Reposting one article by Teacher Jiang Xiaoyuan: Can all the problems brought by science be solved by science?
2007-03-30 21:16:43
Can all the problems brought by science be solved by science? ——A discussion with Professor Wei Menghua
Jiang Xiaoyuan
http://www.sciencenet.cn/sbhtmlnews/200733001117574176097.html
Science Times 2007-03-30, A4
Having read with respect Professor Wei Menghua’s article, “Science Has No Third Pole—A Discussion with Professor Liu Huajie,” published in the March 23 issue of Science Times · Weekend Review, as well as Professor Liu Huajie’s article, which was the object of discussion and had appeared earlier in Science Times, I have been deeply moved, and cannot resist offering a few modest views of my own.
Professor Wei’s article, though titled a “discussion,” in fact contains many points of agreement with—and even expansions of—Professor Liu Huajie’s arguments; one could say it is support for and solidarity with Professor Liu. As for the views in Professor Wei’s article, such as that science is “not sacred, nor mysterious,” that science “has no authority, nor does it need authority,” that science “does not need an -ism,” that science “is not a palace, still less some temple,” and so on, I very much agree with all of them. So, borrowing Professor Wei’s method, I too wanted to write an article titled “A Discussion,” which would in fact be an act of support. But after looking further down the article, I found that there really was something in the latter part that could be discussed. So I decided to really discuss that first, and then talk about other matters.
In his article, Professor Wei says: “Science is a double-edged sword, bringing humanity both opportunities and challenges. Ironically, to solve the problems humanity faces, in the end we still have to rely on science. Truly: success comes from Xiao He, and failure also comes from Xiao He.” Here Professor Wei’s meaning is clear: science brings problems to humanity (challenges), but “to solve the problems humanity faces, in the end we still have to rely on science.” This wording easily gives rise to two implications: first, the problems brought by science must still be solved by science; second, science can “ultimately” solve the problems humanity faces, which is almost the same as saying that “science can solve all of humanity’s problems.”
I will not discuss that second implication, because, for one thing, Professor Wei could argue that he did not explicitly say “science can solve all of humanity’s problems,” and that this was merely my extrapolation; for another, so long as we point out that the first implication does not hold, the second implication will naturally also fail.
Professor Wei’s first implication—that “the problems brought by science must still be solved by science (through further development)”—is actually a very familiar formulation to us. In the discourse of earlier scientism, this was a very “persuasive” proposition. But in fact, this proposition has never been proven—and indeed cannot be proven.
In the past, Doctor Tian Song had the famous saying “good things go to science, bad things go to the devil,” which revealed precisely the absurdity of this proposition. Here I can offer another, more worldly analogy to explain the danger of this proposition. We often see the following among people who speculate in stocks (as well as in property, postage stamps, antiques…): if he loses on this trade, he says he will continue with the next one, in order to turn defeat into victory; if he wins on this trade, he says the same thing—that he will continue with the next one, in order to press on and do better. So, no matter whether he wins or loses on any given trade, it can always become the reason for him to continue with the next trade. In other words, “the problems brought by stock speculation can only be solved by stock speculation.” The proposition “the problems brought by science can only be solved by science” is in fact exactly the same—no matter whether science brings us blessings or disasters, it all becomes a reason for further developing science; isn’t that astonishing?
I can also use Professor Wei’s spear to attack Professor Wei’s shield. In his article, Professor Wei then laments that there are too many nuclear weapons in the world today, too many tanks and artillery pieces, so human beings are not living happily. And he also knows that these nuclear weapons, tanks, and artillery pieces have all been brought to us by the development of science and technology. So what should be done? On this issue, if we further develop science and technology, apart from bringing us more, newer, and more efficient nuclear weapons and tanks and artillery pieces for killing, could there possibly be the opposite result? Everyone knows that to solve the problem of there being too many nuclear weapons, tanks, and artillery pieces, one can only rely on forces outside science. So the example Professor Wei gives precisely shows that what he said earlier—“to solve the problems humanity faces, in the end we still have to rely on science”—does not hold water.
After all that talk, what I mean is actually very simple: we cannot take it for granted that the problems brought by science can certainly be solved by the further development of science. If science has brought us problems (or to put it as challenges or disasters), then we have every need to reflect from outside science.
On February 27, 2007, the publicly issued “Declaration on the Idea of Science” by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Presidium of the Chinese Academy of Sciences is one of the most important documents in recent years in the field of science culture in our country; it offers a completely new discussion of the spirit of science and the social responsibility of science, among other things. In particular, it calls on science workers to “more consciously avoid the negative effects of science and technology, and shoulder the responsibility of assessing the consequences of science and technology, including: examining and evaluating all possible consequences of one’s own work; once drawbacks or dangers are discovered, one should alter or even suspend one’s own work; if one cannot make the decision alone, one should temporarily delay or halt the relevant research and promptly alert society.” It also requires science workers to “regulate scientific behavior from the social, ethical, and legal levels.” This clearly bids farewell to the old creed that “to solve the problems humanity faces, in the end we still have to rely on science,” and instead requires us to reflect on the negative effects brought by science and technology from outside science. In fact, several years ago, Liu Yongxiang, president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, already said that “while science and technology bring blessings to humanity, if they are abused without control and guidance, they may also bring harm”—which means the same thing.
