Entail Panpsychism?

Politicization of science

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The politicization of science is the manipulation of science for political gain. It occurs when government, business, or advocacy groups use legal or economic pressure to influence the findings of scientific research or the way it is disseminated, reported or interpreted. The politicization of science may also negatively affect academic and scientific freedom. Historically, groups have conducted various campaigns to promote their interests in defiance of scientific consensus, and in an effort to manipulate public policy. Since science debate is never settled, the next hot shot scientist is welcome to try to disprove Einstein's theories for yet once more, the umpteenth, uncountable time, this is not disallowed by science. On the other hand, policy makers are required to take timely action regardless of the raging debates and/or apparent credibility of alternative viewpoints. Politics cannot be completely divorced from policy.

Overview

Many factors can act as facets of the politicization of science. These can range, for example, from populist anti-intellectualism and perceived threats to religious belief to postmodernist subjectivism and fear for business interests.^[4]

Politicization occurs as scientific information is presented with emphasis on the uncertainty associated with the scientific evidence. The emphasis capitalizes on the lack of consensus, which influences the way the studies are perceived.^[5] Chris Mooney describes how this point is sometimes intentionally ignored as a part an "Orwellian tactic." Organizations and politicians seek to disclaim all discussion on some issues as 'the more probable conclusion is still uncertain' as opposed to 'conclusions are most scientifically likely' ^[6] in order to further discredit scientific studies.

Tactics such as shifting conversation, failing to acknowledge facts, and capitalizing on doubt of scientific consensus have been used to gain more attention for views that have been undermined by scientific evidence. "Merchants of Doubt," ideology-based interest groups that claim expertise on scientific issues, have ran successful "disinformation campaigns" in which they highlight the inherent uncertainty of science to cast doubt on scientific issues such as human-caused climate change, even though the scientific community has reached virtual consensus that humans play a role in climate change.^[7]

William R. Freudenburg and colleagues have written about politicization of science as a rhetorical technique and states that it is an attempt to shift the burden of proof in an argument. ^[8]He offers the example of cigarette lobbyists opposing laws that would discourage smoking. The lobbyists trivialize evidence as uncertain, emphasizing lack of conclusion. Freudenberg concludes that politicians and lobby groups are too often able to make "successful efforts to argue for full 'scientific certainty' before a regulation can be said to be 'justified' and maintain that what is needed is a balanced approach that carefully considers the risks of both Type 1 and Type 2 errors in a situation while noting that scientific conclusions are always tentative. ^[9]

President of the American Council on Science and Health Hank Campbell and microbiologist Alex Berezow have described "feel-good fallacies" used in politics, where politicians frame their positions in a way that makes people feel good about supporting certain policies even when scientific evidence shows there is no need to worry or there is no need for dramatic change on current programs. They have claimed that progressives have had these kinds of issues with policies involving genetically modified foods, vaccination, overpopulation, use of animals in research, nuclear energy, and other topics.

Politicization by advocacy groups

Global warming

Both mainstream climatologists and their critics have accused each other of politicizing the science behind climate change. There is a scientific consensus that global surface temperatures have increased in recent decades and that the trend is caused primarily by human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases.

In 1991, a US corporate coalition including the National Coal Association, the Western Fuels Association and Edison Electrical Institute created a public relations organization called the "Information Council on the Environment" (ICE). ICE launched a $500,000 advertising campaign to, in ICE's own words, "reposition global warming as theory (not fact)." Critics of industry groups have charged that the claims about a global warming controversy are part of a deliberate effort to reduce the impact any international treaty, such as the Kyoto Protocol, might have on their business interests.^[13]

In June 2005, John Vidal, environment editor of The Guardian, asserted the existence of US State Department papers showing that the Bush administration thanked Exxon executives for the company's "active involvement" in helping to determine climate change policy, including the US stance on Kyoto. Input from the industry advocacy group Global Climate Coalition was also a factor.^[14]

In 2006, Guardian columnist George Monbiot reported that according to data found in official Exxon documents, 124 organizations have taken money from ExxonMobil or worked closely with those that have, and that "These organizations take a consistent line on climate change: that the science is contradictory, the scientists are split, environmentalists are charlatans, liars or lunatics, and if governments took action to prevent global warming, they would be endangering the global economy for no good reason. The findings these organisations dislike are labelled 'junk science'. The findings they welcome are labelled 'sound science'." The "selective use of data", cherry picking, is identified as a notable form of scientific abuse by the Pacific Institute, an organization created to provide independent research and policy analysis on issues at the intersection of development, environment, and security.

