Scientism and Values.pdf - Ludwig von Mises Institute

Social Science As A utonomous Activity 257
order may make it appear impossible to judge any particular
one as legitimate, it might, nevertheless, be suggested that these
very claims imply that a normative order transcends the existing
one. The denial of the reality of such transcending objectives,
whether or not incorporated in a method for understanding
society, cannot stand when it is tied to the belief that some specific
order truly constitutes the incarnation of justice.
Although this is precisely the underlying postulate of part of
the work of current social science, its authors have not simply
pointed to part of reality and called it good. Yet, even when they
have refused to point, the perspective embodied within their
research has acted as a pointer for them. While they have not advocated
an amoral power state, they have labored so as to produce
one by systematically eliminating any rational alternative. They
have effectually cancelled unrealized human ideals,--except, of
course, when they have found them to be operative, to be real,
to be other than ideal. Postulating a state within which all alternatives
are unified, within which all ideals are one, they have
made the ideal and the real synonymous. They have charged their
methods to eliminate all tension between experience and aspiration,
between fact and value. Yet once they have dispelled this
tension, the very notion of justice must become irrelevant. Once
they have encouraged existing conditions and normative standards
to blend, the very pursuit of knowledge must become an irrational
endeavor. Once they have dismissed value systems providing terms
by which troubled individuals might assess moving events, historical
states, and political action, man's claim to make meaningful
distinctions, ascribe values, and exercise his reason must become
impertinent.
That they have not been successful in their quest-and who
would doubt the significance of their own contributions to a
pluralistic liberal society?-is due to a lack of consistency, to a
sentimentality which reflects, perhaps, either the afterglow of an
older tradition or some pressing humanistic interest quietly
bidding for recognition. 27 Their respect for the individual does
not arise from the assumptions basic to their methods of inquiry.