Who, then, is to control and guide science? Of course it cannot be science itself, but only ethics, morality, and the humanistic spirit.
(The author is a professor at Shanghai Jiao Tong University)
Comments(43)┆Quote┆Read(225)┆Circle┆Print┆Rewarded Report
The following comments from netizens represent only their personal views and do not represent the views or position of Sina.com
[Anonymous] Gǔ Chì
2007-03-31 00:45:02
“the problems brought by science must still be solved by science,” today Teacher Xiao’s lecture was also about this problem…… But regarding monism and pluralism in views of truth, Teacher Xiao’s insistence also makes a certain amount of sense: if one holds a pluralist, or even relativist, view of truth, then by what right can one say that the idea of environmental protection can control and guide science? Teacher Xiao believes that environmental science is “more true” than traditional science; in that case, of course the matter becomes justified and proper. Moreover, we also have to emphasize that environmental destruction “is real,” that science has indeed caused environmental problems, and so on. But if one says that everyone has truth or that no one has truth, then on what grounds can environmental protection, or, as Teacher Jiang says, “ethics, morality, and the humanistic spirit,” control and guide science? Not on the basis of “truth” but on the basis of “good”? Yet on the one hand, “good” is probably even more plural or relative. On the other hand, even if one says that the humanistic spirit has the upper hand in terms of “good,” the power of good is still limited; just as Teacher He would say that according to the laws of nature, the earth will inevitably be destroyed billions of years from now, and one cannot say that because the destruction of the earth is a bad thing, one therefore has the qualification to alter the laws of physics. This truly is not convincing.
In short, why can ethics, morality, and the humanistic spirit control and guide science? Why should it not be science that controls and guides the humanities? Under pluralism, no one possesses absolute truth, and so no side can possess the authority to stand above the other.
Even if one says that science is merely one culture, then according to the spirit of pluralism and relativism, it should at least not submit to the control of any other culture; promoting the humanistic spirit should not be for the purpose of turning around and controlling science, just as science should not control ethics and the humanities, and ethics and the humanities should not control science, nor are they able to control it; they can only guide human beings, and if they are said to have a guiding effect on science, then that can only be indirect, through influencing the social and cultural environment.
[Anonymous] Li Xia
2007-03-31 01:15:02
Teacher Jiang’s argument is still quite ingenious. Entrusting control over science to things outside science is at least more workable than placing it inside science. Internal control is often inefficient, or even ineffective. The impulse to expand can only be restrained from outside, and this holds for science as well as for the humanities.
Also, little Comrade Gu’s remarks are rather interesting: there are three points to consider as follows: 1. the relation between the three—truth, goodness, and beauty—and human beings; 2. science is not value-neutral; 3. how I can know—from what I ought to know (science) to what I can hope for (ethics) and then to what I can expect (aesthetics)—in such a process, we should have a kind of questioning of science. Old Ma once said, “All science is human science.” Even now, it still makes sense. If human beings are detached from existence, does science still have meaning? As for the issue of truth, it is complicated, but there is one thing we should think about: why exactly are we striving so hard for truth? In fact, old Heidegger already revealed that the essence of truth is freedom. The above words count as a discussion; if anything is inappropriate, please correct me! Hahahahaha, for many years I have been thinking about these questions aimlessly, and even today I still have not fully figured them out. Returning to the thing itself is not a bad method!
[Anonymous] Gǔ Chì
2007-03-31 02:24:47
If “truth” is plural, then “goodness” is even more plural. By what right can things outside science control science? Should Chinese culture be controlled by foreign culture? Should the development of Eastern culture be guided by things outside Eastern culture?
If the final conclusion of pluralism is that the autonomy of science is not even as good as an autonomous, self-conscious “culture,” then I too cannot accept it.
Science is also an activity of human beings’ “free” exploration. But “freedom” does not mean one may act wantonly. From ancient Greece to Kant, “freedom” means “self-discipline.”
If science needs heteronomy, then what is the thing that has the right to regulate science? Where does its authority come from? If science is dangerous, then wouldn’t this thing standing above science be even more dangerous? My view is just the opposite: the notion that science needs to be manipulated by some external force actually contains a certain dogmatic complex within it.
In my view, the problem with modern science is not that it is too free, but precisely that it has lost freedom, that it is no longer pure, free, and self-disciplined like ancient Greek science, but has instead been swayed by external demands and prescriptions such as utility, efficiency, increasing productivity, and bringing blessings to humanity, and has forgotten the demands of the good that arise from itself, forgotten self-discipline.
