Gleaning Life Lessons from Scientific Laws
Why I Started Writing This
I had planned long ago to write a long essay on “science and value,” but when exactly I will finish such an essay is anyone’s guess. In any case, it will take at least until I am in graduate school, because this topic deserves at least a book, and it also requires a great deal of accumulated work. Philosophy is not merely epistemology, and even less merely linguistic analysis; philosophy should at least include three parts: ontology, epistemology, and axiology. So-called “philosophy of science” should of course not be limited to “what is science,” and even less should it only discuss “how science knows” or “how science explains.” In addition to asking “what on earth is science,” philosophy of science should also ask “what does science mean,” that is, reflect on the value and significance of science. This is a very large and very important topic. Although people have long since ventured into it, I believe there is still plenty of room in it, and it is well worth further exploration.
The article below has no direct connection with my “grand” plan, nor is it the main topic I want to discuss in “science and value.” It is just something I happened to think of and wanted to write down as a casual reflection. I write reflections simply to sort out my own thoughts and views; what one has thought and what one has written are worlds apart. Often, only by writing a thought down can one discover how imperfect it is; sometimes only after turning one’s thoughts into an essay can one truly understand what one is thinking. Communicating with a pen yields more than communicating with one’s mouth. If no one is talking with me, that is no matter; it is fine to talk to myself. Talking to oneself with a pen is much better than sitting with closed eyes and brooding over things in silence.
Truth and Goodness
Moore called deriving an “ought” from an “is” the “naturalistic fallacy,” and ever since then, modern ethical discussions have drawn a clear line between “is” and “ought,” between nature and ethics.
The “naturalistic fallacy” is well named: indeed, one cannot deduce a normative “ought” from an “is.” Science, which studies the truth of nature, cannot directly bring human beings moral norms. Science is not omnipotent after all; if one thinks that ethics can be regulated solely by science, that is indeed a kind of “naturalistic fallacy.”
If there is a gulf between “is” and “ought,” then what about the relation between “truth” and “goodness”?
In ancient Greece, and especially in Chinese philosophy, “truth” is “goodness”: truth and the highest good are identical. Greek philosophers contemplated more the essence of nature and pursued the ultimate truth of all things, while Chinese philosophers explored more the essence of human nature and pursued the highest moral realm. In fact, the goals they sought were the same!
The introduction of the “naturalistic fallacy” shattered the harmony between truth and goodness; the pursuit of the truth of nature has since then been unrelated to ethics—many scientists and ethicists hold similar views. But is that really so?
When discussing topics such as the relation between science and ethics, people are often speaking within the context of mainstream modern ethics. This ethics can be divided into two parts: “metaethics” and “normative ethics.” The former analyzes ethics and its language itself, while the latter tries to propose norms for human moral life or explain those existing norms. From the standpoint of normative ethics, that is, from the perspective of “what ought one do,” scientific laws indeed cannot yield ethical norms. Moreover, trying to use the “is” of scientific laws to justify and dominate ethical norms is dangerous; social Darwinism is one example.
However, in an older tradition, ethics has another form—“virtue ethics.” Whether Socrates or Confucius and Mencius, what they concerned themselves with was less “what ought one do” than “what kind of person ought one become.” This kind of ethics is not preoccupied with discussion of “norms” (though of course it cannot ignore them entirely); it places greater emphasis on shaping an ideal personality. In modern times, this form of ethics has been revived through the efforts of MacIntyre and others.
Virtue ethics replaces normative ethics’ pursuit of a construction of the minimum ethical standard with the shaping of an ideal personality. Of course, this may carry the risk of making the highest morality into the lowest requirement; nevertheless, the idea of mistaking the highest ideal for a basic norm still belongs to the mode of thinking of normative ethics. Virtue ethics leaves the question of behavioral norms to jurisprudence or normative ethics (virtue ethics and normative ethics are not necessarily mutually exclusive), while focusing on the individual consciousness’s inner support for the “good” — what is goodness? Why pursue goodness? What can I hope for if I do good? These are all questions that normative ethics finds difficult to answer.
I should not expand the discussion of ethics here. What I want to say is that, from a certain perspective, truth and goodness are still unified. For we do not demand that one “derive” or “infer” an “ought” from an “is.” Once our point of focus is the highest ideal rather than the lowest requirement, we discover that the unity of truth and goodness is precisely our highest ideal. Thus, although we cannot “prove” goodness from truth, we can still “experience” goodness from truth; we can place our longing and pursuit within the harmony of truth and goodness.
In short, what I say below is all what I have “gained” from scientific laws, not an attempt to use scientific laws to support ethical norms. The inspiration that scientific laws give to life is similar to the insight one obtains when gazing up at the starry sky.
March 13, 2006 (to be continued)
“Laws” Themselves
Newton’s First Law
Newton’s Third Law
Law of Universal Gravitation
Maxwell’s Equations
First Law of Thermodynamics
Second Law of Thermodynamics
The Theory of Evolution
Special Relativity
General Relativity
Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle
Complementarity Principle
Indeterminacy
Quantum Mechanics as a Whole
Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem
Dissipative Structures
Gaia and Symbiosis
(to be continued)
Latest Comments
- Wu
2006-03-14 08:32:20
The font is too small; I can’t read it clearly
- Gu
2006-03-14 12:37:32
Whoa… has anyone noticed that the font size on Yiku has been changing a lot lately? Yesterday, xx-small was the same size as the usual small…
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
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