Structural elements of the scientific substantiation of truth. The concept of scientific truth. Features of truth in scientific knowledge. Additional criteria for the truth of scientific knowledge
Scientific truth is knowledge that meets the double requirement: first, it corresponds to reality; secondly, it satisfies a number of scientific criteria. These criteria include: logical harmony; empirical verifiability; the ability to predict new facts based on this knowledge; consistency with that knowledge, whose truth has already been reliably established. The criterion of truth can be the consequences derived from scientific provisions.
In the history of philosophy, there have been several understandings, ways of interpreting truth:
1. ontological. "Truth is what it is." The very existence of the thing is important. Until some time, the truth may be hidden, unknown to a person, but at a certain point in time it is revealed to a person, and he captures it in words, in definitions. in works of art.
2. epistemological. "Truth is the correspondence of knowledge to reality." However, in this case, many problems and disagreements arise, since an attempt is often made to compare the incomparable: the ideal (knowledge) with the real-material.
2. positivist. "Truth is empirical confirmation." In positivism, only that which could really be tested in practice was subjected to consideration, everything else was recognized as "metaphysics" that went beyond the interests of "real (positivist) philosophy."
3. pragmatic. "Truth is the usefulness of knowledge, its effectiveness." According to these criteria, what at a given moment in time gives an effect, brings a kind of “profit” was recognized as true.
4. Conventional(founder - J. A. Poincare). "Truth is an agreement." In case of disagreement, you just need to agree among themselves what is considered true.
Most likely, the concept of truth combines all these approaches: it is both what really is and the correspondence of our knowledge to what really is, but at the same time it is also a certain agreement, an agreement on the acceptance of this truth.
Delusion- unintentional distortion of knowledge, a temporary state of knowledge in search of truth.
Lie- intentional distortion of the true.
Criteria for the truth of scientific knowledge:
1. Scientific knowledge should not be contradictory and contribute to the further development and improvement of the theory system.
2. This positive change in theory should sooner or later, one way or another, indirectly or directly give certain practical results, be useful.
3. Practice. It has the dignity of immediate certainty. Only practical activity that transforms reality proves the truth or falsity of knowledge.
4. Time. True scientific knowledge must be considered in its historical limitations. Scientific knowledge reveals its true value, its this-worldly strength and power only when it is considered in development, under specific conditions, used in combination with other forms of knowledge (ordinary, artistic, moral, religious, philosophical).
Additional criteria for the truth of scientific knowledge:
1. E. Mach introduces the principle of economy of thought and simplicity of theory;
2. The beauty of scientific theory. A. Poincare insists on the beauty of the mathematical apparatus;
3. The criterion of common sense; 4. The criterion of insanity - the criterion of non-compliance with common sense;
5. H. Reichenbach puts forward the criterion of the greatest predictiveness of the theory.
6. Verification theory; 7. K. R. Popper refers to the principle of "falsification"
So, 3 types of scientific rationality, which can be expressed as scheme:
1) Classical rationality - emphasis on O-those.
The object exists really or objectively, regardless of the subject. Consequently, the knowledge that is obtained is true precisely when it is knowledge of the object. Only the object itself has value, truth consists in knowing the object. Truth is the correspondence of our knowledge to the object. Belief in the existence of absolute truth.
(facilities)
S → Wed. → [O] (object)
S-tknowledge
(operations)
2) Non-classical rationality - takes into account the relationship between knowledge about O-those and the nature of the means and operations of activity.Truth- the truth is relative, the truth of several specific theoretical descriptions that differ from each other is allowed, because each of them may contain a moment of objectively true knowledge.
(facilities)
C → (Compare → O) (object)
S-tknowledge
(operations)
3) Post-non-classical rationality - takes into account the correlation of knowledge about O-those both with the nature of the means and operations of activity, and with value-target structures. Post-non-classical science includes in the truth about the object of the subject of knowledge:
whatever we study, whether objects of living nature or inanimate, we eventually gain knowledge about ourselves.
(facilities)
[(C → Compare → O)] (object)
S-tknowledge
(operations)
forms of truth.
1. within dialectical materialist positions distinguish the material and spiritual spheres of reality (objective and subjective reality). Respectively:
1) subject truth - truth as adequate information about material systems of various structural levels (micro-, macro- and mega-worlds), while distinguishing types: subject-physical, subject-biological, etc.
2) Spiritual truth - people also evaluate feelings, ideas, thoughts from the standpoint of the concepts of "true" and "untrue" (the sphere of "spirit" is the world of feelings, ideas, theories, reflective perceptions, ideals, beliefs, love).
