Scientism
8
MENTIONS
5
EPISODES
5
PODCASTS
Search complete. 8 mentions across 5 episodes found for "Scientism".
Sep 16, 2026
David Patrick HarryHOST
through this stakeholder capitalism, but what's it doing? It's making sure that you are not an autonomous person because they were radically collectivist, which is kind of the other side of the enlightenment coin.
David Patrick HarryHOST
We've talked about the enlightenment and the five pillars being rationalism, Scientism, individualism, technological progress and democracy.
David Patrick HarryHOST
But also in there is an immense sense of collectivism that we see in the French Revolution that if you own something, it is actually part of the corruptive element of society.
David Patrick HarryHOST
because it means that you have to have an ego to claim possession of something.
Casey LuskinGUEST
So anyway, we'll get to that maybe a little bit as well.
Casey LuskinGUEST
But then he couples this with this kind of strange argument where he says that ID proponents, when we are arguing that ID is science, that somehow this shows that ID has a, quote, "Scientistic tone", and we're actually agreeing with our atheistic opponents that, quote, "All reality must be scientifically documentable." What is he saying here? Well, scientism, of course, not science.
Casey LuskinGUEST
We're talking about scientism, is the view that science is the only true, valid pathway to real, objective, reliable knowledge, okay? Um, and so scientism, of course, is what sort of is the, the fundamental philosophical premise of atheism, that, you know, science is the only real pathway to have i-, um, knowledge.
Casey LuskinGUEST
This criticism of ID, of course, is absurd.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
But, um, uh, that's what has his attention.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
But he also publishes in the, in the war years an essay called "Scientism and the Study of Society." Okay? "Scientism and the Study of Society." And this is, uh, was meant to be an introduction to, to the larger work.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
Um, he defined, uh, scientism as the slavish imitation of the method and language of science, a very prejudiced approach which before it's considered its subject, claims to know what is the most appropriate way of investigating it.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
Okay? And he then draws a contrast in this essay between what he called the objectivism, uh, the collectivism, and the historicism of the scientistic approach.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
And for those of you who study economics, what he's basically saying there is that this approach that economists are taking is the appropriate approach, that the- Critics, the men of science, are invoking these other things to criticize economics, and his claim is that actually the economics approach is the truly scientific one.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
So this is obviously, it's, it's aimed at trying to respond to these arguments that he was hearing in the 1930s.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
Now, in, in the, in the course of the, uh, uh, the text, uh, Scientism and the Study of Society, uh, he gives examples.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
So, uh, of the-- for the objectivist approach, behaviorism in psychology was, so the only way that, uh, only things that we can take into account in doing psychology is things that are observable, okay? [audience member coughing] Uh, um, sociology and the work of Wesley Claire Mitchell and John Maynard Keynes would be examples of a collectivist approach.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
But, um, uh, that's what has his attention.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
But he also publishes in the, in the war years an essay called Scientism and the Study of Society.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
Okay? Scientism and the Study of Society.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
And this is, uh, was meant to be an introduction to, to the larger work.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
Um, he defined, uh, scientism as the slavish imitation of the method and language of science, a very prejudiced approach which before it's considered its subject, claims to know what is the most appropriate way of investigating it.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
And for those of you who study economics, what he's basically saying there is that this approach that economists are taking is the appropriate approach, that the- Critics, the men of science, are invoking these other things to criticize economics, and his claim is that actually the economics approach is the truly scientific one.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
So this is obviously, it's, it's aimed at trying to respond to these arguments that he was hearing in the nineteen thirties.
Bruce CaldwellGUEST
Now, in, in the, in the course of the, uh, uh, the text, the Scientism and the Study of Society, uh, he gives examples.
Robert FrederickGUEST
yeah so you know religion kind of helped this whole process along by being so corrupt, you know, the Catholic church just got so corrupt and then science looked so wonderful and alluring and this distinction of truth and not truth, just, just sort of got lost, but Bacon himself stripped out the metaphysics and gave the idea that data and empirical data was all you needed.
Robert FrederickGUEST
And he even said it, this book by David Whitney, Maladies of Modernity, Scientism and the Deformation of Political Order.
Robert FrederickGUEST
He really zeroes in to like kind of the exact moment Bacon did it.
Robert FrederickGUEST
And so did another woman who's writing a book about Bacon, Sophie Weeks.