Intelligent design

The intelligent design movement associated with the Discovery Institute, attempts to "defeat [the] materialist world view" represented by the theory of evolution in favor of "a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions".^[18] The Discovery Institute portrays evolution as a "theory in crisis" with scientists criticizing evolution and that "fairness" and "equal time" requires educating students about "the controversy."
One of the most reliable and empirically tested theories in science is that all forms of life on Earth are related by common descent with modification.^[19] Accordingly, any controversial aspects of evolution are a matter of religion and politics, not science. The 2005 ruling in the Dover trial, Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, where the claims of intelligent design proponents were considered by a United States federal court concluded that intelligent design is not science, that it "cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents", and concluded that the school district's promotion of it therefore violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.^[21]

In 2006 the scientific journal Science published survey finding that the U.S. ranks second from last in acceptance of the theory of evolution among thirty-four developed countries surveyed. The article said: "The acceptance of evolution is lower in the United States than in Japan or Europe, largely because of widespread fundamentalism and the politicization of science in the United States."^[22]

Tobacco and cancer

A cigarette carton warns about the health risks of smoking. Public awareness was delayed by a SCAM (Scientific Certainty Argumentation Method).^[23]

By the mid-1950s there was a scientific consensus that smoking promotes lung cancer, but the tobacco industry fought the findings, both in the public eye and within the scientific community. Tobacco companies funded think tanks and lobbying groups, started health reassurance campaigns, ran advertisements in medical journals, and researched alternate explanations for lung cancer, such as pollution, asbestos and even pet birds. Denying the case against tobacco was "closed," they called for more research as a tactic to delay regulation.^[24] John Horgan, notes a rhetoric tactic that has been used by tobacco companies. It is summarized in a line that appeared in a confidential memo from a tobacco company, in 1969, when they sought to cast doubt on evidence that supports smoking causes cancer. It read, "Doubt is our product since it is the best means of competing with the 'body of fact' that exists in the mind of the general public. It is also the means of establishing a controversy."

Eugenics

Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler was well known for eugenics programs which attempted to maintain a "pure" German race through a series of programs that ran under the banner of Racial Hygiene. The Nazis manipulated scientific research in Germany, by forcing some scholars to emigrate, and by allocating funding for research based on ideological rather than scientific merit.

In the early 20th century, Eugenics enjoyed substantial international support, from leading politicians and scientists. The First International Congress of Eugenics in 1912 was supported by many prominent persons, including: its president Leonard Darwin, the son of Charles Darwin; honorary vice-president Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty and future Prime Minister of the United Kingdom; Auguste Forel, famous Swiss pathologist; Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone; among other prominent people.

The level of support for Eugenics research by the Nazis prompted an American Eugenics advocate to seek an expansion of the American program, with the complaint that "the Germans are beating us at our own game".

There was a strong connection between American and Nazi Eugenics research. Nazis based their Eugenics program on the United States' programs of forced sterilization, especially on the eugenics laws that had been enacted in California.

Government politicization

Soviet Union

In the Soviet Union, scientific research was under strict political control. A number of research areas were declared "bourgeois pseudoscience" and forbidden. This has led to significant setbacks for the Soviet science, notably in biology due to ban on genetics (see "Lysenkoism") and in computer science, which drastically influenced the Soviet economy and technology.

United States

The General Social Survey (GSS) of 1974 recorded that conservatives had the highest rates of trust in science between the three major political demographics; conservatives, liberals, and moderates. This study was repeated annually between 1972 through 1994, and biannually from 1994 until 2010. In 2010 when the same study was repeated, conservatives trust rates had decreased from 49% to 38%, moderates from 45% to 40%, and liberals staying relatively stable, rising slightly from 48% to 50%.

