PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE-AN INTRDUCTION

Kambadur Muralidhar PhD FNASc FASc FNA

Former Jawaharlal Nehru Chair, UoH
Former Sir JC Bose National Fellow, SAU
Former Head, Department of Zoology, DU
Email: kambadur2015@gmail.com
Extended Abstract
Philosophy literally means love of knowledge1. It follows from this that Philosophy is an attitude
and not a domain knowledge. In practice however, it is equated with any domain knowledge. In
in the ancient world, total human knowledge was very limited and hence the word Philosophy
was referring to whole of human knowledge and experience. Later human knowledge comprised
many areas like History, Literature, Economics, Physics and Biology etc. No single person could
know, leave alone understand, all those branches of human knowledge. Pure Philosophy was
restricted to answering only profound questions like meaning of human existence, etc. As such
questions are creative and non-real time, philosophical method was only reflective thinking and
speculative analysis. Understanding our world of experience and finding a meaning (Truth?) is a
basic human instinct. Philosophical deliberations and debates could have begun not earlier than
10000 B.C.E. Animal husbandry and Agriculture were discovered around that period. Life style of
hunter-gatherer changed to living together at a geographical location with boundaries. Early tribal
societies changed to kingdoms and later to civilized modern governments of different types.
Hunger, fear and sex can be seen as the fundamental driving forces behind human activities2.
Thinking and language could have developed simultaneously as thinking is not possible without
a language. A small number of great thinkers in many civilizations around the world
(Mesopotamian, Assyrian, Sumerian, Greek, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, Middle Eastern around
Palestine and probably many more) expressed their thoughts which spread to other places initially
through oral traditions and later through written word. Each transfer of knowledge could have
errors in understanding and in expression (unintentional or deliberate). The earliest recorded
philosophic deliberations date to 4000 B.C.E. Historians, however, credit Thales of Miletus (620
B.C.E.) as being the first modern philosopher in this world. Let us also understand that thinking
is not possible without a language. Hence language is a limitation for philosophical deliberations.
The common man’s understanding of Philosophy and Philosophers is is actually misunderstanding.
Many common men and women believe that Philosophers are sad always and philosophizing
arises from experience of sorrow and suffering. That they are absent minded and deeply
engrossed in thought is a popular belief. Socrates comes to our mind immediately. That
philosophers do not talk with clarity and we donot know what they are thinking about is another
popular perception. Samuel Johnson, the lexicographer paraphrased philosophy well as,
“searching for a black cat in a dark room where it is not’. We can summarize this by the
observation that there is no standard textbook of Philosophy. Many western philosophers have
said many things on diverse matters. No two philosophers have talked on the same thing, leave
alone agree with each other.
Philosophers existed in all societies of the ancient world. Broadly speaking, majority of western
philosophers, addressed and discussed Aesthetics and Ethics. Eastern including Middle Eastern
philosophers were obsessed with death and other such human sufferings. They deliberated on
these and came up with answers. Two types of answers were proposed. Majority were theistic
philosophies around the idea of ‘GOD’. Some were agnostic or even non-theistic denying the
existence of God totally. Great religions resulted from these efforts. Major part of humanity
practices one or the other of these religions like Islam, Christianity, and Hinduism etc. None of
them is homogeneous in theory or in practice (read rituals). Luckily in our country, Philosophy is
called ‘Darshana’. One has to ‘see’, indeed experience, the philosophical truth for oneself before
accepting. The three Abrahamic religions arose around Jerusalem. The various versions of
Hinduism like Sanathana Dharma, Brahmanism, Vaishnavism, Saivism etc. arose in different parts
of India. The growth and differentiation of Hinduism was by absorbing many local tribal
traditions3. Zoroastrianism, credited to Zarathustra, a Persian Philosopher had influence on earlier
version of Hinduism. There was also a great atheistic tradition in many societies especially India
and China. The Charvaka schools of Philosophy, the Ajivikas system4, the Jain and Buddhist
systems are some examples. Three off shoots of these philosophical systems were Religion,
Theology and Mythology. Mythologies “do not offer solutions but give meaning to life” says
Devadatta Pattanaik5. Major part of the world has faith in one or the other religions. Faith does
not demand logic. The Indian system of logic reached its zenith in Vadiraja, a Madhwa saint
philosopher. In recent years, the western world also has come up with atheistic and Rational
philosophies. Bertrand Russel and Whitehead based their philosophy on sound Mathematical
logic6. There are many who have questioned the validity of western Philosophy7. The non-theistic
Natural Philosophy became later during 15th century Natural Science during the Renaissance
movement. There was a lot of Natural Philosophy dealing with mathematics, astronomy, human
and animal life in Greek, Islamic and Hindu philosophic systems8.
During and after the Renaissance period (15th century C.E.), Natural philosophy was renamed as
Natural Science9. The aims, principles and goals of this new system of philosophy was described
by many especially Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes, Leibniz and others. Scientific method got
defined and described. Natural Science comprises Physics, Chemistry and Biology. Later Geology
was added. Mathematics and Physics provide tools and techniques to investigate Nature.
Chemistry is described through Physics. Biology uses all the other three. Physics discovered the
Universal Laws of Nature. Physics suggests a deterministic model for nature and natural
phenomena. Chemistry failed to discover the ‘universal substance’ which underlies the diversity
of objects in this world. Biology was a descriptive science for more than 3000 years. Post-
Renaissance, Biology also became an experimental science and Reductionist Biology became the
Biology. Today organismic Biology and Systems Biology are considered true Biology. Human
Biology raised unique philosophical problems unlike Physics or Chemistry. Biological phenomena
like Evolution etc. follow stochastic model unlike the deterministic model of Physics applicable to
macro world of objects.
The Vienna school of philosophers emphasized logic as a foundation and tool to general
philosophy. Mathematical logic was the characteristic of early Greek philosophers like Pythagoras,
Democritus and others. In the 20th century Bertrand Russel was a towering figure in extensively
basing his philosophy on mathematical logic. Social philosophers like Karl Marx, Adam Smith,
Maynard Keynes, Milton Friedman, Skinner, John Dewey, Sigmund Freud and others based their
philosophies on sound logic and reasoning.
Philosophy of Science essentially discusses scientific method and its defects in leading us to
grasping reality or Truth. Natural Science is supposed to be amoral in the words of Vannevar
Bush. There are serious debates whether science is valueless and apolitical. Although there is no
science of ethics, there is ethics of science. Many philosophers have criticized science for its failure
to tackle ethical issues. Science is also a social activity done in groups and has hierarchy in opinion
making. While David Hume emphasized that reason is a slave of passion. Sir Arthur Eddington
says “that rational thinking will lead us to rational results and Truth is a faith”. We believe that
Faith does not demand logic. Hence religions survive and expand. Many great practioners of
Natural Science are atheists. They do not belong to any Church. While Science (Physics, Chemistry
or Biology) has grown and progressed towards understanding domain knowledge, philosophy has
not progressed at all. There is no textbook of Philosophy with any conceptual framework or
characteristic set of paradigms. The same questions and problems are being discussed from 600
B.C.E. to present day. Sociologists and natural scientists are quarreling on methodology. In certain
areas of Natural science like cognitive sciences, Immunology etc. hardcore science and philosophy
are converging. Mind has become the focus of discussion in Neurosciences and in Psycho-
Philosophy, bordering on Theology and metaphysics. Roger Penrose and Francis Crick have talked
about ‘Soul’. Quantum phenomena in the behavior of elementary particles is raising the problem
of Free will in new light. In the post-truth era of ours, whether emergent properties like
consciousness, evolution as well as quantum phenomena are properties of matter (and hence
understandable by Reductionist Science) or they are supernatural phenomena and only
philosophy can demystify them is hotly being debated. Nobel laureate Weinberg, mathematical
philosophers like Quine and others assert that science is sufficiently capable of arriving at Truth
without the help of philosophy or theology. There are others like Thomas Aquinas and many more
who believe in God and other super natural concepts and phenomena. They also sound logical.
Philosophy of Science is an intellectually satisfying domain to pursue. Ontology and Epistemology
are more important for Social Sciences and Humanities than Natural Science. Deductive logic and
Inductive reasoning are research methods for Natural sciences.