[Anonymous] Gǔ Chì
2007-03-31 02:51:03
Modern scientists often think: I only care about exploring truth in science—good and evil are none of my business—I only care whether an atomic bomb can actually be made; once I have researched the atomic bomb, who drops the atomic bomb is none of my business; the evil is not science, but the person who drops the atomic bomb. And so on.
—What kind of attitude is this? Is it being too free? No—on the contrary, it is losing freedom and forgetting self-discipline. Handing good and evil over to another, shifting responsibility onto others, instead of taking responsibility for oneself! We should emphasize science’s self-discipline, emphasize that science should control itself, that it should be responsible for itself!
If control is handed over to ethics and the humanities, then science can become even more detached: if science goes wrong, then blame ethics for not having controlled it well, blame the humanities for not having guided it well! It is not my science’s own problem!
[Anonymous] Xinzhai Lao Jiang
2007-03-31 10:38:10
“if science goes wrong, then blame ethics for not having controlled it well, blame the humanities for not having guided it well! It is not my science’s own problem!” When criticizing Wu Guosheng, Teacher Zhao defended it in exactly this way.
Little Gu’s doubts and criticisms are excellent. Some “anti-science cultural people” actually think that words like “correct” and “truth” can no longer be used; I think that has gone somewhat off the rails.
Pluralism and monism both presuppose some questionable assumptions, and we need to transcend them from a deeper foundation.
Gu’s consideration of freedom is somewhat close to Professor Wu’s line of thought. However, I have serious doubts about whether the concept of freedom can be used to solve this problem; it is too vague, too metaphysical.
[Anonymous] Li Xia
2007-03-31 11:47:36
Hahahahaha, seeing little Gu’s long post, before cooking lunch I’ll still try to reply with a couple of points: 1. ethics and the humanities are not the ethics and humanities of some people, but the ethics and humanities of everyone; for example, the Western Ten Commandments of Moses and the Chinese principle of “Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire” are a kind of overall prescription; 2. as for the understanding of freedom, it should not be like this. Rousseau once said: man is born free, yet everywhere he is in chains. Freedom always has boundaries; there is no freedom detached from boundaries. Self-discipline is the foundation of morality, not the foundation of science. Kant’s starry heavens above and the moral law within were meant to emphasize the a priori character of morality; in other words, the categorical imperative can only be a priori. If one wants X and therefore does Y, that is a form of hypothetical judgment; if I do not want to obtain X, then I can entirely refrain from doing Y—how much uncertainty is implicit here! 3. Regarding the notion of internal and external control, there are some points I agree with, and some I do not. For example, the force of internal control is always weak, whereas the force of external control is greater and more effective. For instance, can you get a peer to evaluate you objectively without pressure? Much less the giants of science? A preference for camouflage is a common state in evaluation; there is nothing to criticize about that. Another example: can you get the discipline secretary within a system to effectively supervise the top leader within that same system? Science is only one human undertaking, and it faces exactly the same predicament. As for relativism, that is more complicated, so I won’t say more here. Rambling on, for reference!
[Anonymous] yxy
2007-03-31 13:40:58
1. ethics and the humanities are not the ethics and humanities of some people, but the ethics and humanities of everyone; for example, the Western Ten Commandments of Moses and the Chinese principle of “Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire” are a kind of overall prescription;
————————
So, it turns out that Teacher Li is a monist about ethics.
That’s right—if ethics were not monistic, how could it have the power to check the highly monolithic modern science?
I support that. I do not approve of excessive pluralization; dialogue and integration should still be pursued, and as far as possible one should merge plurality into unity.
[Anonymous] Gǔ Chì
2007-03-31 14:22:31
Teacher Jiang is right. My line of thought naturally comes close to Teacher Wu’s, because I have been deeply “poisoned” by him～～
YXY’s question is also what I wanted to say: many people, when opposing the monism of science, consciously or unconsciously still insist on ethical monism.
I also do not approve of excessive relativization, but I also do not approve of merging plurality into unity as much as possible. My pluralism is “preserve the common, seek the differences”; there is no need to deliberately seek commonality, but one should preserve certain inherent “commonalities” and not excessively interrogate or doubt them, and on this basis pursue diversity—this is exactly the opposite of the pluralism of “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” The latter says not to overemphasize dissolving the “differences,” but to stress tolerance and understanding of differences, and on that basis pursue convergence; whereas I call for not overemphasizing dissolving the “common,” but to tolerate and understand the “common,” for example the ethical golden rule and silver rule, some existing consensus; relativist skepticism can pause here for the time being, and on this basis one then seeks as rich a diversity as possible.