The study by Gordon Gauchat, which investigates time trends in the public trust of science in the United States, suggests that the increase of distrust of conservatives can be attributed to the two cultural shifts. The first was during the post-Reagan era when the NR emerged, and the second during the G.W. Bush era when the NR intensified and conservatives commenced the “war on science”.
Barack Obama and other politicians, since Bush’s Presidency, have expressed their concerns with the politicization of science in both the public and government sphere. In 2011, during his State of the Union speech, Obama discussed his dissatisfaction of the relationships between organized science, private economic interests, and the government.

The data collected in this study reveals the Public Trust in Science, the Public Confidence in Science, and the Predicted Probabilities between Liberals and Conservatives. The survey examines variables including gender, ethnicity, level of education, income, religion, age, political party preference, political demographics, and changes over time. Conclusively, the empirical findings of this study have shown that that although the distrust of conservatives has increased over time, the overall public trust in science has not changed since the 1970s.

George W. Bush administration

In 2004, The Denver Post reported that the George W. Bush administration "has installed more than 100 top officials who were once lobbyists, attorneys or spokespeople for the industries they oversee." At least 20 of these former industry advocates helped their agencies write, shape or push for policy shifts that benefit their former industries. "They knew which changes to make because they had pushed for them as industry advocates."

Also in 2004, the scientific advocacy group Union of Concerned Scientists issued a report, Scientific Integrity in Policymaking: An Investigation into the Bush Administration's Misuse of Science which charged the following:

A growing number of scientists, policy makers, and technical specialists both inside and outside the government allege that the current Bush administration has suppressed or distorted the scientific analyses of federal agencies to bring these results in line with administration policy. In addition, these experts contend that irregularities in the appointment of scientific advisors and advisory panels are threatening to upset the legally mandated balance of these bodies.

A petition, signed on February 18, 2004, by more than 9,000 scientists, including 49 Nobel laureates and 63 National Medal of Science recipients, followed the report. The petition stated:

When scientific knowledge has been found to be in conflict with its political goals, the administration has often manipulated the process through which science enters into its decisions. This has been done by placing people who are professionally unqualified or who have clear conflicts of interest in official posts and on scientific advisory committees; by disbanding existing advisory committees; by censoring and suppressing reports by the government’s own scientists; and by simply not seeking independent scientific advice. Other administrations have, on occasion, engaged in such practices, but not so systematically nor on so wide a front. Furthermore, in advocating policies that are not scientifically sound, the administration has sometimes misrepresented scientific knowledge and misled the public about the implications of its policies.

The same year, Francesca Grifo, executive director of the Union of Concerned Scientists' Scientific Integrity Program, stated "We have reports that stay in draft form and don't get out to the public. We have reports that are changed. We have reports that are ignored and overwritten."

In response to criticisms, President Bush in 2006 unveiled a campaign in his State of the Union Address to promote scientific research and education to ensure American competitiveness in the world, vowing to "double the federal commitment to the most critical basic research programs in the physical sciences over the next 10 years."

Surgeon General

Richard Carmona, the first surgeon general appointed by President George W. Bush, publicly accused the administration in July 2007 of political interference and muzzling him on key issues like embryonic stem cell research.

"Anything that doesn't fit into the political appointees' ideological, theological or political agenda is often ignored, marginalized or simply buried," Carmona testified.

Although he did not make personal accusations, the Washington Post reported on July 29 that the official who blocked at least one of Carmona's reports was William R. Steiger.

Food and Drug Administration

In July 2006 the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) released survey results that demonstrate pervasive political influence of science at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Of the 997 FDA scientists who responded to the survey, nearly one fifth (18 percent) said that they "have been asked, for non-scientific reasons, to inappropriately exclude or alter technical information or their conclusions in a FDA scientific document." This is the third survey Union of Concerned Scientists has conducted to examine inappropriate interference with science at federal agencies.

The Department of Health and Human Services also conducted a survey addressing the same topic which generated similar findings.^[44] According to USA Today, a survey of Food and Drug Administration scientists by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and the Union of Concerned Scientists found that many scientists have been pressured to approve or reject new drugs despite their scientific findings concerns.^[44] In July 2006, the Union of Concerned Scientists released survey results that they said "demonstrate pervasive political influence of science" at the Food and Drug Administration.