And here are the views based on the spheres of reality:
A) existential reality: the spiritual and vital values of people (the ideals of goodness, justice, beauty, feelings of love, friendship, etc.), as well as the spiritual world of individuals. Since people solve the problems of the truth of ideas about goodness, beauty, evaluate (study) their own and other people's feelings, it is necessary to recognize the concept existential true.
B) cognitive reality: questions about the conformity of an individual's beliefs to one or another set of religious dogmas or the correctness of understanding by one or another person of any scientific concept, theory - conceptual true. You can also highlight operational truth - as the true ideas of the subject about the methods and means of cognition.
2. According to the specifics of the types of cognitive activity: scientific, everyday (everyday), moral, artistic, religious, authoritarian, etc.
1) Ordinary truth is the result of ordinary empirical knowledge associated with the appearance of things. Such knowledge does not go to the level of essence. But this knowledge contains a statement of phenomena and correlations between them. And this statement is true. For example, "Snow is white." If in the application of this knowledge (these everyday truths) one does not claim to reveal the principles and laws of being, then there will be no erroneous judgments about these laws. The first attempt leads to falsehood.
2) scientific truth - masters not random, superficial connections, but studies the general and natural. It penetrates the essence of objects and processes, not limited to the phenomenon, uses a specific methodology and special research methods, a specific language.
From these differences, the conclusion suggests itself that scientific knowledge is always closer to absolute truth than ordinary knowledge. But rising to the level of high generalizations, abstractions, science enters the sphere of inductive conclusions. And since full induction is impossible in the vast majority of cases, then the probability of inaccuracies increases. Given the binding of any judgment (knowledge) to a specific area or a specific fragment of being, the degree of truth, for example, of the ordinary judgment “You can hammer nails into a board with a hammer” is higher than the Big Bang theory or the scientific description of the nuclear fusion process.
3) artistic truth - in works containing such constructions, can be "hidden" in the plot-plot layer, the layer of characters, and finally, in the layer of coded ideas.
The power of truth hidden behind fiction is shown by G. Altov in his novel “The Searing Mind”: “Cervantes lost his arm in the battle near Leparto; you ho
Do you remember well who fought with whom and how the battle ended? And Don Quixote even today helps those who storm the impossible. In every victory there is a share of his participation. ... I affirm: Don Quixote's attack on a windmill is one of the most effective battles in the history of mankind ... ".
4) religious truth - can be recognized as truth one way or another based on all 3 approaches to truth: a) statement of objective reality (the concept of correspondence); b) play the role of moral orientation, give a clearly tangible pragmatic effect (pragmatic); c) the total content of fundamental theological, philosophical and religious teachings is quite coherent (the concept of coherence) (although we must not forget about the already mentioned problem of initial judgments).
God: not recognizing the ontological existence of God (as a certain
entity related to the sphere of objective reality that exists
outside and independently of human consciousness), it exists in the subjective sphere: objectively there are people who are the creators and bearers of the idea of God, faith in God, faith in the correctness of a particular religious doctrine. Objectively, there is not God, but the idea of God.
Religion is a myth created around a real historical figure and her life (Yeshua), reflecting the deep desire of the people for some ideal (the ideals of Christianity, which the real Jesus might not have preached).
Any religious teaching includes:
1) a system of value attitudes - the basis for achieving the positive goals of dogma - substantiating a person in the world and society, ensuring moral relations between people, creating an ideological base.
2) mythical, fantasy elements - do not have independent cognitive significance. Perform 2 functions:
The teachings fill the "cognitive void" - they give some (fantasy, mythical) picture of the world - a literal understanding of this part of religious dogma (for example, texts Old Testament) is absurd for a modern person
This is an external, "literary" form through which the actual ideological content of the dogma is presented.
Thus, religious truth is a system of ideas contained in religious teachings, which reflects the ideals of human relationships fixed in the public consciousness, ideas about the best norms and rules of human society, about the best personal qualities.
Religious truths - truths-opinions, have nothing to do with the forms and results of knowing the properties of the objective world, therefore they cannot be called objective truths. Religious teachings have nothing to do with the formation of an adequate picture of the world.
5) authoritarian truth - a) knowledge based on the authority of the person who made this judgment. b) when the basis for accepting knowledge, judgments, statements as truth is the position of this subject in the social hierarchy (imposed opinion). In epistemological terms, a) and b) are largely identical, since in both cases the recipient and future carrier of knowledge does not justify its truth, but agrees with the opinion of another person.
On the one hand, subjectivism can never be ruled out (no matter how outstanding a scientist the subject of the statement is). On the other hand, it is impossible to know everything on your own, anyway, most of the information in science is taken for granted.
6) moral truth - The foundations of morality are inextricably linked with the spiritual and emotional experience of a person, with the necessary share of authoritarian acceptance of the moral imperative.