2007-03-31 16:07:01
Xiao Gu asked: “If ‘truth’ is plural, then ‘goodness’ is even more plural. By what right do things outside science get to control science?”
That’s a good question. My immature view is: some reason for control that people put forward does not necessarily require epistemological truth or ethical goodness. Can we simply bracket those two and leave them unaddressed for the time being?
For example, A may feel, in the sense of the lifeworld, that science is bad, then others should respect A’s feeling. A’s feeling may thus become a kind of reason. A’s feeling can be changed; others can educate A (for instance, through traditional popular science) so as to alter A’s view, thereby making A no longer doubt science and instead support it.
If B feels that the environment in which B lives is bad, and feels that this has something to do with science, then others should also respect B’s feeling. Environmental assessment needs to incorporate scientific factors—that is the most common understanding—but I also want to say: “Environmental assessment also needs to incorporate non-scientific factors.” This is a requirement of the democratic age, and a way to break the collusion of interests within the scientific community. Environmental impact assessment seems to have gone through the following stages:
1. A few laypeople in the minority lead the determination of feeling;
2. Environmental scientists assess;
3. Interdisciplinary scientists and environmental scientists assess together;
4. Citizens, scientists, NGOs, and other actors assess together.
China has already moved toward stage 4; the national environmental protection bureau has already been doing this.
There are also problems with “peer review” in the scientific community. Science Times had an article yesterday, on A3, that was very interesting. The CSC website reposted it.
2007-03-31 16:13:23
Xiao Gu:
The reason I do not dare to use concepts like truth and Truth lightly is that I worry that all arguments and all reasoning will be rapidly turned to others’ use: in the end, only science gets the final say.
A monistic view of truth, argumentation under rationalism—of course that is very coherent, but in the end it is too arrogant an idea; even Kant still preserved something that could not be reached. David Bloor pointed out long ago the shortcomings of similar arguments. However, not using such a line of thought, not lightly using such words, is usually only a strategy; it does not thereby commit one to much else.
Nor does it mean that we must choose relativism. I am certainly not an extreme relativist, but I am certainly a conditionalist, that is, a weak relativist.
How many truths there are—we do not know, strictly speaking; we should remain doubtful. Even if there is only one truth, further specification is needed: who can contact, who can access that one truth? If everyone cannot touch it or reach it, OK, then God (truth) and all of us are at approximately equal distances and equally unreachable; but once “priests” claim that they can serve as intermediaries, that becomes troublesome. In fact, the history of religious thought has already given vivid examples; in terms of social operation, science and religion are indeed as similar as Durkheim described.
Why do we not mainly talk about epistemology and instead focus on politics? Because, as Wu teacher said, environmental problems are to a large extent political problems. Non-political reasons have already been talked about enough; many of those who destroy the environment also understand the reasons involved. So, thinking in reverse, from top down, I chose the plural path.
If considered purely in epistemological terms, the plural path is indeed a path that invites trouble.
[匿名] 古雴
2007-03-31 16:39:48
I think that “truth” can and should only be discussed as a pursuit.
I do not like expressions like who controls whom, who guides whom. Scientists and the public should engage in “dialogue”; they should communicate and negotiate. But whether one says scientists should control or guide the public or vice versa, that is improper. The same goes for the humanities, ethics, and science: if it is a matter of “bringing science back to the humanities,” and the humanities and science become an immanent relation, then if one says “control,” that means self-control, self-discipline; if it is an external relation, then one should not say that one controls the other.
Liu teacher’s talk of “citizens and scientists assessing together” is very good. Perhaps one could say that environmental decision-making (a political issue, not a scientific one) should be jointly controlled or guided by citizens and scientists? But in any case I do not accept that scientists should be controlled or guided by citizens; scientists should control themselves.
As for ethics, my accumulation is really too little. I appreciate virtue ethics, but virtue ethics cannot cope with practical problems. Recently I have noticed Habermas’s “discourse ethics”/“dialogue ethics,” which seems quite interesting.
2007-03-31 18:19:53
[I think that “truth” can and should only be discussed as a pursuit.]
I think that sometimes we can, for good reason and with good grounds, say that we have attained truth on a particular question.
Of course one cannot simply, in general, say that scientists control the public, or that the public controls scientists; that would certainly cause problems. But it also seems that one cannot say that scientists should never, on certain questions, be guided, led, or even controlled by the public, by humanities professors, or by whoever else.
I think we should insist on the so-called dialectic, or, like later Wittgenstein, analyze each concrete problem concretely, and insist on the plurality of solutions.
I may be criticized for saying nothing at all; I think such criticism is not very fair, though I do admit that this is still not concrete enough.
[匿名] 古雴
2007-03-31 18:53:39
What I mean is that a monistic truth can only be discussed as something to be pursued (it should still perhaps be discussable as a faith). But in everyday language rather than academic inquiry, of course it is also fine to talk about having attained truth, betraying truth, and so on. There is a book called People Who Betrayed Truth, and I do not think that title is inappropriate.
