The Way to a Critical Science
I n order to understand in depth why today’s level of unscientificity takes on increasingly coarse forms due to unjustified, unrealistic models and hypotheses, and thus ends up in dead ends, it is inevitable to take a closer look at the foundation of modern science.
Science claims to be a methodically secured form of knowledge.
A first logical question would therefore be: What is the basis of today’s science’s claim to act “scientifically” with its methods and procedures, i.e. to produce objective or truthful knowledge?
This fundamental question cannot remain unanswered if a science wants to call itself “critical”, i.e. if it does not want to remain in a state of naivety, or more precisely, in ignorance about the justification of its methodological approach.
Every science that takes itself seriously, therefore, cannot avoid to become clear about its epistemological foundations, i.e. about its own laws.
For if unresolved presuppositions about what is to be understood by knowledge flow into the formulation of the concept of science, then this concept of science is itself unscientific.
The scientific discipline that deals specifically with this question is classically called epistemology or theory of knowledge.
Its first and primary endeavor can only be the investigation of knowledge, i.e. the knowledge of knowing.
Based on this starting position, the question consequently arises what is to be understood by “knowledge”.
Because here already the first difficulty begins, as there is still no uniform definition of the term “knowledge” according to the Wikipedia-definition:
“The term knowledge is one of the basic terms of modern philosophy. It cannot be traced back to other more familiar or superordinate terms and cannot be defined without self-reference (circular reasoning).“¹
This means that there is only one definition using one’s own term, which is an impossibility from a logical point of view, which is why one would have to truthfully admit that one actually has no definition at all.
Nevertheless, in the course of history — also according to great philosophers like Immanuel Kant and Karl Popper — two indispensable elements of knowledge have emerged, namely on the one hand the appearance (experience) and on the other hand the theory (concepts/ideas), in order to be able to explain the context of a phenomenon.
Whether on the basis of these two elements of knowledge an actual access to “reality” is possible, is irrelevant or stands again on another sheet.
I.e. in a first step only the relation to reality can be clarified by the investigation of knowledge.
Knowing must therefore be directed towards knowing.
The laws brought to light in this way make it possible to turn science into a “critical” science.
Without this insight, any research or action that calls itself scientific remains in a naive, unreflected state.
It is therefore a matter of seeing through the scope and justification of one’s own actions.
For in every action two things always come into consideration: the action itself and the knowledge of its laws.
The claim of a science of knowledge is therefore a critical science with the aim to investigate the laws of knowledge.
This can only be done through one’s own mental activity, through thinking.
It cannot be done by observing the neurophysical processes in the brain.
This is to be emphasized because in the age of modern, reductionistic mind-brain theories the fact of this phenomenal difference is often confused or completely faded out.
For even if a dependence of both phenomena — material and mental — is clearly recognisable, they are ontically, i.e. in terms of being, not on one level.
This is also made clear by modern brain research, as a contemporary exponent of evolutionary epistemology, Gerhard Vollmer, concludes:
“These psychophysical discoveries suggest that every state of consciousness clearly corresponds to a brain state, or that there is only one state at all, which is perceived differently — namely psychologically and physiologically.“²
This is a clear expression of the fact that there is a correspondence or condition between physiological (brain) and psychological (mind) processes.
However, this is not equivalent to being ontically the same.
For there remain two different kinds of phenomena.
On the one hand a psychological phenomenon in the form of thinking and consciousness and on the other hand its material correlate in the form of measurable, neurophysiological brain processes.
Therefore, these two different phenomena have to be examined first for themselves, in order to be able to recognize then the kind of their relationship.
The decisive question which has to be answered in the science of knowledge is therefore: How are our thoughts and whether at all related to the external reality?
Its aim is to fathom the laws of knowing , i.e. the nature of knowing itself.
The science of knowledge thus forms the basis of all scientific actions, in that it undertakes a presuppositionless investigation of knowing in and for itself.
Only under its consideration the products of a science can be judged according to their true value and meaning.
In connection with the other sciences, the science of knwoledge therefore enables the overcoming of all one-sided world views, since it dedicates itself exclusively to the process of knowing, without already preceding it with mental determinations (knowledge judgements).
It is therefore the fundamental science in itself.
Historically, however, it did not originate as the first science.
It was preceded more than two thousand years ago by the first science at all, introduced by Aristotle (384 B.C. — 322 B.C.), which deals with the conclusions of the human mind — known as “logic”.
Logic is also essential to the science of knowledge.
However, logic itself is only a formal science, i.e. without science of knowledge, it alone cannot decide whether knowledge is true or consistent with reality.
Its task is limited to the logical connection of knowledge.
Thus, it necessarily presupposes knowledge and has no content without it.
It shows therefore that the object of investigation of the first science at all is of purely mental nature.
Accordingly, in the logic also only mental proofs are cited, i.e. it is not accepted, as today usually demanded, only physical, sensually perceptible things as “proof”.
This fact continues in the second science of human history, namely mathematics by Euclid (~3rd century B.C.), which in turn is based on logic.
As the third science the natural science came up in the middle of the 15th century with personalities like Copernicus (1473–1543), Galilei (1564–1642) and so on.
It, too, could only emerge on the basis of the preceding sciences, logic and mathematics.
Natural science is therefore based on two (pure) sciences of the mind.
For this reason alone, it is reasonable to assume that spirit, not matter, underlies nature.
A first attempt to establish a science of knowledge — as a historically fourth science — was made by Immanuel Kant (1724–1804).
However, he did not succeed in the step from his theory of knowledge to an actual science of knowledge.
Because he and all neo-Kantians up to the present day have failed to carry out a precise observation of the faculty of knowing (thinking) according to strictly scientific criteria.
This is why they have inevitably failed or lost themselves again and again in prejudices, dogmatism and metaphysical ideas.
Although Kant succeeded in refuting the dogmatic philosophy of his time, he was unable to replace it with a philosophy free of dogma.
For with his assertion of a so-called “thing-in-itself” (primordial ground of things), which exists beyond the cognitive faculty of man, he began the same cardinal error that he reproached his predecessors with.
He abandoned the principles of science because he went beyond his own experience and consequently proceeded only from an assumption to which he himself had no access whatsoever — in other words: metaphysics.
But also all subsequent epistemological investigations failed again and again due to the lack of the presuppositionlessness of their investigations.
I.e. the questions already contained beliefs (axioms), whereby the result is decisively predetermined, since it is merely a product of the interpretations put into it beforehand.
After all, the core of science can only lie in the unbiased, thinking observation of the world, which never goes beyond the experience of reality, be it sensual or ideal.
Therefore, there is no way around overcoming previous epistemological conceptions and one-sidedness according to this standard and thus doing science of knowledge in the true sense.
This requires an adequate study of the individual elements of knowledge and in the correct posing of questions in order to arrive at the crucial starting point without presumptions.
Which will be the focus of my further writing. Stay tuned.
[1]: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erkenntnis
[2]: Vollmer, G. 1987. Evolutionäre Erkenntnistheorie. 4. Aufl. Hirzel, Stuttgart.
Note: This text was originally written in German and translated into English using Deepl, because I am a native German speaker.
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