On Science, Problem of Induction and Limit of Human Understanding: Part II

*This is the part 1 of?series on The Exploration of Science and Problem of Induction.

Having Ears hear not, having Eyes see not, having heart understanding not. They follow nothing but their own conjecture.

It is perhaps no stranger that we live in the strange land where in the “modern science” and materialistic journalist, the naming and dating (of events, phenomena, observation, etc) are factual but doesn’t capture the essential truth of the Reality, thus provide us with illusory understanding, fiction and lies, while “traditional Science” and religious novelist are doing exactly the opposites, names and dates might be fictious, but they capture the factual, meta-physical, non-empirical Truth about the Reality itself.

What does it mean to do “Science” this day? Where is the (real) “Scientist” when we need them the most today? How do we can pursue the Truth and trust the Institution of Science if they’re providing us with Anti-Truth? ?

Since Enlightenment Revolution, it seems that we keep narrowing our perspective and degrading our intuition. There’s no more discourse on whether we, as the successor of our predecessor, are actually having a choice to hear and see what is the preceding History trying to convey. It looks like that we’re kept in this straight-jacket naming, definition and precise re-construction of the Past. We’re losing our imaginative power. Just like the entropy act as dissipating medium, the so-called scientific enquiry turns into the academic sports and self-referential narcissism, the theatre of ignorance and aggrandization of arrogance. Instead of liberating our self-consciousness, it provides the perfect medium for eco-chamber and muted our ability to think for oneself. If the medieval celebrates the power of intellect, the post-enlightenment prefers the weakness of intellect given the fact that the thinking business is now shifting to the machine, computers and Artificial Intelligence.

The objective morality born out of naturalistic and materialistic lens, as absurd as it heard, is governing every social aspect of modern’s life. Everything is seen in light of empirical, subjective experience, and inductive thinking. No one seems to question that history actually happens, not in backward but forward. Looking at reality through the rear-mirror is only projecting our own bias, introducing the notion that somehow things are either too deterministic, mechanical or predictable. It gives us the cognitive comfort and ease, making the perfect stage of hypnotic performance for modern society. Remember one thing: history defined as any successive chain of events, proceeding forward in time, but can only be inferred with posterior effect.

The rise of nationalism and neo-liberalism doctrine dictating our 21st century today, in fact its cornerstone of organized violence is and will never be effective. Our innate capacity for conflict, rivalry and competition has been contained into self-defeating and nihilistic fashion. The flexibility of arrangement for societal structure and human relationship is suppressed. How do we solve the meta-crisis facing our Civilization today? When Steven Pinked said that we’re living in the age of relatively peaceful, a better living standard by means of health, security, food or any other conceivable parameters possible compared to ancient society, is actually nothing could be further from the truth. Supplied by ex-post statistic, convincing numbers and particular data, one could become the believer of such marvel brought by Enlightenment Era. Unfortunately, we live in a modern society that no longer able to produces religious thoughts to confront the established system that are widely and universally accepted to be the objective and absolute value. The established system of anti-religion and secularism becomes too religious. Look no further than the current ongoing conflict in the supposed City of Peace. The inherent double standard of definition: it is act of terrorism when such moral scientist is visited upon violence, but as soon as the violence is inflicted by their very own hand, they call it act of self-defense. Do we succumb ourselves to this allure of scientist that manipulate and monopolize violence? Where is the (real) “Scientist” when we need them the most today?

Montesquieu’s Spirit of the Law, uttered by our contemporary politician is basically a mask to hide the lawless spirit of modernity. The nonethical ethics where legal legitimacy is reigned supreme without the real Ethos. We should learn from history, at least for the last 5000 years that when our security and legal framework need system of coercion to maintain it, eventually things will end up with no security, lawlessness and a lot of violence. How do we get stuck to the present-day conception of liberty, equality and fraternity since those Age of Enlightenment and French Revolution? Where actually we only play freedom and give rise to the real king, dictator and oligarch to make us obey unquestionably. How do we find ourselves subdued by the prevailing Institution of Science and New-Atheist movement that glorifies materialism and natural evolution, celebrating the death of God, and claiming themselves as the front-runner proponent of humanity? Where actually they only follow and play with their own desire, becoming the slave and worshipper of their own Procrustean Bed, unscientific and unfalsifiable claims. It is Max Planck, the father of quantum physic that remarked the (real) Science as the willingness to let go (of established theory, representation, model, etc), to contradict oneself, to embrace the death of older knowledge. So, indeed the Truth does not triumph by convincing, imposing set of (subjective and arbitrary) value through cult of violence to make its opponents accept and submit, but rather because the opposing force (or perhaps to contextualize: the entrenched Establishment) is eventually dies.

Narrative is told by the survivor. It is no stranger and not uncommon in the society that made to believe in evolution produces the fittest survivor, to find their surviving own narrative as absolute truth. The story to confirm the fitness of their model of reality. How one could be so dogmatic to insist just because the birds is indeed flying after given the lecture about aerodynamic, it must be coming from their superior theorizing, modeling, representing concept of aerodynamic? Alternative-narrative is rare and non-intuitive, precisely because its absent. Non-survivor does not write history, therefore making things more problematic. This is what Nassim Taleb called as silent evidence, the needed evidence that actually matters. It is easier to infer and induce from the visible, tangible and observable, but to do so without rigor and the correct premise at the first place, one could conclude anything by supplying the cherry-picked data and evidence. One could be easily turned into a fool fooled by randomness. Science is hard.

There are class of people who takes their knowledge too seriously. The problem become more acute when these people are responsible for the development of our scientific thinking that supposedly loosely held their definite definition & theory. Following the maxim of scientific method is actually all about testing and rejecting (or failure to reject) the hypothesis. Knowledge is not improved by confirmation or via positiva but rather via negativa, hence Popperian falsification. Sometimes these people argue about the “progress” made by our modern society, comparing “average” benefit (materialized as basic needs, public goods, etc) to the previous older generation. Again, there is no evidence that one should take such statement for granted without the sound premise and rigorous method to describe such phenomena. Just a simple demonstration is adequate to refute what does it mean by “average” human in practice. Beware of generalization from particular and worse particularizing the general. Average human will have one breast and one testicle. As silly and as weird as it sounds, that’s what you’ll hear from scientist speaking and purporting the logic of average to its logical extreme, blinded by their own tools. As noted by McLuhan, media theorist that once you invent the tool (or media), given long enough time, it is the tool itself that will control you. So, as Nietzsche, when he said when starring to the abyss and fighting the monster, one should beware and cautious of becoming the monster and suddenly realize the abyss is staring right back at him.

Are you measuring the table with your "ruler"? Or the "ruler" is actually being measured by the table? Wittgenstein ruler applied here, noting that unless there is a real sense of reliability from the revealer of information, what is being really revealed is less about the information but rather about the one (read: the fake-scientist, if you will) who convey the information. Last but not lease, try to compare the books written by the so-called father of Natural Evolution itself, Charles Darwin with the post-modern evolutionary thinker and philosopher and you’d proceeded to notice the stark difference and style of argumentation. One concern with one’s own limited knowledge, adhere to the concept of scientific progress through testing the hypothesis, admitting that it's all about model and metaphorical tools at first place, showing modesty and humility of incompleteness shown by the Reality, while on other end you have club of pseudo-scientist, turning science into scientism and perhaps even worse religious-dogmatic scientific cult. Do we succumb ourselves to this allure of scientist that manipulate and monopolize our enquiry to understanding the world? As pursuer of truth? Where is the (real) “Scientist” when we need them the most today?