United States Department of the Interior

On May 1, 2007, deputy assistant secretary at the United States Department of the Interior Julie MacDonald resigned after the Interior Department Inspector General, Honorable Earl E. Devaney, reported that MacDonald broke federal rules by giving non-public, internal government documents to oil industry and property rights groups, and manipulated scientific findings to favor Bush policy goals and assist land developers.^[47] On November 29, 2007, another report by Devaney found that MacDonald could have also benefitted financially from a decision she was involved with to remove the Sacramento splittail fish from the federal endangered species list.

MacDonald's conduct violated the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) under 5 C.F.R. § 2635.703, Use of nonpublic information, and 5 C.F.R. § 2635.101, Basic obligation of public service.^[49] MacDonald resigned a week before a House congressional oversight committee was to hold a hearing on accusations that she had "violated the Endangered Species Act, censored science and mistreated staff of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service."

Climate Change

In December 2007, the Christian Science Monitor reported that at least since 2003, and especially after Hurricane Katrina, the George W. Bush administration broadly attempted to control which climate scientists could speak with reporters, as well as edited scientists' congressional testimony on climate science and key legal opinions. Those who have studied organizations that set up to delay action and manufacture uncertainty about the well-established scientific consensus have divided their tactics into three steps: first, deny that there is a problem, second, make the case that there are benefits involved, and, third, insist that there is nothing that can be done.

In a study, "The legitimacy of environmental scientists in the public sphere" by Gordon Gauchat, Timothy O’Brien, and Oriol Mirosa, the researchers conclude that attitudes about environmental scientists as policy advisers are highly politicized. Their results demonstrate that, to be perceived by the public as a reputable policy advisor, the public's perception of their integrity and understanding weigh more strongly than their agreement with scientific consensus.

Waxman report

In August 2003, United States, Democratic Congressman Henry A. Waxman and the staff of the Government Reform Committee released a report concluding that the administration of George W. Bush had politicized science and sex education. The report accuses the administration of modifying performance measures for abstinence-based programs to make them look more effective. The report also found that the Bush administration had appointed Dr. Joseph McIlhaney, a prominent advocate of abstinence-only program, to the Advisory Committee to the director of the Centers for Disease Control. According to the report, information about comprehensive sex education was removed from the CDC's website.

Other issues considered for removal included agricultural pollution, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and breast cancer; the report found that a National Cancer Institute website has been changed to reflect the administration view that there may be a risk of breast cancer associated with abortions. The website was updated after protests and now holds that no such risk has been found in recent, well-designed studies.

Abortion–breast cancer hypothesis

The abortion-breast cancer hypothesis is the belief that induced abortions increase the risk of developing breast cancer.^[55] This belief is in contrast to the scientific consensus that there is no evidence suggesting that abortions can cause breast cancer. Despite the scientific community rejecting the hypothesis, many pro-life advocates continue to argue that a link between abortions and breast cancer exists, in an effort to influence public policy and opinion to further restrict abortions and discourage women from having abortions.^[59] While historically a controversial hypothesis, the debate now is almost entirely political rather than scientific.

The most notable example of the politicization of this topic was the modification of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) fact sheet by the George W. Bush administration from concluding no link to a more ambiguous assessment regarding the abortion-breast cancer hypothesis,^[58] despite the NCI's scientifically-based assessment to the contrary.

United States House Science Subcommittee on Oversight

In January 2007, the U.S. House Committee on Science, Space and Technology announced the formation of a new subcommittee, the Science Subcommittee on Oversight, which handles investigative and oversight activities on matters covering the committee's entire jurisdiction. The subcommittee has authority to look into a whole range of important issues, particularly those concerning manipulation of scientific data at Federal agencies.

In an interview, subcommittee chairman Rep. Brad Miller pledged to investigate scientific integrity concerns under the Bush Administration. Miller noted that there were multiple reports in the media of the Bush Administration's manipulation of science to advance his political agenda, corrupt advisory panels, and minimize scientific research with federal funds. Miller, as part of the House Committee of Science and Technology, collected evidence of interference with scientific integrity by Bush's political appointees.