Control, guidance, leadership, and so on—of course these are possible. For example, how much investment goes into which research directions, giving certain scientists more honors or material rewards, encouraging scientists to lean toward certain kinds of research, and so on: these of course are possible, and necessary too. But when one looks into it, these forms of control or guidance are political acts. The government and the state of course have the power and qualification to control and guide, and if one says that citizens are the masters of the state, there is nothing wrong with that. But however one puts it, I still think this is indirect, not control directed at science itself. Just like with pseudoscientific research—like Liu teacher said: do I have the right to engage in pseudoscience? If the pseudoscience I engage in brings harm, of course it also needs to be restrained, but the control and restraint are not aimed at “pseudoscience” itself. Since even pseudoscience should enjoy such freedom, how could science instead not be allowed to?
[匿名] 老赵
2007-03-31 19:37:30
Science should be controlled and guided by something outside science; that has always been the ideal of scientific cultural people. Unfortunately, so far I have not seen any successful example in this regard; there are many failed ones, however. Among the big ones are the Pope’s treatment of Galileo, and Stalin—Lysenko’s treatment of genetics.
I asked Hua Jie this question before, and Hua Jie evaded and sidestepped, and still has not given me a single positive example.
History was the subject I hated most in primary and secondary school, but I cannot help marveling at how formidable history is. It is said that among Mao Zedong’s half-bed of books, there were very few Marxist-Leninist works; most were histories of ancient China.
[匿名] 老赵
2007-03-31 19:40:44
This Jiang Xiaoyuan is also so muddled. The stock-market problem can of course only be solved by stock trading:
if you lose money trading stocks and have no money left, then naturally you stop trading.
[匿名] 老赵
2007-03-31 19:47:58
A certain professor, in his article, then lamented that there are now too many nuclear weapons and too many tanks and artillery pieces in the world, so human beings live unhappy lives.
=======================
That is nonsense. In an era with tanks and artillery, compared with an era without science, where are people happier?
In the age of cold weapons, when the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom revolted, 40% of the people died. In modern warfare, fewer and fewer people die. In Iraq, in a war of national annihilation, how many people died? What percentage of the national population was that?
[匿名] 老赵
2007-03-31 20:08:37
What responsibility do scientists bear? That is a question worth pondering.
For example, are the “meritorious founders of the two bombs” criminals against humanity?
It is said that there was a husband-and-wife pair researching the atomic bomb; they felt that it was dangerous for only the United States to have the atomic bomb, so they leaked nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union. Later they betrayed the death penalty.
Were they traitors to the state, or saviors of humanity?
After all, how to make an atomic bomb is a scientist’s business. Whether to make one, and whether to drop one, the power remains in the hands of politicians. If scientists are to be made responsible, should the nuclear button be handed to scientists first? If so, there would long ago have been no atomic bombs in the world. Unfortunately, no politician is willing to relinquish power. Why shouldn’t “humanistic spirit” and “ethics” come solve this problem?
[匿名] 老赵
2007-03-31 20:11:08
Correction:
“Later they betrayed the death penalty” should read “Later they were sentenced to death.”
2007-03-31 20:53:38
Science being controlled from outside—are those examples still hard to find? In the era of Big Science, major scientific projects were almost all controlled from outside: the Manhattan Project, the Apollo Program. As for whether they were successful or good, that requires a separate evaluation. Our country recently decided to pursue a lunar program and a large aircraft project; these are also typical examples in this regard. China’s “Two Bombs, One Satellite” program back then should count as a success, shouldn’t it? Wasn’t it decided by political leaders? Did just a few scientists decide on their own to launch these projects? Wasn’t one of China’s accelerator projects also launched after some science bigwig talked it up to Deng Xiaoping? Was it really decided by the scientific community according to scientific laws? Even if it went through that procedure, if the central authorities did not approve, there would be no way to proceed. Political leaders make decisions about science; when they botch it, Zhao teacher remembers it. What about when they do it well, when they succeed?
One cannot simply, as Tian Song sarcastically put it, assign the good to science and the bad to the devil—then classify all successful examples elsewhere and all failures as external control and guidance, can one?
[匿名] 古雴
2007-03-31 21:19:46
On the one hand, projects like the lunar program and the Two Bombs, One Satellite program are, in my view, not good scientific research. Strictly speaking, they all count as technological engineering; doing science should not be the same as doing engineering.