7) philosophical truth - Philosophical knowledge has a number of features that make it related to scientific (systematic, organized, focused on understanding the essence of the studied phenomena, spheres of being). But: it is not an experimental science, it formulates general laws, starting from the data of particular sciences. Moreover, philosophical knowledge is not just general, but universal knowledge of the worldview level, i.e. not to solve particular scientific problems, but to formulate the values of the cognitive process at the level of paradigms, the general methodology of scientific knowledge. Philosophical knowledge is anthropocentric, and therefore alternative.
3. According to the degree of completeness of the development of the object: relative And absolute . The development of the concept of relative and absolute truth was influenced by the fact of the cognitive inexhaustibility of complexly organized objects.
P.V. Alekseev and A.V. Panin: in the present absolute truth - knowledge that is identical to its subject and therefore cannot be refuted with further development knowledge, she
a) the result of the knowledge of certain aspects of the objects under study (a statement of facts, which is not identical to the absolute knowledge of the entire content of these facts);
b) final knowledge of certain aspects of reality;
d) complete, actually never fully achievable knowledge about the world.
But: "g" - it is obvious that such a truth is impossible; knowledge about the studied individual properties of a particular object of study (“a”) or about one or another aspect of reality (“b”) - can still gain new understanding at some distant time. Finally, it is not given to us to foresee which particular moments of the knowledge of today will not be refuted by the knowledge of the future.
Human knowledge is always relative, because depend on the level of development of society and historical and cultural conditions,
But this does not speak of the fundamental unknowability of the world and the a priori untruth of any knowledge. Relative knowledge is also objective, but incomplete, plus in the future it can be refined and supplemented. At the same time: 1) each relative truth contains a certain proportion of absolute truth; 2) under certain conditions, the question of the relativity or absoluteness of truth does not stand at all. Example: With the advent of the theory of relativity, classical mechanics has not ceased to be true, just there have been restrictions on the spheres in which it is true.
The philosophy of scientific truth historically acts as an understanding of the degree of reliability of both theoretical and empirical knowledge. “What is truth?” Pontius Pilate asked Jesus Christ. This question was and still remains one of the main questions of both philosophy and science. To answer it, it is necessary first of all to understand what meaning scientists and philosophers put into the word "truth" when they talk about its phenomenon. There is an opinion that the truth is a particularly accurate or absolutely reliable reflection of reality in the human mind, which is subjective in form and objective in content. This, in fact, follows from the very definition of truth as knowledge, the content of which does not depend on the state of the cognizing subject. Without a doubt, truth is the end result of human cognitive activity. The idea of Aristotle became classical, who argued that the knowledge gained must correspond to reality. IN AND. Lenin formulated a new definition of truth as a process and showed how absolute and relative truths relate to each other, how from one relative truth another, more complete, reliable truth arises. Relative truth is incomplete (or limited) knowledge about the object of knowledge, since the latter is inexhaustible in its change, development. However, in any relative truth there are moments, plots that perfectly adequately reflect the state of the various aspects of the object. These include dates, places of events, as well as theoretical evidence that is irrefutable, such as heliocentrism. Absolute truth expresses completely complete and accurate knowledge about the object of cognitive activity, that is, one hundred percent correspondence of knowledge to an object, thing, phenomenon, process, etc. Many principles and laws of nature are absolutely true.
To realize the essence of the dialectical unity of relative and absolute truths means to understand the inclusion of two opposites in objective truth: the relativity and absoluteness of knowledge. And this testifies to the infinity of scientific knowledge.
The human mind, historically ascending the steps of scientific knowledge of the secrets of the universe, at each subsequent stage of the movement of relative truth to absolute truth again and again asks questions: how much we know the world and are there limits to scientific knowledge? In an effort to find answers to these eternal questions, philosophers have long been divided into three groups: optimists, pessimists and agnostics. The representative of the first group, G. Hegel, was deeply convinced that “the essence of the Universe, hidden and closed at the beginning, has no power that could resist the daring of knowledge; she must reveal herself to him, show him her riches and her depths, and let him enjoy them. Skeptics, without denying in principle the cognizability of the world, express doubts about the reliability (truth) of knowledge. The great Aristotle warned: “He who clearly wants to know must first thoroughly doubt.” Representatives of agnosticism (Greek ag-nostos - inaccessible to knowledge) see main problem in the impossibility of comprehending the truth due to the absolute variability, fluidity of phenomena, processes in being and consciousness. One can philosophically conclude that agnosticism is an exaggerated form of skepticism.