Donald Trump administration

The issue of politicized science surfaced again during the 2016 United States presidential campaign by then Republican candidate Donald Trump. Trump stated his intention to strip NASA's Earth Science division of its funding, a move that The Guardian writes "would mean the elimination of NASA's world-renowned research into temperature, ice, clouds and other climate phenomena".

Dedications and holidays

On January 22, 2013, New Jersey Representative Rush D. Holt, Jr., a Quaker Christian and nuclear physicist, introduced a resolution to the United States Congress designating February 12, 2013 (Charles Darwin's 204th birthday) as "Darwin Day" in order to recognize "the importance of sciences in the betterment of humanity".

Scholarly studies of the politics of science

The politicization of science is a subset of a broader topic, the politics of science, which has been studied by scholars in a variety of fields, including most notably Science and Technology Studies; history of science; political science; and the sociology of science, knowledge, and technology. Increasingly in recent decades, these fields have examined the process through which science and technology are shaped. Some of the scholarly work in this area is reviewed in The Handbook of Science & Technology Studies (1995, 2008), a collection of literature reviews published by the Society for Social Studies of Science. There is an annual award for books relevant to the politics of science given by the Society for Social Studies of Science called the Rachel Carson Prize.

Antiscience

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Antiscience is a position that rejects science and the scientific method. People holding antiscientific views do not accept that science as an objective method can generate universal knowledge. They also contend that scientific reductionism in particular is an inherently limited means to reach understanding of a complex world.

History

In the beginnings of the scientific revolution, scientists such as Robert Boyle found themselves in conflict with those such as Thomas Hobbes, who were skeptical of whether science was a satisfactory way to obtain genuine knowledge about the world.

Hobbes' stance is sometimes regarded as an antiscience position:

In his Six Lessons to the Professors of Mathematics,...[published in 1656, Hobbes] distinguished 'demonstrable' fields, as 'those the construction of the subject whereof is in the power of the artist himself,' from 'indemonstrable' ones 'where the causes are to seek for.' We can only know the causes of what we make. So geometry is demonstrable, because 'the lines and figures from which we reason are drawn and described by ourselves' and 'civil philosophy is demonstrable, because we make the commonwealth ourselves.' But we can only speculate about the natural world, because 'we know not the construction, but seek it from the effects.'^[2]

It was also Hobbes who "put forth the idea of the significance of the nonrational in human behaviour."^[3] Jones goes on to group Hobbes along with others he classes as 'antireductionists' and 'individualists,' such as Wilhelm Dilthey, Karl Marx, Jeremy Bentham and J S Mill, and then he adds Karl Popper, John Rawls, and E. O. Wilson.^[4]

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in his Discourse on the Arts and Sciences, claimed that science can lead to immorality. "Rousseau argues that the progression of the sciences and arts has caused the corruption of virtue and morality" and his "critique of science has much to teach us about the dangers involved in our political commitment to scientific progress, and about the ways in which the future happiness of mankind might be secured".^[5] Nevertheless, Rousseau does not state in his Discourses that sciences are necessarily bad, and states that figures like René Descartes, Francis Bacon, and Isaac Newton should be held in high regard. In the conclusion to the Discourses, he says that these (aforementioned) can cultivate sciences to great benefit, and that morality's corruption is mostly because of society's bad influence on scientists.

William Blake reacted strongly against the work of Isaac Newton in his paintings and writings, and is seen as being perhaps the earliest (and almost certainly the most prominent and enduring) example of what is seen by historians as the aesthetic or romantic antiscience response. For example, in his 1795 poem Auguries of Innocence, Blake describes the beautiful and natural robin redbreast imprisoned by the materialistic cage of Newtonian mathematics and science.^[6] In Blake's painting of Newton, he is depicted "as a misguided hero whose gaze was directed only at sterile geometrical diagrams drawn on the ground".^[7] Blake thought that "Newton, Bacon, and Locke with their emphasis on reason were nothing more than 'the three great teachers of atheism, or Satan's Doctrine'...the picture progresses from exuberance and colour on the left, to sterility and blackness on the right. In Blake's view Newton brings not light, but night".^[8] In a poem, W.H. Auden summarises Blake's anti-scientific views by saying that he "[broke] off relations in a curse, with the Newtonian Universe".^[9]

One recent biographer of Newton^[10] considers him more as a renaissance alchemist, natural philosopher, and magician rather than a true representative of scientific illuminism, as popularized by Voltaire and other illuminist Newtonians.

