Phil 308, 20th C. Continental Philosophy, Spring 04, Simons
Study Questions #1 (10 pts)
Due:
The following questions refer to the text by Claude Bernard below:
1. Does Bernard fully accept the description of the experiment as forcing nature to unveil herself? Explain.
2. What, according to Bernard, is one of the great stumbling blocks of the experimental method?
3. What are the three evolutionary periods of the human mind?
4. What is the basis of freedom of mind and why is it important?
5. Does Bernard believe in determinism? Explain.
6. When, according to Bernard, should we follow our feelings instead of the logical deductions of our reasoning?
7. Who are systematizers?
8. What are the results of an exaggerated belief in theories?
9. What is the revolution which the experimental method has effected in the sciences?
10. Where is genius revealed and is it enough for science?
Claude Bernard, An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine, trans. H.C. Green (New York: Dover Publications, [1865]1957); pp. 21-23, 27-28, 35-43.
Men of science who mean to embrace the principles of the experimental method as a whole, must fulfill two classes of conditions and must possess two qualities of mind which are indispensable if they are to reach their goal and succeed in the discovery of truth. First, they must have ideas which they submit to the control of facts; but at the same time they must make sure that the facts which serve as starting point or as control for the idea are correct and well established; they must be at once observers and experimenters.
Observers, we said, purely and simply note the phenomena before their eyes. They must be anxious only to forearm themselves against errors of observation which might make them incompletely see or poorly define a phenomenon. To this end they use every instrument which may help make their observations more complete. Observers, then, must be photographers of phenomena; their observations must accurately represent nature. We must observe without any preconceived idea; the observer’s mind must be passive, that is, must hold its peace; it listens to nature and writes at nature’s dictation.
But when a fact is once noted and a phenomenon well observed, reasoning intervenes, and the experimenter steps forward to interpret the phenomenon.
An experimenter, as we have already said, is a man inspired by a more or less probable but anticipated interpretation of observed phenomena, to devise experiments which, in the logical order of his anticipations, shall bring results serving as controls for his hypothesis or preconceived idea. To do this, an experimenter reflects, tries out, gropes, compares, contrives, so as to find the experimental conditions best suited to gain the end which he sets before him. Of necessity we experiment with a preconceived idea. An experimenter’s mind must be active, i.e., must question nature, and put all manner of queries to it according to the various hypotheses which suggest themselves.
But when the conditions of an experiment are once established and worked up according to the mind’s preconceived idea, an induced or premeditated observation will, as we said, result. Phenomena then appear which the experimenter has caused, but which must now be noted, so as to learn next how to use them to control the experimental idea which brought them to birth. Now, from the moment when the result of an experiment appears, the experimenter is confronted with a real observation which he has induced and must note the results of the experiment exactly, like those of an ordinary observation, without any preconceived idea. The experimenter must now disappear or rather change himself instantly into an observer; and it is only after he has noted the results of the experiment exactly, like those of an ordinary observation, that his mind will come back, to reason, compare and decide whether his experimental hypothesis is verified or disproved by these very results. To maintain the comparison suggested above, I may say that our experimenter puts questions to nature; but that, as soon as she speaks, he must hold his peace; he must note her answer, hear her out and in every case accept her decision. It has been said that the experimenter must force nature to unveil herself. Yes, the experimenter doubtless forces nature to unveil herself by attacking her with all manner of questions; he must never answer for her nor listen partially to her answers by taking, from the results of an experiment, only those which support or confirm his hypothesis. We shall see later that this is one of the great stumbling blocks of the experimental method. An experimenter, who clings to his preconceived idea and notes the results of his experiment only from this point of view, falls inevitably into error, because he fails to note what he has not foreseen and so makes a partial observation. An experimenter must not hold to his idea, except as a means of inviting an answer from nature. But he must submit his idea to nature and be ready to abandon, to alter or to supplant it, in accordance with what he learns from observing the phenomena which he has induced (pp. 21-23).