In this regard, it is important to understand that the philosophy of truth is designed not only to identify the cognitive procedures of science and its logical operations, not only to reveal the social mechanisms of its functioning and use, but also to evaluate its general cultural significance, to determine the general meaning of scientific activity from the point of view of a historically defined social and cultural perspective. The philosophy of scientific truth develops in at least two directions. On the one hand, since antiquity there has been a process of improving the classical concept of truth as objective in essence, most fully corresponding to the reality being studied. Originating in the teachings of Plato and Aristotle, today it is largely associated with dialectical thinking. The other direction is a critical revision and even replacement of the classical concept of truth with other, alternative ones. With all the differences in them, there is one common position, namely: truth never needs any external force, standing outside of knowledge, which could somehow guide it. It is always self-directed by its objective content.
Of course, truth is generated by the activity of the subject, but in its content it is a reflection of objectivity, cleared by consciousness from subjective ideas (to the extent, of course, to which it is generally possible in every cognitive situation), because the goal of cognition is to obtain such information about the objective world, which would ensure successful practical activity, and for this the subject must eliminate himself from the content of this information - eliminate it precisely as a subject, with all its attribute properties, in particular, with its attitude to what it cognizes. For example, the pathogenicity of a microbe is established. But this is not the doctor's subjective opinion about him, but his objective property. Thus, truth as such - both in ontological and epistemological terms - is axiologically neutral. Thus, both Einstein's theory of relativity and the laws of gravity have nothing to do with the subjectivity of the scientist. They are subjective in content. Consequently, the discovery of truth involves the distraction of the scientist's consciousness from everything random and external in relation to the studied things, objects, phenomena. The path to truth is a constant limitation by the scientists themselves of the subjectivity of opinion.
In this regard, the famous English philosopher Karl Popper expressed, at first glance, a paradoxical idea that all theories and principles that are considered true will sooner or later be refuted anyway. Thus, the philosopher again drew the attention of researchers to the fact that all knowledge is, in principle, relative. By the way, K. Popper himself avoided using the concept of "truth". However, the problem of understanding the truth from the point of view of the adequacy of knowledge to the facts of reality is considered by him comprehensively: as the correspondence of an object and any of its designations (for example, the correspondence of the sound of a gramophone record), as the problem of the “meta-language of science”, understanding the statement in two senses - through the analysis of statements about things and research on themselves. According to Popper, the status of truth can be compared to a mountain peak, which is always in a fog. However, the latter circumstance does not in the least affect the existence of the peak itself. K. Popper shows that true knowledge does not depend in any way on the possibilities of cognition of a scientist, however, it is very difficult to obtain it - it is "a path of trial and error", "assumptions and refutations".
So, in objective truth, the world is revealed as it really is, regardless of the person who knows himself and his consciousness, although elements of subjectivity are always present in truth. But subjectivity should in no way be associated with delusion. Misconceptions appear not so much because of the wrong choice of ways to solve a scientific problem, but because of a lack of information.
It is believed that the criterion of truth is only practice. At the same time, the latter, like knowledge, is an integral part of human culture. The criterion of practice is put forward not only by dialectical materialism, it also occupies a central place in the philosophy of positivism and pragmatism. Ultimately, these are conscious attempts by a rational individual to resolve the so-called world secrets of being. Humanity does not cease to ask itself eternal questions about what is the origin of the Universe and where is the source of life, as well as the world and human mind. Will philosophical and methodological analysis help to understand such complex problems of cognition as the presence or absence of any boundaries in comprehending the mysteries of the development of the world, society, and man? To answer all these questions cognitive activity it is necessary to complete the scientific and philosophical design of the theory of knowledge. It is she who is durable link between objective reality, the cognitive and practical activities of the “total social” person. At the same time, one should not forget about the immensity of everything unknown and about the relativity of human knowledge. “I know that I don’t know anything,” said Socrates, “but there are people who don’t know this either.”
The most famous definition of truth was given by Aristotle and later adopted by Thomas Aquinas. Conformitas seu adaequatio intentionalis intellectus cum re - intentional agreement of the intellect with a real thing or correspondence to it. In other words, a thought is called true (or truth) if it corresponds to its subject. Such an interpretation is called the "classical concept of truth" (or "correspondence theory", from the English. Correspondence - correspondence).
In the course of the development of philosophy and science, this understanding caused a number of questions and disagreements. In the philosophy of Marxism, absolute and relative truth are distinguished, while the first is known through the sum of the second. At the end of the 19th century, C. Pierce and J. Dury identified truth with utility (the philosophy of pragmatism). In their opinion, that which is useful and brings success is true.
During the period of classical science, scientists tried to find universal foundations of knowledge that did not raise any doubts. The dominant system was the mechanistic picture of the world. The ideal of scientificity was understood as a mathematically built model, and the geometry of Euclid served as a real model.