Antiscience issues are seen as a fundamental consideration in the transition from 'pre-science' or 'protoscience' such as that evident in alchemy. Many disciplines that pre-date the widespread adoption and acceptance of the scientific method, such as geometry and astronomy, are not seen as anti-science. However, some of the orthodoxies within those disciplines that predate a scientific approach (such as those orthodoxies repudiated by the discoveries of Galileo) are seen as being a product of an anti-scientific stance.

Friedrich Nietzsche stated within The Gay Science that “in Science, convictions have no rights of citizenship, as is said with good reason. Only when they decide to descend to the modesty of a hypothesis, of a provisional experimental point of view, of a regulative fiction, maybe they be granted admission and even a certain value within the realm of knowledge—though always with the restriction that they remain under police supervision, under the police of mistrust. But does this not mean, more precisely considered, that a conviction may obtain admission to Science only when it ceases to be a conviction? Would not the discipline of the scientific spirit begin with this, no longer to permit oneself any convictions? Probably that is how it is. But one must still ask whether it is not the case that, in order that this discipline could begin, a conviction must have been there already, and even such a commanding and unconditional one that it sacrificed all other convictions for its own sake. It is clear that Science too rests on a faith; there is no Science ‘without presuppositions.’ The question whether truth is needed must not only have been affirmed in advance, but affirmed to the extent that the principle, the faith, the conviction is expressed: ‘nothing is needed more than truth, and in relation to it, everything else has only second-rate value.”^[11]

The term 'scientism' derives from science studies and is a term spawned and used by sociologists and philosophers of science to describe the views, beliefs and behavior of strong supporters of science. It is commonly used in a pejorative sense, for individuals who seem to be treating science in a similar way to a religion. The term reductionism is occasionally used in a similarly pejorative way (as a more subtle attack on scientists). However, some scientists feel comfortable being labelled as reductionists, while agreeing that there might be conceptual and philosophical shortcomings of reductionism.^[12]

However, non-reductionist (see Emergentism) views of science have been formulated in varied forms in several scientific fields like statistical physics, chaos theory, complexity theory, cybernetics, systems theory, systems biology, ecology, information theory, etc. Such fields tend to assume that strong interaction between units produce new phenomena in higher levels that cannot be accounted for solely by reductionism. For example, it is not valuable (or currently possible) to describe a chess game or gene networks using quantum mechanics. The emergentist view of science ("More is Different", in the words of Nobel physicist Philip W. Anderson)^[13] has been inspired in its methodology by the European social sciences (Durkheim, Marx) which tend to reject methodological individualism.^{[citation needed]}

Political

Left-wing

One expression of antiscience is the "denial of universality and... legitimisation of alternatives",^{[citation needed]} and that the results of scientific findings do not always represent any underlying reality, but can merely reflect the ideology of dominant groups within society.^[14] In this view, science is associated with the political Right and is seen as a belief system that is conservative and conformist, that suppresses innovation, that resists change and that acts dictatorially. This includes the view, for example, that science has a "bourgeois and/or Eurocentric and/or masculinist world-view".^[15]

The anti-nuclear movement, often associated with the left,^[16][17][18] has been criticized for overstating the negative effects of nuclear power,^[19][20] and understating the environmental costs of non-nuclear sources that can be prevented through nuclear energy.^[21] Many scientific fields which straddle the boundary between the biological and social sciences have also experienced resistance from the left, such as sociobiology,^[22] evolutionary psychology,^[23] and population genetics.^[24] This is due to the perceived association of these sciences with scientific racism^[25] and neocolonialism.^[24] Many critics of these fields, such as Stephen Jay Gould, have been accused of having strong political biases,^[26] and engaging in "mob science".^[27]

Right-wing

The origin of antiscience thinking may be traced back to the reaction of Romanticism to the Enlightenment, this movement is often referred to as the 'Counter-Enlightenment'. Romanticism emphasizes that intuition, passion and organic links to Nature are primal values and that rational thinking is merely a product of human life. There are many modern examples of conservative antiscience polemics. Primary among the latter are the polemics about evolutionary theory^[28] and modern cosmology teaching in high schools, and environmental issues related to global warming^[29][30] and energy crisis.

