Mohamed Ibrahim Mousa

201600903

Reflective Essay 1

Consider a deeply held significant idea that you believe in(other than the ones we discussed in
class). Use the critical thinking model you learned in Chapter 1 to critically analyze it. Does it
still stand? Why or Why not? Can you think of any implications for the conclusion you reach?

It is the habit of man when he finds a useful or appealing way of thinking to overrate it. I could
think of three examples. Firstly, he has done that with philosophy in ancient Greece. Greek
philosophers believed that only philosophy is what worth doing. They thought little of practical
works which were typically left for their servants and slaves. To second that, in the medieval
dark ages, the ecclesiastic discipline preached for the superiority of theological and scholastic
studies. In their point of view, the argument was so simple: why bother with anything mortal if
God will take care of it in the more valuable after life? The third example I am intended to
present is actually the most important one. It is the third component of the triad of human
knowledge believed by Herbert Spencer (Mythology, Philosophy and Science). After the
renaissance, natural sciences were thought of as the ultimate savior of man from his past
ignorance and primitive beliefs. Again, man has made his last living mistake; he again assumed
that science is the ultimate activity that worth doing. He even assumed that science is the only
way for truth. I do believe that science is by no means the only way for truth and I shall present
my ideas hereafter.

Let me start first by defining some terms so that everything becomes crystal clear when we
discuss it. I mean by science “knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or
the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method” as
the Merriam-Webster dictionary defines it (Merriam-Webster, 2018). Therefore, it is a system of
obtaining knowledge and facts about the real world. It is true that nothing in science is proved
hundred percent, but I mean by facts those laws or pieces of information that we know nearly
unquestionable such as the existence of sun and the solar system. Defining what truth means
maybe a tougher task. However, since I am only defining terms for my own usage, it should be
less difficult. I believe some statement to be true when it describes clearly a single or a set of
configurations of things in the world that can be contradicted by another statement. And there is
at least a hypothetical possible way for validating its content. When I say that the apple held by
Mark is green, if all the words have definite meanings from the context then the statement can be
true or false. If the statement coincides with the actual configuration of Mark, the apple and its
color then the statement is true regardless how we may or may not prove its truth. That should
make clear, to some extent, what I mean when I mention terms like Science or truth.
After roughly defining what I mean by the terms I would use, let’s start by some reasons why I
believe science is not the only way for truth. To start with, there are many questions that defy
science by their mere structure. Take for example the simple question: Is there objects that we
humans cannot observe? The definition of the objects to be not observables sets them outside the
realm of science and its methods. The statement is valid as it distinguishes two worlds: one
where humans can observe everything and another one where there are objects never observed or
measured by humans. You shall note that this by itself does not entail that there are other ways
for knowledge than science, to see that, consider the case if these questions cannot be answered
by any way whether it is science or not. However, the question I presented at least suggests that
we may have to develop other tools than science to address such questions. I think the previous
example captures a very distinctive feature of the questions cannot be treated with science. The
non-testability of some objects or some of their properties puts a limitation on how far science
can investigate them. Such statements’ truth cannot be addressed by science.

To further illustrate examples of such statements that science cannot decide their truth, consider
the following set of questions “Is there an afterlife?”, “Does God exists?”, “Did it happen that a
physical law of nature that holds for the universe from its beginning to its end behaved other way
just for one time?” The first two ones are of the category we already dealt with (the unobserved
features or objects). The last one highlights a whole new areas, science dares not to encounter,
which are events that are not repeatable. The last one is particularly interesting as it distinguishes
observation from science. Using the terms of the scientific methods, Science requires the
reproducibility of experiments or phenomena or at least to have a trace that suggests that they
happened. In this point of view, a better theory is a theory which can convince a lot of other
researchers other than its author. Think of the hypothetical extreme case if you are studying
gravity in a completely controlled experiment that there is almost no room for error. If it
occurred to you that you saw an orange defying gravity and floating upwards then falling down
without any scientific explanation. Furthermore, assume that did not happen again till the end of
our universe lifetime. Did what you did by observing the orange was science? It is not. It is just
observation that cannot be either tested or reproduced. No one will be convinced by your
accounts. Most importantly, you did acquire truth. I admit that this line of argument is not so
strong and far from happening, but it may convince you that at least there is a possibility, even
inside the materialistic view of life, for reaching truths without science, truth that may contradict
science itself. At last, truth is wider and deeper than science reach.

Previously, I showed some examples of statements that cannot be answered by science so how
can we attempt to answer them? The simple answer is by philosophy. In this context, I mean by
philosophy its backbone of critical thinking and thorough analysis that may make one opinion
more probable than the other. We may never be sure if there are objects that we cannot observe,
but we can use information from different fields of knowledge to reach a conclusion whether this
is probable or not. I did not touch on ethical questions, because some may say that they do not
force a definitive configuration of things in world, although some others may disagree. The
question whether science is the only way for knowledge or not is by itself a counter example, as
it could not be answered by science. Philosophy is by far the candidate to extend our knowledge
beyond science reach.

The refutations to my point of view are actually numerous, but I will try to reply to the main and
strong ones I have thought of. Firstly, listing examples of questions that science cannot answer
does not prove there is another way to determine them. From an empirical point of view, you
may guess whatever you want, but you shall not be convinced that something is probably true
except when you observe it. This is indeed a good point. The key to the reply is that the
distinction between guess and observation is not that sharp. You may measure the electric
current to be 10 Amperes for example, but you had to assume many theoretical unobserved
beliefs like that ohm’s law always hold and that our senses do not deceive us ... etc. What I am
trying to say is what is already known that science does not give certain facts. Consequently,
rational and critical thinking could provide some degree of certainty to some facts.

Another counter argument is that science is the best tool we have so we mustn’t deviate to other
less useful and practical methods which only jeopardize our progress to know nature. This line of
thought has many logical leaps. Being the best tool we have is a bit unclear as it is the best tool
to deal with specific topics not all of them. The statement also assumes that the rest of the
intellectual activities other than science are not significant because they are not practical.
Surprisingly, science itself cannot decide if that is true as we can define whatever we want to be
practical. The other issue worth mentioning is that philosophy has shown to be so useful in
influencing and advancing humans’ course. The scientific method itself and the scientific
viewpoint of life is just a recent philosophical idea or school. When Francis Bacon argued in
favor of the new methods of science, this particular act belongs to philosophy not to science.
That and many other examples strongly suggest that philosophy is useful even to science
progress. The last issue I want to highlight is the underlying assumption that all is there is nature.
It is a circular reasoning to say that all is there are natural and materialistic objects and truths
because science has never detected otherwise. Science is concerned with observable and material
objects and truths, it cannot investigate others to prove or disprove their existence.

The problems of epistemology are the typical kind of problems that could never be settled. It is
even hard to imagine if they are fully settled and known. Maybe that is because, ironically, they
are concerned with the problem of how we acquire knowledge itself. I believe science is the best
tool so far we have to investigate the natural world, however, there may be other realms than
natural world. If we let our curiosities to bother with the possibility of the existence of such
realities we are obliged to think by some other means than science. Critical thinking and the
scientific method are so alike and entangled. The only difference between both is that critical
thinking is more general and can be applied to topics where no definitive observation or
measurement can settle the problem. At last, I think it is a bit of a personal choice to choose what
you are concerned to know. I have been thinking about this topic for some time and I am still
convinced that there are other ways for truth than science.

References List:
1. “Definition of Science.” Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Retrieved from: https://www.merriam-
webster.com/dictionary/science. 2018.