Scientism and Values.pdf - Ludwig von Mises Institute

76 Scientism and Values
The disagreement is, in the last analysis, one about the nature
of experience and the quality of life that one philosophy makes
possible and another does not. The noun "experience," the verb
"to experience," and the adjective "empirical" are not univocal
terms that can be transferred from one system to another without
a change of meaning. And for this reason, when our naturalist
takes the no-nonsense position that "knowledge is knowledge," as
he does somewhere in the essay under examination, he is indulging
in an act of oversimplification. 26 Knowledge is indeed knowledge,
but what is knowledge? I am ashamed to have to say it,
because it is something that any undergraduate who has taken a
course in the history of philosophy ought to know; but I am
forced to say it in view of the no-nonsense attitude of our philosopher.
What knowledge is, is still an open question which
Western philosophy has not succeeded in resolving in spite of the
tremendous effort that has been put into the attempt to do so.
Experience does not come labeled as empirical, nor does it come
self-eertified as, such. What we call "experience" depends on assumptions
often hidden beyond scrutiny, which define it and
which in turn it supports. We are here caught in a kind of circular
analysis we would do well to admit and accept, for it can be
avoided only by abandoning our system and falling back on incoherence.
With these observations about the form of our philosopher's
argument out of the way, we turn to the substantive problem that
arises, because of the introduction of the concept of emergence.
In order to examine it, I have to call the reader's attention to
the first of the two tenets that our philosopher considers central to
naturalism. He states it as follows: "The first [thesis] is the existential
and causal primacy of organized matter in the executive
order of nature." 27
Our problem arises because we can interpret emergence in one
of two ways. Either the term "emergence" points to a place where
the causal link is not known, but is assumed to exist, or to a
place where it is not known because it does not exist. If we assert
"the existential and causal primacy of organized matter," we must
take the first interpretation of emergence. If we take the second,