The principles of mechanics were applied not only in the natural sciences, but also in the social sciences and the humanities. The work of Benedict Spinoza "Ethics", dedicated to the problems of human freedom, is built on a mathematical model. Using a geometric system of proofs (theorems, lemmas), the author postulates the idea that everything that happens in the world has a cause in God.
With the accumulation of data, it became clear that there are patterns inherent in a particular science (biology, chemistry, etc.). Mechanism does not explain everything. There is a transition to a disciplinary-organized science. Moreover, the emergence of new empirical material gradually discredits existing ideas about certain phenomena, the question arises of creating a new theory, which casts doubt on the idea of the only possible description of truth.
At the beginning of the 20th century, within the framework of the philosophy of logical positivism, the question arose of finding a reliable basis for scientific knowledge. According to the concept of philosophers of this direction, “…reality is a set of states of things in the world surrounding a person. Such states (properties) can be empirically detected and expressed in elementary atomic sentences, which they called "protocol sentences"" [Philosophy: Textbook / Ed. A.F. Zotova, V.V. Mironova, A.B. Razin. - 2nd ed., revised. and additional - M .: Academic Project; Tricksta, 2004. -S. 629]. The totality of such proposals, according to the positivists, constitutes a reliable basis of scientific knowledge. You can get it based on observation and experiment.
The positivists also singled out the theoretical level of knowledge formed with the help of induction and hypotheses. Both of these levels (theoretical and empirical) constitute a scientific theory. The consequences logically deduced from general theoretical propositions were verified by experiment. The more a theoretical explanation received empirical confirmation, the more reasonable and scientific it was considered. This method was called the principle of verification and turned into a criterion for demarcating science and non-science in logical positivism.
Its failure was that verification is not possible in all areas of scientific knowledge (mathematics, social sciences and humanities). It became not always available with the advent of sophisticated equipment. For example, to check the data obtained from the collision of particles at the hadron collider, you need to build your own hadron collider, etc. Moreover, the question arose of how much evidence is needed to conclude that a theory is correct. According to the principle of verification, the statement "all metals are electrically conductive" will be true if each of the metals has this property. However, in this case, the amount of metals is finite and verification is possible. The well-known theory of white swans can serve as an example of the reverse situation. For quite a long time there was an opinion that all swans were white, until in 1697 the expedition of Willem de Vlamnik discovered a population of blacks in western Australia.
The philosopher and sociologist Karl Popper tried to solve this problem. Since scientific theories often belong to an endless or underexplored subject area, it can be much easier to establish the falsity of a general statement than to look for the entire body of supporting facts. To do this, it is necessary to find only one example that contradicts the general theory. According to Popper, scientific knowledge is a description of nature, striving to become true, but this goal cannot be achieved, from his point of view, there is no criterion for scientific truth.
Popper proposes to replace the principle of verification with the principle of falsification. The theory does not require substantiation by empirical facts, but verification and refutation with their own help. According to this principle, every scientific generalization is potentially falsifiable. Moreover, the more refutation attempts it has withstood, the more stable the theory is, the more it retains the status of a temporary scientific truth. If an assertion fails scrutiny, it should be resolutely discarded. Actions to save him lead to dogmatism and the rehabilitation of false theories, the philosopher believes.
The principle put forward by K. Popper is rather of a normative nature, but in reality, a scientist, faced with empirical refutation, will not abandon his theory, but will rather look for the cause of the conflict between the empirical and theoretical levels. Will look for the possibility of changing some parameters, to save the theory.
Thomas Kuhn, an American historian and philosopher, creates a concept of the philosophy of science that is not divorced from scientific and social reality in a historical and modern context. The key concept in his philosophy is the concept of "paradigm". The bearer and developer of the scientific paradigm is the scientific community. “A paradigm is what unites members of the scientific community, and, conversely, the scientific community consists of people who recognize the paradigm” [Kun T. The structure of scientific revolutions. - 2nd ed. - M., 1977.- S. 229].
One way or another, in the process of accumulating new knowledge, data appear that contradict existing ideas. When there are too many of them, there is a need to create a new theory. Thomas Kuhn called this process the scientific revolution. If it is necessary to revise the fundamental foundations of scientific knowledge, a global scientific revolution or a change in scientific paradigms takes place.
However, the old theory does not cease to exist. It can be used to explain certain phenomena, in those areas of reality in which it is acceptable. Newtonian mechanics is still studied at school, although Einstein's theory of relativity is the most reliable. The fact is that Newton's mechanics still works, but only at low speeds.