Everyone first works out his own ideas about what he sees and is inclined to interpret natural phenomena by anticipation before knowing them through experience. This tendency is spontaneous; a preconceived idea always has been and always will be the first flight of an investigating mind. But the object of the experimental method is to transform this a priori conception, based on an intuition or a vague feeling about the nature of things, into an a posteriori interpretation founded on the experimental study of phenomena. This is why the experimental method is also called the a posteriori method.
Man is by nature metaphysical and proud. He has gone so far as to think that the idealistic creations of his mind, which correspond to his feelings, also represent reality. Hence it follows that the experimental method is by no means primitive or natural to man, and that only after lengthy wanderings in theological and scholastic discussion has he recognized at last the sterility of his efforts in this direction. At this point man becomes aware that he cannot dictate laws to nature, because he does not contain within himself the knowledge and criterion of external things, and he understands that to find truth he must, on the contrary, study natural laws and submit his ideas, if not his reason, to experience, that is, to the criterion of facts. Yet for all that, the method of work of the human mind is not changed at bottom. The metaphysician, the scholastic, and the experimenter all work with an a priori idea. The difference is that the scholastic imposes his idea as an absolute truth which he has found, and from which he then deduces consequences by logic alone. The more modest experimenter, on the other hand, states an idea as a question, as an interpretative, more or less probable anticipation of nature, from which he logically deduces consequences which, moment by moment, he confronts with reality by means of experiment. He advances, thus, from partial to more general truths, but without ever daring to assert that he has grasped the absolute truth. Indeed if we held it at any point whatever, we should have it everywhere; for the absolute leaves nothing outside itself.
An experimental idea, then is also an a priori idea, but it is an idea that presents itself in the form of an hypothesis the consequences of which must be submitted to the criterion of experiment, so that its value may be tested. The experimenter’s mind differs from the metaphysician’s or the scholastic’s in its modesty, because experiment makes him, moment by moment, conscious of both his relative and his absolute ignorance. In teaching man, experimental science results in lessening his pride more and more by proving to him every day that primary causes, like the objective reality of things, will be hidden from him forever and that he can know only relations. Here is, indeed, the one goal of all the sciences, as we shall see further on.
The human mind has at different periods of its evolution passed successively through feeling, reason, and experiment. First, feeling alone, imposing itself on reason, created the truths of faith or theology. Reason or philosophy, the mind’s next mistress, brought to birth scholasticism. At last, experiment, or the study of natural phenomena, taught man that the truths of the outer world are to be found ready formulated neither in feeling nor in reason. These are indispensable merely as guides; but to attain external truths we must of necessity go down into the objective reality of things where they lie hidden in their phenomenal form.
Thus, in the natural progress of things, appeared the experimental method which includes everything and which, as we shall soon see, leans successively on the three divisions of that unchangeable tripod: sentiment, reason and experiment. In the search for truth by means of this method, feeling always takes the lead, it begets the a priori idea or intuition; reason or reasoning develops the idea and deduces its logical consequences. But if feeling must be clarified by the light of reason, reason in turn must be guided by experiment (pp. 27-28).
The first condition to be fulfilled by men of science, applying themselves to the investigation of natural phenomena, is to maintain absolute freedom of mind, based on philosophic doubt. Yet we must not be in the least skeptical; we must believe in science, i.e., in determinism; we must believe in a complete and necessary relation between things, among the phenomena proper to living beings as well as in all others; but at the same time we must be thoroughly convinced that we know this relation only in a more or less approximate way, and that the theories we hold are far from embodying changeless truths. When we propound a general theory in our sciences, we are sure only that, literally speaking, all such theories are false. They are only partial and provisional truths which are necessary to us, as steps on which we rest, so as to go on with investigation; they embody only the present state of our knowledge, and consequently they must change with the growth of science, and all the more often when sciences are less advanced in their evolution. On the other hand, our ideas come to us, as we said, in view of facts which have been previously observed and which we interpret afterward. Now countless sources of error may slip into our observations, and in spite of all our attention and sagacity, we are never sure of having seen everything, because our means of observation are often too imperfect. The result of all this is, then, that if reasoning guides us in experimental science, it does not necessarily force its deductions upon us. Our mind can always remain free to accept or to dispute these deductions. If an idea presents itself to us, we must not reject it simply because it does not agree with the logical deductions of a reigning theory. We may follow our feelings and our idea and give free rein to our imagination, as long as all our ideas are mere pretexts for devising new experiments that may supply us with convincing or unexpected and fertile facts….
