Gertrude Himmelfarb has an excellent
review-essay in The New Republic (subscription
required) dealing with the philosophical shortcomings of
Darwin-anthologists Edward O. Wilson and James D. Watson. Here is
her conclusion:
The editors of these new editions of Darwin may have
taught us more than they know. A non-scientist may well stand in
awe of the enormous achievements that they as individuals, and
science in general, have to their credit. They have learned a great
deal, and we have learned a great deal from them. But what they
have evidently not learned is humility--an appreciation of the
limits of science, of what science does not know and cannot know.
This is what they now inadvertently remind us: that there are,
after all, other modes of knowledge, other scholarly
disciplines--philosophy, history, literature, theology--that have
taught us a good deal, over the ages, about human nature, social
behavior, ethical principles and practices. There are even
non-scholarly, non-professional sources of knowledge that do not
come within the purview of science--wisdom, experience, common
sense.
In Darwin's day, some eminent scientists--T. H. Huxley, most
notably--were distressed by the mechanistic and reductivist
interpretation of evolution itself. Today we have even more cause
to be concerned about the mechanistic and reductivist
interpretation of all of human life, including its emotional and
intellectual dimensions, in the name of Darwinism. This is more
than science. It is scientism--and scientism with a vengeance, for
it is not only science that is now presumed to be the only access
to comprehensive truth, but also that sub-category of science known
as Darwinism.
Not least for this reason, it is finally to Darwin and the
Darwinians of his own time that we must turn--to the conquistador
who was personally modest even as he was bold in imagination and
conception, and to his bulldog who tried to restrain the irrational
exuberance of some of Darwin's disciples. We may recall Huxley's
advice to Paley's successors, that they follow his example by
refraining from "rushing into an antagonism which has no reasonable
foundation." All the parties in the current controversies could
profit from that wise counsel.
I have to say I've never heard a prominent scientist claim that
science is "the only access to comprehensive truth". For a theory
to be accepted, it must be observable and testable. Right now
String Theory is a beautiful, comprehensive theory of particles and
fields, but it's not generally accepted because it hasn't been
tested experimentally. The CERN supercollider may prove some
aspects of String Theory, but it may not. You might want to watch
the NOVA program Judgement Day: Intelligent Design on Trial. In
that program, Ken Miller, a prominent evolutionary scientist,
explains that evolution and all scientific theories should be
regarded as tentative. That doesn't sound like a claim to
"comprehensive truth".
T H Huxley| 10.27.10 @ 10:18PM
I have to say I've never heard a prominent scientist claim that science is "the only access to comprehensive truth". For a theory to be accepted, it must be observable and testable. Right now String Theory is a beautiful, comprehensive theory of particles and fields, but it's not generally accepted because it hasn't been tested experimentally. The CERN supercollider may prove some aspects of String Theory, but it may not. You might want to watch the NOVA program Judgement Day: Intelligent Design on Trial. In that program, Ken Miller, a prominent evolutionary scientist, explains that evolution and all scientific theories should be regarded as tentative. That doesn't sound like a claim to "comprehensive truth".