On the other hand, the government’s “control” over science in these projects is different from cases like Galileo and Lysenko. The former basically belong to what I call indirect effects, but the external force is not trying to rewrite science. Imagine a leader thinking that the critical mass of uranium is more than 200 kilograms—too heavy, not good, a socialist atomic bomb should be lighter than a capitalist one, so you should change the scientific conclusion so that the critical mass is only 100 kilograms—that would be direct control over science. But in those engineering projects, there was no such thing. In the cases of Galileo and Lysenko, by contrast, the external force was not merely suppressing or promoting scientific research activity, but also suppressing or advocating scientific theory; there is a very big difference. Last time Xiao teacher advocated stirring up the Scientific Revolution for the sake of environmental protection, which also smacks of direct control over science; but if one says that, for the sake of environmental protection, we should allocate more money to ecologists, that is different.
Let me add something more about scientists’ responsibility. I think it should be discussed from two sides. On the one hand, scientists are citizens, and of course need to shoulder the responsibilities of citizens; insofar as they are citizens, being constrained and controlled by the state, by law, and by the public is necessary. But if scientists are considered solely in their capacity as scientists, then they have special responsibilities and missions—perhaps one could speak of a kind of professional ethics, or of industry norms, and these should be matters for scientists’ own autonomy and self-decision.
[匿名] 老赵
2007-03-31 21:21:47
What you are talking about is merely science spending big money and being controlled from outside; it is not science itself.
[新浪网友
2007-03-31 21:25:43
Replying to wildflora:
What you are talking about is merely science (actually technology) spending big money and being controlled from outside; it is not science itself.
2007-03-31 21:26:43
【This Jiang Xiaoyuan is also so muddled. The stock-market problem can of course only be solved by stock trading:
if you lose money trading stocks and have no money left, then naturally you stop trading.】
Luckily, Zhao teacher is not as muddled in life as he is when thinking about the problem of scientism, hehe.
Problems caused by stock trading can of course be solved in other ways. For example, if you lose money, you can take the money you have left and invest it in opening a little snack shop or something. Or you can become a stock commentator and talk others into it while you yourself reap the benefits. For people who always lose money trading stocks, continuing to trade stocks is generally the worst choice, because the likelihood of continuing to lose money is relatively high.
[匿名] 某人
2007-03-31 21:39:05
Pluralism and monism both presuppose some questionable assumptions, which need to be surpassed from a deeper foundation.
＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝
I hope Jiang teacher will have time to chat about this topic.
2007-03-31 21:46:35
【Pluralism and monism both presuppose some questionable assumptions, which need to be surpassed from a deeper foundation.
＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝
I hope Jiang teacher will have time to chat about this topic.】
It is a long story. Basically, I think it takes two to tango; where there is a head-on struggle, probably both sides are at fault. What exactly the fault is still requires careful analysis. When scientific fundamentalists and anti-scientific cultural people go at each other, probably both sides have blind spots.
I have not yet thought through the problems of pluralism and monism.
[匿名] 新浪网友
2007-03-31 22:39:40
新齋老蔣
2007-03-31 21:26:43
【This Jiang Xiaoyuan is also so muddled. The stock-market problem can of course only be solved by stock trading:
if you lose money trading stocks and have no money left, then naturally you stop trading.】
Luckily, Zhao teacher is not as muddled in life as he is when thinking about the problem of scientism, hehe.
Problems caused by stock trading can of course be solved in other ways. For example, if you lose money, you can take the money you have left and invest it in opening a little snack shop or something. Or you can become a stock commentator and talk others into it while you yourself reap the benefits. For people who always lose money trading stocks, continuing to trade stocks is generally the worst choice, because the likelihood of continuing to lose money is relatively high.
=========================================
Hehe, science is the most amazing stock of all, hitting the daily limit every day. I’ve never once seen it fall.
A lot of cultural people come out and talk science down, but science still keeps booming just the same.
If it were not so, the scientists would long ago have all changed professions and gone to open snack shops.
2007-03-31 23:37:13
1. It turns out that Zhao teacher’s logic in criticizing Jiang teacher has already failed, so he can only drag things off to some other place.
2. The stock market has rises and falls; whether one stays the course or makes a strategic transfer, both have prospects. Only muddleheads think that after losing money, the only way to recover one’s losses is to keep selling the house, selling blood, and blindly going long in stock trading. Of course, there are also some stock commentators and traders who hustle others and are unwilling to work hard to become rich by opening a snack shop. They need to give people unfounded confidence so that they can profit from the losses of those muddleheads……
[匿名] 老赵
2007-04-01 00:11:53
Jiang Xiaoyuan’s own logic has failed.
The stock market has rises and falls; science has rises but no falls. Using the stock market as a metaphor for science is pure nonsense.
The stock market is a casino. If you are afraid of losing money, don’t go in. Winning is luck; losing means accepting your bad luck. There is no such thing as a “problem” at all.
The so-called “problems” of science do not exist. Although without science there would be no automobiles, automobile fatalities are not science’s problem, nor are they the problem of the person who invented the automobile; they are a problem of an automobile society.
Just as the nuclear weapons problem is not a science problem but a political problem.