If a doctor imagined that his reasoning had the value of a mathematician’s he would be utterly in error and would be led into the most unsound conclusions. This is unluckily what has happened and still happens to the men whom I shall call systematizers. These men start, in fact, from an idea which is based more or less on observation, and which they regard as an absolute truth. They then reason logically and without experimenting, and from deduction to deduction they succeed in building a system which is logical, but which has no sort of scientific reality. Superficial persons often let themselves be dazzled by this appearance of logic; and discussions worthy of ancient scholasticism are thus sometimes renewed in our day. The excessive faith in reasoning, which leads physiologists to a false simplification of things, comes, on the one hand, from ignorance of the science of which they speak, and, on the other hand, from lack of a feeling for the complexity of natural phenomena….
Men who have excessive faith in their theories or ideas are not only ill prepared for making discoveries; they also make very poor observations. Of necessity, they observe with a preconceived idea, and when they devise an experiment, they can see, in its results, only a confirmation of their theory. In this way they distort observation and often neglect very important facts because they do not further their aim….
But it happens further quite naturally that men who believe too firmly in their theories, do not believe enough in the theories of others. So the dominant idea of these despisers of their fellows is to find others’ theories faulty and to try to contradict them. The difficulty, for science, is still the same. They make experiments only to destroy a theory, instead of to seek the truth. At the same time, they make poor observations, because they choose among the results of their experiments only what suits they object, neglecting whatever is unrelated to it, and carefully setting aside everything which might tend toward the idea they wish to combat. By these two opposite roads, men are thus led to the same result, that is, to falsify science and the facts.
Accordingly, we must disregard our own opinion quite as much as the opinion of others, when faced by the decisions of experience. If men discuss and experiment, as we have just said, to prove a preconceived idea in spite of everything, they no longer have freedom of mind, and they no longer search for truth. Theirs is a narrow science, mingled with personal vanity or the diverse passions of man. Pride, however, should have nothing to do with all these vain disputes. When two physiologists or two doctors quarrel, each to maintain his own ideas or theories, in the midst of their contradictory arguments, only one thing is absolutely certain: that both theories are insufficient, and neither of them corresponds to the truth. The truly scientific spirit, then, should make us modest and kindly. We really know very little, and we are all fallible when facing the immense difficulties presented by investigation of natural phenomena. The best thing, then, for us to do is to unite our efforts, instead of dividing them and nullifying them by personal disputes. In a word, the man of science wishing to find truth must keep his mind free and calm, and if it be possible, never have his eye bedewed, as Bacon says, by human passions.
In scientific education, it is very important to differentiate, as we shall do later, between determinism which is the absolute principle of science, and theories which are only relative principles to which we should assign but temporary value in the search for truth. In a word, we must not teach theories as dogmas or articles of faith. By exaggerated belief in theories, we should give a false idea of science; we should overload and enslave the mind, by taking away its freedom, smothering its originality and infecting it with the taste for systems.
The theories which embody our scientific ideas as a whole are, of course, indispensable as representations of science. They should also serve as a basis for new ideas. But as these theories and ideas are by no means immutable truth, one must always be ready to abandon them, to alter them or to exchange them as soon as they cease to represent the truth. In a word, we must alter theory to adapt it to nature, but no nature to adapt it to theory.