Suggested Reading:

1. Durant W (1961), The Story of Philosophy, Pocket Books, Simon & Schuster
Inc.,
2. Yuval Noah Harari (2011) Sapiens- A brief History of Human Kind, Penguin Random House,
UK.

3. Sen, KM (1991) “Hinduism” Penguin Reprint, Penguin Books, London.

4. Basham A.L. (1951) History and Doctrines of Ajivikas, A vanished Indian Religion, Motilal
Banarsi Dass Publishers (P) Ltd. Delhi.
5. Pattanayak, Devdutt (2022) Interview by Gowri Ramanarayan, The Hindu, Oct 23rd edition.
6. Russell B (1946) A History of Western Philosophy, George Allen & Unwin
Ltd (UK)
7. Lakoff G and Johnson M (1998) “Philosophy in Flesh: The embodied mind
and its Challenge to Western thought”, Basic Books, New York.
8. Al-Biruni (1017) India, Edited by Qeyamuddin Ahmad and published by the
National Book Trust, New Delhi in 1983.
9. Geoffrey Gorham Philosophy of Science, A Beginner’s Guide (2009), One World, Oxford.

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Webinar to be given at the LIS academy training course on ‘Ethics in Research’ as part of research
methodology, at VTU, Bengaluru on 31st October, 2022.