From this point of view, scientific truth is conventional. Aristotle's physics stated that heavy objects tend to go down, and this was true. 300 years ago it was replaced by Newtonian force gravity; and already at the beginning of the twentieth century, Einstein found out that bodies slide along the geodesic lines of space-time. And this, too, has become a new truth.
Thus, scientific truth is an explanation of reality that is most suitable for the scientific community in a specific time period. Alexander Sergeev, a member of the RAS Commission for Combating Pseudoscience and Falsification of Scientific Research, in his work “The Problem of Practical Demarcation of Science and Pseudoscience in the Russian Scientific Field” uses the term “scientific mainstream”. Scientific postulates can be questioned. In the event of the emergence of new data, scientific theories are revised, and sometimes the foundations of all science are revised.
A natural question arises, if there is no absolute truth, but only an agreement of a certain group of people, why should we trust science?
According to Polish sociologist Piotr Sztompka, trust is always associated with uncertainty about the future. If our predictions were always fulfilled, it would lose its meaning. “Trust is a guarantee accepted for the future uncertain actions of other people” [Sztompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 80].
“Trust is confidence plus actions based on it, and not just confidence itself. Trust is a concept from the realm of active discourse. Trust is a special, human platform in an unknown future world in which other people play a central role” [Shtompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 82].
Who do we trust when we talk about trust in science?
Trust always belongs to the human, humanitarian, and not natural discourse. In other words, it can be given to a person or a group of people, and not to an impersonal object. By relying on technology, for example, we are actually putting our trust in the people who invented it, tested it experimentally, and followed all safety precautions during assembly and installation.
“By trusting knowledge, we ultimately trust the actions of scientists who made some discoveries (we believe that they acted seriously, were truthful, conscientious, self-critical, had evidence to support their statements, and reasoned in accordance with the principles logic). We give credit also to the scientific method: a certain procedure, a way of creating knowledge, which is considered the best among others (such as revelation, intuition and faith). But here again, what we ultimately believe is the actions of researchers (that they conducted research professionally, scrupulously, in accordance with accepted standards of evidence, using the most modern methodologies),” Sztompka notes [Sztompka P. Trust is the basis of society . - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 392].
“Trust in science can be reduced to trust in the actions of scientists: researchers and organizers of scientific life, who together create a scientific environment” [Shtompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 393].
Here are a few reasons why we can trust the scientific community.
1. Practical efficiency.
It's hard to argue with what scientific achievements significantly changed our world in recent centuries. It is thanks to science that the average life expectancy has increased, high-tech means of transport have appeared, the speed of communications has significantly increased, etc. Science works and the evidence is everywhere.
Wherein main goal Science has always been the knowledge of reality, not the applied application of knowledge. As Sztompka notes, trust always refers not only “to a specific person (A trusts B), but also to a certain action (A believes that B will do X)” [Sztompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 393]. In the case of science, X is the pursuit of truth. It is logical to conclude that what is true can have practical use, while something that is false will not have such an application. And, despite the fact that there is no absolute truth in science, the laws that help explain reality (albeit temporarily) and make predictions have wide practical applications and will transform our world. Therefore, if science does not know the absolute truth, then at least it strives for it and successfully proves it.
2. Scientific ethics.
Until the twentieth century, scientific ethics remained at its best. To a large extent, she is the heiress of the British gentleman's society (XVII-XIX centuries). At that time, a number of wealthy and educated people were interested in one or another scientific field. It was still possible to achieve serious success in the scientific field at that time alone. “The motives of gentlemanly honor were transformed into a special kind of scrupulousness, which became the foundation of scientific ethics” [Sergeev A. The problem of practical demarcation of science and pseudoscience in the Russian scientific field. URL: http://klnran.ru/2015/10/demarcation/.]. The social position of the scientist, on which his well-being directly depended, was the key to the observance of ethical standards.
R. Merton identifies 4 basic norms of scientific ethics. The norm of universality requires that science be objective. The scientist's statements should not depend on personal or social attributes (race, nationality, religion, class, etc.). The norm of generality postulates the idea that scientific knowledge is in the public domain, and not the personal property of the author. The norm of disinterestedness requires the rejection of personal satisfaction from the discovery of "truth" in favor of the external interests of the whole society. The fourth norm (organized skepticism) requires impartial analysis from the standpoint of empirical and logical criteria. Each work is subject to critical analysis by other scientists.
At the beginning of the 20th century, big money came into science, and the old mechanisms of ethical regulation stopped working. This was one of the reasons for the emergence of pseudoscience. Gradually, ethical regulation began to move into the legal plane. In Russia, such a transition is noticeably late, which is probably due to the fact that science in our country has not been subject to commercial pressure for a long time.
