Scientific
dialectics
The
constituent
science provokes unceasingly
the constituted sciences in
setting new targets. In its overall
evolution, science progresses
dialectically. The history of sciences
is the animated history of victories won over contradiction. A
scientific 'truth' is each time a (temporarily) overcome
contradiction, while waiting to meet a new contradiction. The prospect for a science
which would advance in continuous line by simple 'accumulation'
corresponds to a naive image. Actually crises
are driving scientific progress. The advance in knowledge means
something like a permanent revolution.
It is thanks to the dialectical articulation of two movements of the thought, the inductive
movement and the deductive
movement, that the spirit reaches gradually
an agreement with the natural
reality. It begins working already with the simple perception. For
man 'to feel it' and 'to see it' are already kneaded of ideas because
perception is already assumed in the conduct of the logos. Science
begins strictly with the language. The discursive articulation of the
language is more and more in charge of the rational articulation of
the cosmos in the unit of the 'logos' inextricably word, calculation
and reason.
From the simple subjective
appearance to an objective
perception of facts, - the scientific facts -, from scientific facts
to the rational articulation of the relationship between the facts, -
the scientific laws -, from the scientific laws to the articulation
of relationship between the scientific ratios, - the theories -,
takes place a progressive
dialectical conquest of the rational realm over the empirical one.
And this evolutionary and revolutionary conquest is already given, so
to say in embryo, as soon as the specific humanity emerges at the
same time in continuity and in rupture with nature.
The scientific experiment is logos managed.
The
process of the logos in taking control of the concrete
reality proceeds dialectically
between two heterogeneous differential polarities which are, on the
one hand, the given
natural reality and, on the other hand, the idea.
This is going on through a triple moment, released by Claude Bernard,
which governs the experimental process. The fact suggests the idea.
The idea directs the experiment. The experiment judges the idea.
Hypothesis,the idea behind what you see. If…
then. The process is
hypothetical-deductive. It is necessary to confront the idea with the
facts. The hypothesis has scientific significance only if it is
verifiable. It is thus necessary to invent the means of checking, and
for doing that, you have still to proceed hypothetical-deductively.
Actually it was Blaise Pascal who invented as well the experimental
device as the conditions of experimentation for checking the
assumption of Toricelli. The hypothesis directs the experiment. The
experiment judges the idea.
The scientific object is not any more an object by itself having its
truth and even its reality independently of the knowing subject. The
object of science is a 'ratio'. It is the relationship
itself between a subject and an object. This purely logical ratio is
mathematically translated. Science thus constitutes a dialectical
process beyond of the two first antithetic prospects. Objectivity and
subjectivity are exceeded in a logical-material reality we call
'universe'. This universe is
neither simply given nor simply received. It is
built. It is to some extent
created by science.
The new scientific spirit
relativizes its speech as 'one' possible speech on totality. It
aims at relations rather than at 'real' objects. It proceeds and is
constituted hypothetical-deductively. Its 'materialism' is not any
more 'substantial' but simply of 'structural'.
Science is a dialectical overtaking of dogmatism
and scepticism. Both find the truth in
their going beyond. Here is an epistemological turning of major
importance which opens the modern prospect on the scientific truth.
This one cannot be constituted any more in dogmatic absolute
affirmations. It proceeds critically.
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