To sum up, two things must be considered in experimental science: method and idea. The object of method is to direct the idea which arises in the interpretation of natural phenomena and in the search for truth. The idea must always remain independent, and we must no more chain it with scientific beliefs than with philosophic or religious beliefs; we must be bold and free in setting forth our ideas, must follow our feeling, and must on no account linger too long in childish fear of contradicting theories. If we are thoroughly steeped in the principles of the experimental method, we have nothing to fear; for, as long as the idea is correct, we go on developing it; when it is wrong, experimentation is there to set it right. We must be able, then, to attack questions even at the risk of going wrong. We do science better service, as has been said, by mistakes than by confusion, which means that we must fearlessly push ideas to their full development, provided that we regulate them and are always careful to judge them by experiment. The idea, in a word, is the motive of all reasoning, in science as elsewhere. But everywhere the idea must be submitted to a criterion. In science the criterion is the experimental method or experiment; this criterion is indispensable, and we must apply it to our own ideas as well as to those of others (pp. 35-40).
From all that has so far been said, it follows necessarily, that no man’s opinion, formulated in a theory or otherwise, may be deemed to represent the whole truth in the sciences. It is a guide, a light, but not an absolute authority. The revolution which the experimental method has effected in the sciences is this: it has put a scientific criterion in the place of personal authority.
The experimental method is characterized by being dependent only on itself, because it includes within itself its criterion, --experience. It recognizes no authority other than that of facts and is free from personal authority. When Descartes said that we must trust only to evidence or to what is sufficiently proved, he meant that we must no longer defer to authority, as scholasticism did, but must rely only on facts firmly established by experience.
The result of this is that when we have put forward an idea or a theory in science, our object must not be to preserve it by seeking everything that may support it and setting aside everything that may weaken it. On the contrary, we ought to examine with the greatest care the facts which apparently would overthrow it, because real progress always consists in exchanging an old theory which includes fewer facts for a new one which includes more. This proves that we have advanced, for in science the best precept is to alter and exchange our ideas as fast as science moves ahead. Our ideas are only intellectual instruments which we use to break into phenomena; we must change them when they have served their purpose, as we change a blunt lancet that we have used long enough….
To sum up, the experimental method draws from within itself an impersonal authority which dominates science. It forces this authority even on great men, instead of seeking, like the scholastics, to prove from texts that they are infallible and that they have seen, said or thought everything discovered after them. Every period has its own sum total of errors and of truths. Certain mistakes are, in a sense, inherent in their period, so that only the subsequent progress of science can reveal them. The progress of the experimental method consists in this,--that the sum of truths grows larger in proportion as the sum of error goes less. But each one of these particular truths is added to the rest to establish more general truths. In this fusion, the names of promoters of science disappear little by little, and the further science advances, the more it takes an impersonal form and detaches itself from the past. To avoid a mistake which has sometimes been committed, I hasten to add that I mean to speak here of the evolution of science only. In art and letters, personality dominates everything. There we are concerned with a spontaneous creation of the mind, that has nothing in common with the noting of natural phenomena, in which the mind must create nothing. The past keeps all its worth in the creations of art and letters; each individuality remains changeless in time and cannot be mistaken for another….
The experimental method is the scientific method which proclaims the freedom of the mind and of thought. It not only shakes off the philosophical and theological yoke; it does not even accept any scientific authority. This is by no means pride and boastfulness; experimenters, on the contrary, show their humility in rejecting personal authority, for they doubt their own knowledge also and submit the authority of man to the authority of experience and of the laws of nature….
The experimental method, the free thinker’s method, seeks only scientific truth. Feeling, from which everything emanates, must keep its complete spontaneity and all its freedom for putting forth experimental ideas; reason also must preserve that freedom to doubt, which forces it always to submit ideas to the test of experiment. Just as, in other human actions, feeling releases an act by putting forth the idea which gives a motive to action, so in the experimental method feeling takes the initiative through the idea. Feeling alone guides the mind and constitutes the primum movens of science. Genius is revealed in a delicate feeling which correctly foresees the laws of natural phenomena; but this we must never forget, that correctness of feeling and fertility of idea can be established and proved only by experiment (pp. 40-43).