Display:
Actually, science increasingly does tell us how to govern. Science cannot measure or calculate whether an act is "good" or "evil". But science can tell us something about the consequences of our acts.

A case in point is the climate change debate. The calculated consequences of our CO2 emissions are such that everybody agrees that these consequences are bad (unless you are actively working to bring about the end of the world). Even climate change deniers don't argue that these consequences are OK. Instead they have to argue that the scientific estimates of the consequences are wrong. If you accept the scientific findings we must do something to combat GHG emissions, and that is science telling us how to govern.

More generally, I think there is a very broad consensus about many moral questions when posed clearly a such. If you ask: "Is it OK that poor children die because they cannot afford medical care?", even right-wing politicians will not publicly agree. They will argue that their policies help poor children rather than harm them. It is then up to (sociological/medical) science to demonstrate when they are wrong. What is needed for this is more thinking and more science ("reason"), not less!

Real capricorns don't believe in astrology.

by tomhuld (thomas punkt huld at jrc punkt it) on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 06:33:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Welcome to ET tomhuld, if it's your first post..

I love your tag line

tomhuld:

Real capricorns don't believe in astrology.

...in view of the fact that even a mention of astrology on this site is sure to bring the world down around you...

...there's only smoking that's worse....

<hides>

"Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky

by ChrisCook (cojockathotmaildotcom) on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 07:17:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]
<puff>Say what?</puff>

You can't be me, I'm taken
by Sven Triloqvist on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 07:51:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]
What you smokin', Sven?

In the end, might makes right. Nothing has changed since the caveman.
by THE Twank (yatta blah blah @ blah.com) on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 08:00:44 AM EST
[ Parent ]
To quote superspiv Arthur English "Play the music! Open the cage!"

You can't be me, I'm taken
by Sven Triloqvist on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 10:39:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Thanks for the welcome! I've been a longtime lurker with a few scattered posts, though seemingly not long enough to know that there was something controversial about astrology.

What about homeopathy, can you make fun of that?

Real capricorns don't believe in astrology.

by tomhuld (thomas punkt huld at jrc punkt it) on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 03:05:03 PM EST
[ Parent ]
I agree completely that we need a greater focus on reason, empirical results and predictive power (science, if you will) in our political life. But that does not obviate the need for political decisions.

I also agree that there is a very broad consensus that letting poor people starve in the gutter is wrong, even if it is in the short-term interest of the oligarchy. However, even when backed by a massive (if not quite unanimous - Uncle Miltie and his Chicago Boyz would disagree) consensus, it remains a political position, and there is no point pretending that it's scientifically supported.

In fact, I think it can be downright harmful to present what is inherently a political decision as a technical matter than can be unambiguously resolved through the scientific method. After all, Uncle Miltie and Maggie Thatcher got a lot of traction out of obfuscating the political decisions that underlie much of the economic science (and pseudoscience) that they used.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 08:17:58 AM EST
[ Parent ]
The points that I was trying to make up thread were:

  1. What ever changes we may need to make in our approach to the organization and direction of society and/or to our understanding of ourselves, and whatever is meant by "beyond reason," remedies cannot involve abandoning or repudiating reason.

  2. That our minds and our mental abilities, including  reason and self conscious awareness, are products of evolution, that reason is only one component, albeit  a very important component, of our capabilities and that perhaps we need to do a better job of supplementing our powers of reason with our other mental tools.

  3. That we need more focus on the nature of our inner functioning, (brain science), and our interpersonal functioning, (anthropology, sociology and political economy), unless we are satisfied with our existing institutions.

  4. That this likely will involve an increase in several aspects of our awareness and a refinement of our consciousness.  We are aware of these problems, for instance the "externalization" of environmental and human costs in our economics, but we have thus far largely been unable to remedy them.

  5. That over-valuation of reason may be almost as damaging as devaluation of reason.

As to perspective or context, that was what I was attempting to provide in the first several paragraphs of my comment above.  

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Mon Nov 10th, 2008 at 11:55:10 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Display:
Login
. Make a new account
. Reset password
Occasional Series