Scientism and Values.pdf - Ludwig von Mises Institute

Science and the Studies of Man 57
dents of man make two replies. With Linton they plead the youth
of their studies. When one remembers the rapidity of the development
of classical mechanics from Galileo to Newton, all this old
excuse does is to remind one of Oscar Wilde's epigram about the
United States: "America's youth is its oldest tradition." The second
reply is that what gives a discipline its status as a science is the
use of the scientific method, and since the studies of man use this
method, they are sciences. It is fair to reply to them that it is a
strange kind of subject matter that, when treated scientifically, produces
no better results, in terms of agreement, than philosophers
produce. It is also fair to add that it is a question whether in some
of the disciplines of man scientific method in any but the most
rudimentary sense can be said to be applicable. Indeed, it might
not be useless to ask whether ((the scientific method" (as, distinct
from a variety of generalized techniques, procedures, and manners
of observation and correlation) is not the most successful canard
palmed off by philosophers on philosophically naive scientistsbut
let me hasten to add that I would not dare ask this question,
for only madmen dare outrage the pieties of their fellow beings.
We must consider another difficulty that prevents the studies of
man from achieving the status of a science. The difficulty is not
encountered by all the studies of man; it is encountered only by
those that must reckon with value.
Let us first note the obvious fact that the student of man cannot
always exclude value from his discipline. The social scientist
(whether anthropologist or sociologist), the political theorist, the
depth psychologist, and the student of personality turn their work
into sheer triviality if they ignore the values of men. I know that
Freud asserted that the psychoanalyst is not interested in the morals
of his patient. But I take it that it is generally recognized today
that this is one point on which Freud was in error. For there seems
to be a close link between neuroses and morality, as Freud himself
clearly saw. I have not forgotten that since Spinoza's day many
philosophers have professed to be able to observe moral phenomena
scientifically-by which they mean, as the physicist observes
falling bodies. Hume alleged that his method was that of the physicist
and called on philosophers to follow his lead. And in our day,