Characteristics of antiscience associated with the right include the appeal to conspiracy theories to explain why scientists believe what they believe,^[31] in an attempt to undermine the confidence or power usually associated to science (e.g. in global warming conspiracy theories).

Religious

In this context, antiscience may be considered dependent on religious, moral and cultural arguments. For this kind of religious antiscience philosophy, science is an anti-spiritual and materialistic force that undermines traditional values, ethnic identity and accumulated historical wisdom in favor of reason and cosmopolitanism. In particular, the traditional and ethnic values emphasized are similar to those of white supremacist Christian Identity theology, but similar right-wing views have been developed by radically conservative sects of Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism. New religious movements such as New Age thinking also criticize the scientific worldview as favouring a reductionist, atheist, or materialist philosophy.
A frequent basis of antiscientific sentiment is religious theism with literal interpretations of sacred text. Here, scientific theories that conflict with what is considered divinely-inspired knowledge are regarded as flawed. Over the centuries religious institutions have been hesitant to embrace such ideas as heliocentrism and planetary motion because they contradicted the dominant understanding of various passages of scripture. More recently the body of creation theologies known collectively as creationism, including the teleological theory of intelligent design, have been promoted by religious theists in response to the process of evolution by natural selection.^[32]

Areas

Historically, antiscience first arose as a reaction against scientific materialism. The 18th century Enlightenment had ushered in "the ideal of a unified system of all the sciences",^[33] but there were those fearful of this notion, who "felt that constrictions of reason and science, of a single all-embracing system... were in some way constricting, an obstacle to their vision of the world, chains on their imagination or feeling".^[33] Antiscience then is a rejection of "the scientific model [or paradigm]... with its strong implication that only that which was quantifiable, or at any rate, measurable... was real".^[33] In this sense, it comprises a "critical attack upon the total claim of the new scientific method to dominate the entire field of human knowledge".^[33] However, scientific positivism (logical positivism) does not deny the reality of non-measurable phenomena, only that those phenomena should not be adequate to scientific investigation. Moreover, positivism, as a philosophical basis for the scientific method, is not consensual or even dominant in the scientific community (see philosophy of science).

Three major areas of antiscience can be seen in philosophy, sociology, and ecology. The following quotes explore this aspect of the subject.

Philosophy

Philosophical objections against science are often objections about the role of reductionism. For example, in the field of psychology, "both reductionists and antireductionists accept that... non-molecular explanations may not be improved, corrected or grounded in molecular ones".^[34] Further, "epistemological antireductionism holds that, given our finite mental capacities, we would not be able to grasp the ultimate physical explanation of many complex phenomena even if we knew the laws governing their ultimate constituents".^[35] Some see antiscience as "common...in academic settings...many people see that there are problems in demarcation between science, scientism, and pseudoscience resulting in an antiscience stance. Some argue that nothing can be known for sure".^[36]

Many philosophers are "divided as to whether reduction should be a central strategy for understanding the world".^[37] However, many agree that "there are, nevertheless, reasons why we want science to discover properties and explanations other than reductive physical ones".^[37] Such issues stem "from an antireductionist worry that there is no absolute conception of reality, that is, a characterization of reality such as... science claims to provide".^[38] This is close to the Kantian view that reality is ultimately unknowable and all models are just imperfect approximations to it.

Sociology

Sociologist Thomas Gieryn refers to "some sociologists who might appear to be antiscience".^[39] Some "philosophers and antiscience types", he contends, may have presented "unreal images of science that threaten the believability of scientific knowledge",^[39] or appear to have gone "too far in their antiscience deconstructions".^[39] The question often lies in how much scientists conform to the standard ideal of "communalism, universalism, disinterestedness, originality, and... skepticism".^[39] Unfortunately, "scientists don't always conform... scientists do get passionate about pet theories; they do rely on reputation in judging a scientist's work; they do pursue fame and gain via research".^[39] Thus, they may show inherent biases in their work. "[Many] scientists are not as rational and logical as the legend would have them, nor are they as illogical or irrational as some relativists might say".^[39]