The above norms of scientific ethics in more degree belong to the period of the so-called "academic" science (XVII - 2nd half of the twentieth century). “In the period of “post-academic science”, we are witnessing the erosion of trust. The question arises: why? We see the reason in the fact that Merton's scientific ethics are bypassed or weakened, and the recognition of achievements by other scientists is no longer the main reward for the researcher. Five changes that have recently taken place in science as an institution and as a scientific community” [Sztompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 404].
1. Fiscalization of science. The search for funds for expensive research leads to the dependence of science on external bodies which harms the norm of universalism.
2. Privatization of science. Exclusive rights to use the results of scientific knowledge are contrary to Merton's norm of generality.
3. Commercialization of science. “Changes taking place in this direction undermine the conditions of unselfishness and organized skepticism of Merton” [Shtompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 405].
4. Bureaucratization of science. Researchers devote a lot of time to activities that are not related to scientific and creative activity(cost planning, preparing reports, writing projects, etc.).
5. Reducing the exclusivity and autonomy of the scientific community. "The gates of the" tower from Ivory”, begins the flow of people in both directions. The scientific community is being infiltrated by politicians, administrators, marketing experts, lobbyists, all driven by interests and values other than the selfless pursuit of truth. And vice versa - scientists leave the scientific community and take on the roles of politicians, administrators and managers. They use their academic qualifications in political struggle or in marketing, thus undermining the prestige of science and their credibility as scientists. The norm of unselfishness and Merton's universalism is suspended” [Shtompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 405, 406].
However, despite these changes, the ideals of academic science have not lost their relevance and still serve as a moral guide for scientists. The foundations of classical science are more utopian, but no one denies the need to strive for the ideal. In some countries, ethical regulation has gradually begun to move into the legal plane.
3. Science is self-regulating
The unit of scientific knowledge is a scientific article, in scientific journal It's hard enough to publish false information. Articles applying for publication are carefully checked, and the author, as a rule, is not familiar with the reviewers. They, in turn, being experts in a certain field of science, check the correctness of the research performed by the author. Of course, at this stage it is difficult to take into account all the nuances, and unreliable data can be published. If the research is not very important, most likely it will end there. Otherwise, a much larger number of scientists than two or three people (reviewers) will pay attention to it. Having identified methodological or other errors, they will contact the editorial office. If the article is found to be unreliable, it will remain in the journal with the RETRACTED mark and a link to the analysis and explanation of errors. The article may also not be withdrawn, but supplemented with links to critical analyzes.
There may be situations when different studies of the same topic have not quite the same results. In such cases, systematic reviews (meta-analyzes) are a more reliable source - “works whose authors collect 50 studies of the same problem and formulate general conclusions” [Kazantseva A. Someone is wrong on the Internet! Scientific research on controversial issues. - M: Corpus, 2016. - S. 226].
Trust in science is also needed within the community. Often a scientist is a specialist in a narrow field, while many significant discoveries are made in related fields. No one is able to verify all the studies done by others, which leads to the need to take the results on faith. The proof of the Abc-conjecture proposed by Shinichi Mochizuki takes up several volumes and has not yet been verified by anyone. Even if someone takes up this work and establishes that the proof is correct, there is a chance that this scientist will make a mistake. The Pythagorean theorem has been tested for thousands of years by different scientists and today is no longer in doubt.
The accumulation of knowledge is possible only when scientists trust predecessors, Merton said. “If we were to start everything from scratch now, then we would have to strike fire again and reinvent the wheel” [Sztompka P. Trust is the basis of society. - M: Logos, 2012. - S. 395].
Brief conclusions:
1. Scientific truth - an explanation of reality that is most suitable for the scientific community in a specific time period. Scientific postulates can be questioned. In the event of the emergence of new data, scientific theories are revised, and sometimes the foundations of all science are revised.
2. Science has a high practical efficiency, which increases the level of trust in it.
3. The scientific community has developed a strategy for insurance against the risks of falsification over the years.
4. The ideals of academic science have not lost their relevance and still serve as a moral guide for scientists. The foundations of classical science are more utopian, but no one denies the need to strive for the ideal.
Systematization and communications
Dialectics
Scientific understanding of truth
· Initially, a person has no reason to doubt that a relative who left the apartment on the street to take out the garbage to the trash or buy bread in the bakery really exists, and has not disappeared into nowhere. Also, science for the most part relies on this bold assumption - if the subject does not perceive the world of things around him in all its integrity and completeness, this does not mean that this world exists only within the focus of the subject's attention or is generally illusory. Atoms cannot be perceived by the eye, but their existence was eventually proven experimentally.