[匿名] 新斋老蒋
2007-04-01 00:21:31
Among scientific fundamentalists, Professor Zhao has always been rather strong in logic. What’s up today?
When you came up to criticize Professor Jiang, you weren’t talking about whether science can outperform the stock market. You started right off by saying that stock-market problems can only be solved by the stock market itself. From the dialogue above, it can be seen that this logic does not work.
As for the argumentative line that a certain problem is not a scientific problem but a political one, there is no need to drag that out today either. Tian Song’s “what is good belongs to science, what is bad belongs to the devil” has already refuted this.
Go wash up and go to bed.
[Anonymous] ME
2007-04-01 08:29:59
TO Lao Jiang:
Lao Jiang said: “For people who always lose money speculating in stocks, continuing to speculate is generally the worst choice, because the probability of losing more money is greater.”
“Generally speaking” does not settle the issue. Inductive logic does not guarantee truth. If you keep speculating, there is still hope of recovering your losses: on the one hand there is the possibility of luck, and on the other hand this person may also keep learning through trial and error! Here one needs Bayes probability and belief updating.
I think Professor Jiang’s analogy is still appropriate. Scientists and gamblers do indeed have similarities. Philosophers of science sometimes use this to describe changes in scientific theories as well; for example, a Professor Marr at UIUC once wrote a book called Betting on Theories.
[Anonymous] Xinzhai Lao Jiang
2007-04-01 09:17:07
Hua Jie:
Of course, abstractly speaking, anything is possible.
Even reverse induction is possible.
But in real life, for someone who always loses money in the stock market, if he wants to keep speculating and hopes to change the outcome, he has to produce some concrete reasons.
[Anonymous] Lao Zhao
2007-04-01 10:53:16
Xinzhai Lao Jiang
2007-04-01 00:21:31
Among scientific fundamentalists, Professor Zhao has always been rather strong in logic. What’s up today?
When you came up to criticize Professor Jiang, you weren’t talking about whether science can outperform the stock market. You started right off by saying that stock-market problems can only be solved by the stock market itself. From the dialogue above, it can be seen that this logic does not work.
===============================
Getting into the stock market means losing money; that is the nature of the stock market, not the stock market’s “problem.” The real problems in the stock market can only be solved in the stock market itself.
As for the line that a certain problem is not a scientific problem but a political one, there is no need to bring that argumentative logic out again today. Tian Song’s “what is good belongs to science, what is bad belongs to the devil” has already refuted this.
===================================
Responsibility and power go together; whoever has power has responsibility. That is the universal rule of society. Tian Song cannot produce any “bad ones,” so he feels psychologically unbalanced and says some酸溜溜的话, what kind of “refutation” is that? Just like those who loudly call for “humanities” and “ethics” to guide science, yet still cannot produce any brilliant views on “guidance,” they have no one to blame but themselves for talking big.
[Anonymous] yxy
2007-04-02 00:29:33
I once discussed Tian Song’s article privately with him, Lao Jiang, Liu Bing, and others.
Tian’s view is not stable. He also could not answer my objections.
If he has already refuted a certain view, others can also say that his criticism has already been rebutted.
I think citing authority to prove a point is not a good strategy; it is better to directly cite the authority’s views and arguments.
Citing Tian’s article makes the weight even less sufficient.
[Anonymous] Xinzhai Lao Jiang
2007-04-02 09:17:59
Whether a certain person’s view has been refuted or not, there is no absolutely objective and unanimous judgment on this.
Perhaps Professor Zhao upstairs thinks he has long since thoroughly and completely refuted the anti-science cultural people; perhaps the anti-science cultural people think that certain statements no longer need to be answered.
Different people will have different interpretations.
The article above and the discussion, too, are not strict academic texts; they are merely roughly expressing each person’s views, and cannot be required to be very rigorous.
How much citation counts as enough, and how much weight a person’s article has, are also understood differently by different people.
[Anonymous] Lao Lao
2007-04-02 10:56:57
Quoting Tian Song’s statement merely shows that Tian speaks interestingly, and that everyone does not wish to discuss the matter in detail. Things like “what is good belongs to science,” etc., Tian’s sarcasm really is interesting. Zhao has not disproved this fact. Tian’s article has been publicly published and can be checked; your statement has not been published, so everyone cannot appreciate it.
[Anonymous] yxy
2007-04-02 12:41:05
Tian Song writes very well, but not rigorously enough.
Because I have communicated with Lao Jiang, he also endorsed my opinion. Since I know Tian is not rigorous, I think one should be cautious in citing Tian’s article again.
I have not communicated with “Lao Lao,” and I also do not have time to write an article for public publication, so I will simply introduce a few points here.
The things brought about by science include both good and bad; that is a fact. Tian Song is simply saying that there are both good and bad things, and that the good cannot be credited to science while the bad is pushed onto others. That is true.