Ecology and health sphere

Within the ecological and health spheres, Levins identifies a conflict "not between science and antiscience, but rather between different pathways for science and technology; between a commodified science-for-profit and a gentle science for humane goals; between the sciences of the smallest parts and the sciences of dynamic wholes... [he] offers proposals for a more holistic, integral approach to understanding and addressing environmental issues".^[40] These beliefs are also common within the scientific community, with for example, scientists being prominent in environmental campaigns warning of environmental dangers such as ozone depletion and the greenhouse effect. It can also be argued that this version of antiscience comes close to that found in the medical sphere, where patients and practitioners may choose to reject science and adopt a pseudoscientific approach to health problems. This can be both a practical and a conceptual shift and has attracted strong criticism: "therapeutic touch, a healing technique based upon the laying-on of hands, has found wide acceptance in the nursing profession despite its lack of scientific plausibility. Its acceptance is indicative of a broad antiscientific trend in nursing".^[41]

Glazer also criticises the therapists and patients, "for abandoning the biological underpinnings of nursing and for misreading philosophy in the service of an antiscientific world-view".^[41] In contrast, Brian Martin criticized Gross and Levitt by saying that "[their] basic approach is to attack constructivists for not being positivists,"^[42] and that science is "presented as a unitary object, usually identified with scientific knowledge. It is portrayed as neutral and objective. Second, science is claimed to be under attack by 'antiscience' which is composed essentially of ideologues who are threats to the neutrality and objectivity that are fundamental to science. Third, a highly selective attack is made on the arguments of 'antiscience'".^[42] Such people allegedly then "routinely equate critique of scientific knowledge with hostility to science, a jump that is logically unsupportable and empirically dubious".^[42] Having then "constructed two artificial entities, a unitary 'science' and a unitary 'academic left', each reduced to epistemological essences, Gross and Levitt proceed to attack. They pick out figures in each of several areas – science studies, postmodernism, feminism, environmentalism, AIDS activism – and criticise their critiques of science".^[42]

The writings of Young serve to illustrate more antiscientific views: "The strength of the antiscience movement and of alternative technology is that their advocates have managed to retain Utopian vision while still trying to create concrete instances of it".^[43] "The real social, ideological and economic forces shaping science...[have] been opposed to the point of suppression in many quarters. Most scientists hate it and label it 'antiscience'. But it is urgently needed, because it makes science self-conscious and hopefully self-critical and accountable with respect to the forces which shape research priorities, criteria, goals".^[43]

Genetically modified foods also bring about antiscience sentiment. The general public has recently become more aware of the dangers of a poor diet, as there have been numerous studies that show that the two are inextricably linked.^[44] Anti-science dictates that science is untrustworthy, because it is never complete and always being revised, which would be a probable cause for the fear that the general public has of genetically modified foods despite scientific reassurance that such foods are safe.

Antivaccinationists rely on whatever comes to hand presenting some of their arguments as if scientific, however a strain of antiscience is part of their approach.^[45]

Opposition to reductionism and positivism

On the limitations of models

A common antiscientific point of contention arises from the fact that mathematical models do not capture the full reality of existence, as can be seen in this quote:

The formulas of mathematical models are "artificial constructions, logical figments with no necessary relation to the outside world". These models always "leave out the richest and most important part of human experience...daily life, history, human laws and institutions, the modes of human self-expression".^[46] A failure to appreciate the subtle complexity of social worlds, means they get excluded from the formulas, even though, "no easy reductionism will do justice to the material". This approach often fails to concentrate "on social structures, processes, and actions in a specific sense (inequality, mobility, classes, strata, ethnicity, gender relations, urbanization, work and life of different types of people, not just elites)", and so tends to generate mostly meaningless oversimplifications.

It is also a common antiscientific point to state that verbal (say, literary and non-mathematical) models are poor representations of reality. If it is clear that a particular statistical or psychological study about romantic love or religious ecstasy (see neurotheology) captures only a tiny fraction of such human experiences, literary accounts and simplified verbal models also cannot adequately convey their full complexity. Both verbal and mathematical models are (partial) maps of reality, providing different points of view, but inherently incomplete descriptions of the territory of human and universe existence (see map–territory relation).