· Truth, as the essence of knowledge common to all, can also exist and become scientific when science distances itself from its arbitrary interpretation and seeks to know its objective, legitimate foundations. It is not for nothing that science constantly fixes such laws of nature and physical constants, under which only a person can exist as a part of this very nature. Thus, truth is conceived by science as the correspondence of knowledge about the existence of things to scientific facts that cannot be disputed by anyone and take place in being, regardless of whether this or that particular individual is aware of their existence or not. Accordingly, knowledge, confirmed by facts, automatically passes into the category of scientific truth, or at least becomes a guiding star in relation to it. This approach gives science quite a strong confidence that all its lost relatives will be found sooner or later. The philosophy of dialectical materialism, which has risen on the yeast of natural science and is still cultivated in higher education, adheres to the same certainty. educational institutions. By its very nature, diamat is the methodology of all natural science in general and of individual sciences in particular.
· From the concept of understanding the truth as the correspondence of knowledge to scientific facts naturally follows the desire of science to create the most general theory of everything, to find such a principle and law of being that would direct and determine all being, as well as knowledge about it. At least, such a dream is still cherished by physics, for which the creation of a general physical theory is a logically substantiated plan and a rather powerful incentive to action. This program unites scientists, subordinating their arbitrary fantasies to common standards through a language of formulas and scientific concepts understandable to all. Philosophers often envy such unanimity in the private scientific environment and lament its absence in the philosophical environment. And they are also upset by the fact that more and more critics of philosophy (or rather, its practical inefficiency) begin to doubt that philosophy in general is a science in the full sense of the word. Apparently, enough reasons have accumulated for such claims.
· In fact, the facts themselves are already for science some local, obvious truths, the knowledge of which is tantamount to a simple establishment of these facts. The way to achieve the truth in the scientific view becomes, therefore, a process of constantly looking beyond the horizon of local truths known to science to even less obvious and more general ones, but at the same time requiring a better understanding of them, associated primarily with the need for an adequate expression of knowledge about them in a form understandable to all. Unfortunately, the farther science moves away from the mere observability of scientific facts, the more difficult it is for it to establish them, it puts even more effort into predicting facts, and their comprehension often becomes an impossible task at all, when knowledge about a fact can no longer be associated or connected with anything. with what human concepts, perhaps in some poetic way, on the verge of escaping meaning, like the delirium of a madman.
In writing, such knowledge will look like something that cannot be decoded, at least for a person who is unfamiliar with professional style solution of some scientific problem. It turns out that as the number of facts known to science expands, the quality of their comprehension by the scientific community becomes more and more narrow and special, and the private scientific knowledge of a person about being becomes less and less accessible for understanding by the broad layers of the recipient. higher education population. It is not for nothing that the heliocentric system of the world, as opposed to the geocentric one, fought its way for so long. Moreover, the idea of a plurality of worlds had a depressing effect on the psyche of many people who are accustomed to thinking in obvious truths. But it may also happen that even such a model of the Universe runs the risk of not being close enough to reality and will only reflect some next stage of a person’s understanding of this scientific fact, a stage of his own intellectual development, and not very advanced at that.
Educational continuity in the search for and knowledge of scientific truth is good, even better, when one scientific generation replaces another with a certain frequency and without special painful upheavals, like the courts of the Inquisition or the persecution of genetics, but scientific progress cannot always be the same like a snail crawling on a green leaf and seeing nothing but this leaf, it tends to speed up and at the present time its speed reaches a limit, after which disaster may follow for all who continue to believe that the most general scientific truth is a real thing and quite achievable. Of course, any scientist will say that scientific progress is endless, that a new vision inevitably comes to replace the old one. But when in the process of cognition of being, priority is given to experiment and the accumulation of scientific facts occurs faster than their comprehension, science simply dissolves in the stream of its division into highly specialized aspects of scientific consideration, where even theoretical conceptual design in its status already resembles some special scientific discipline, which slowly , but surely loses its scientific relevance.
· The specter of scientific truth has always attracted many new enthusiasts to the scientific ranks. But its essence is such that only a small part of it can be revealed to a scientist, and everything else will be hidden behind the horizon, in which you cannot drill holes, but you can go and go forward until your legs are worn to the knees, and to the ultimate truth in in the end it will be even further than it seemed at the beginning of the journey. However, modern science quite enough are those local truths that it has already developed and on the basis of which scientific theoretical creativity is built, the appearance of the movement of scientific thought towards the truth is maintained even more general, but also the least achievable. The scientific community, accustomed to the bonuses of a well-established branched system of academic science, does not need to doubt the likelihood of the existence of scientific truth, since it is precisely for its search that the state allocates funding funds and creates bureaucratic management structures for more and more scientific divisions. But this has little to do with the truth itself.