But the other side can completely avoid this point while continuing to insist on the basic view that science is merely a tool. After all, there is more good than bad, right? After subtraction, there is a positive surplus.
Even the positive surplus does not all belong to science. After all, there were people designing, people making decisions, people organizing implementation, and the masses of working people actually doing the concrete work. That was the merit of engineers, politicians, entrepreneurs, and the broad masses of laboring people. Science merely provided tools and assistance and accounted for only a small part of the credit.
Once everything is sorted out, it becomes clear that science cannot greedily claim all the credit for the development of modern society for itself, and correspondingly, when problems arise, whoever’s responsibility it is should bear it; there is no need for science to shoulder it.
Science really should not be held responsible for many problems; correspondingly, its contribution in many matters is only that of a tool and assistance, and its credit is not large. But when countless things are added together, science’s total contribution is a huge positive number; science is good.
See, the line of argument for instrumentalism is still quite powerful. Tian Song only refuted the first layer and did not think of the second layer.
[Anonymous] Gu Wu
2007-04-02 12:53:05
“what is good belongs to science, what is bad belongs to the devil” is certainly not good, but “a certain problem is not a scientific problem but a political one” still ought to be made clear in many cases; it is not logical to dump all the bad onto science. Are scientific activity and politics inseparable? Even if they are inseparable, like the two sides of a coin, one can still clearly distinguish the face with the denomination from the reverse with the national emblem. Who “controls” whom is itself a political issue; control over thought, culture, and belief should not be advocated.
Sometimes I regard science as a religion. For example, if I were an atheist, or a Buddhist, or something like that, and I thought Christian belief was too old and backward, or that its worldview was simply wrong, could I go demand that Christianity launch an ecological revolution and demand that they change their doctrine? I would not have that qualification! Unless I myself were a Christian leader and I launched a reform—that would be acceptable. Similarly, if I were to say that the mechanistic view of nature and other beliefs of science are too old and backward, or simply wrong and out of step with the times, and demand that science launch a new revolution—if I were standing outside science, I would not be qualified to control scientists’ ideas. Unless I were a scientist and launched a revolution myself, then it would be acceptable.
One can only advocate mutual exchange, but even with regard to exchange, one should not force the other side to participate in exchange. For example, the Amish—if they themselves wish to remain somewhat isolated from the world, I cannot force them to join global cultural exchange, or to accept outside information and opinions; they should be respected. Science, as belief and thought activity, should likewise have such freedom. The only thing that can be controlled by us is how much incense money society gives them as alms.
[Anonymous] Xinzhai Lao Jiang
2007-04-02 14:26:11
Recently I’ve been reading Science in Action; Latour writes really well. I feel quite ashamed now that I’ve read too few books—I’m probably less well read than young Xiao Gu.
The picture Latour paints is very different from what we think, and it is worth paying attention to. The instrumentalism, the split between science, technology, and society, and so on that the many layers above like to talk about have all been strongly impacted here.
[Anonymous] yxy
2007-04-02 16:24:40
The name Latour sounds like an authority at first hearing, better than treating Tian Song’s article as an authority.
But still the same old point: “I think citing authority to prove a point is not a good strategy; it is better to directly cite the authority’s views and arguments.”
[Anonymous] Sina netizen
2007-04-02 16:52:10
B. Latour is only so-so; the word “authority” is a bit odd. In some places Latour even regresses compared to D. Bloor; his nature-society polarity mapping does not have much novelty. This guy’s main contribution was doing a piece of scientific anthropology work first in San Diego, California.
If one can cite Chinese scholars, then of course one should cite Chinese scholars first. Tian Song is not inferior to Latour in some respects.
Latour is quite adept at using other people’s achievements: he takes other people’s case studies and reorganizes and narrates them very well. There are several such figures in SSK.
[Anonymous] Xinzhai Lao Jiang
2007-04-02 17:30:57
Hua Jie,
I won’t compare Song Ge and Latour. This guy probably often comes here now to peer over the wall and even post anonymously.
I do think his double symmetry goes a step further than Bloor’s.
【The word “authority” is a bit odd.】Still, from a sociological point of view, the role of authority is very real and undeniable.
I am not using Latour here to prove anything; I’m merely, like a rustic offering wild celery, suggesting that everyone read this book. In fact, the experts from all sides probably already read it long ago; only I have read rather few books.
[Anonymous] Sina netizen
2007-04-02 19:19:23
“Double symmetry goes a step further than Bloor’s”—on that I reserve judgment. A theory that looks more correct may be very uninteresting. Whether it is “a step forward” is hard to say; it may well be a step backward.
[Anonymous] Xinzhai Lao Jiang
2007-04-02 19:24:50
Don’t misunderstand. Hua Jie may be the domestic scholar who first systematically introduced SSK, but later he does not seem to have continued working on this area as a specialty. Why is that?
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
Leave a Reply