Read up on this.

Personally I think this would be great for politics to adopt, as it would align them to standards very difficult to corrupt or act selfishly on. Introspection and interpretation in politics can be difficult if not confusing at times, just as what can really be attributed to any movement in the federal government at any point in time, such as why is America doing so bad right now?

On another personal note, I think not using such as a means to govern opens the populous up to fascism overall from any group of people that do come in power over the nation, and again makes it very difficult to actually understand any actions and reactions that come from any government body.

Like many things though it would be a slow or gradual process to understanding, and in the start it would be a real ball of worms overall, but in the long run I personally would feel more comfortable simply because any government would have to be openly accountable before it even attempted to do anything, and overall more open in general or accessible buy not only the government in total but the American populous at large.

One example is the government relation to the economy, you simply get a new group with a new direction and overall general chaos results in minor, or sometimes major with word of mouth for the most part being the only visible or tangible part for the process of reduction or understanding.

Basically to me the big change would simply result in the scientific method as applied to the areas of hard science being followed in what the government currently does, I think this would in turn provide a huge benefit to America

As we can see the NSF is a federal body much like the EPA that is required overall by science to stay honest with its actions, this same accounting i feel should be adopted by the entire government. When anything is produced via the scientific method its open to peer review, its not only that but its structure simply calls for or leads to the desire of understanding in total anything it takes on, be it gravity or pollution or if applied the welfare system.

Link to NSF

So overall here is the debate questions.

1) Would you support such an ideal being embraced by the government, the idea being scientism.

2) What change do you think scientism would hold if emplaced or mandated to be used by government in all government based activity.

1) Would you support such an ideal being embraced by the government, the idea being scientism.

Please explain how you think of it being 'embraced'? Note that science almost never prescribes actions, it studies results. Further, note how long it can take science to actually establish a result. Finally, consider how complicated social issues are, leading to great difficulty in actually applying scientific method towards it, leading to inconclusive results, and therefore no action to prescribe. This is, in fact, the reason why social sciences use different methodology than the normal scientific method (as stated in the link above). One of the fundamental tenets of scientific methodology is that the effect being studied needs to be completely isolated. This is completely impossible in social situations....there are always a great deal of factors influencing the population being studied.

2) What change do you think scientism would hold if emplaced or mandated to be used by government in all government based activity.

Things would slow to a complete standstill, and nothing would ever get done. Further, the size of government would increase dramatically, due to the sheer number of studies that would be have to going on. Further, government would be completely unable to adapt dynamically to any rapidly changing situation. Consider the current situation in Lebanon. By the time any of the various scientific studies were done and results verified, all of the current combatants would be old men.

As I have stated in many other posts, I am very much in favor of governmental programs being held to task, have goals identified, and have their performance measured against those goals. This is done in business all the time. However, it is noteworthy that business doesn't follow the scientific method, either. Why? Because it isn't effective or efficient in that environment. Rather, I think government should adapt businessism, and do the things businesses do all the time to set strategy, monitor results, and allocate resources.

v. em·braced, em·brac·ing, em·brac·es
v. tr.
To clasp or hold close with the arms, usually as an expression of affection.

To surround; enclose: We allowed the warm water to embrace us.
To twine around: a trellis that was embraced by vines.
To include as part of something broader. See Synonyms at include.
To take up willingly or eagerly: embrace a social cause.
To avail oneself of: “I only regret, in my chilled age, certain occasions and possibilities I didn't embrace” (Henry James).

from dictionary.com, bold is the target I am trying to obtain.

The natural sciences or study of such by humans brought along the scientific method in that form from necessity really. The lack of application to other issues because one does not understand or want to attempt to understand such from such a framework does not mean it will not work. Such a method works fine in the study of animal behavior, which is complex obviously, so is genetics, physics of super sonic flight, anything you want to bring up under such, so the complexity of society is no excuse to bar such a framework to be employed in regards for the desire for truth. the framework applied would not change much save for making accountable the actions and reactions in a more clear, easier to digest and understandable form, that can be carried over more successfully, and of course makes corruption nearly impossible simply because it would have to gain a large and lasting acceptance, falsehoods die out in the natural science because of the scientific method, we can not say this of anything that does not use such. Ecology is another fine example of natural science being successful when using the scientific method, it works, this is proven.

The other option is basically accepting what? I mean if i took a chemistry class and they operated the way politics does i think chemistry would be a joke if nothing more then a chaotic ignorant mess, I would hope to say this is not reflecting fully of humanity in total but for all the people that speak from perception it hardly ever matches the reality we come to observe. If business strategy worked no company would ever find itself in jeopardy really, that’s not the reality of such though.

Would it be slower in regards to reaction to domestic of foreign issues is a nice point overall. I think using the scientific method on such initially again would only provide for accurate accounting of reason or logic behind and then its relation or reaction and then of course branching out towards real understanding, but overall all of these issues are slow anyways, I simply we see it as just making the system more honest in its endeavors overall and more free from fallacies and corruption in any form in a lasting sense.

Why oh why does everyone always imply an unwillingness to understand whenever questions are asked? You do realize of course that this is completely against the concept of scientism....indicating that you yourself fail to either grasp or embrace the concept. For your edification, I have in fact undertaken advanced studies on how scientific method can be applied to social situations, and in those studies was an advocate, so you might want to be a little more careful in your unfounded criticisms. I also notice that despite your claims of other's inability to grasp the concept, you have failed to provide my asked for explanation of how you saw it being applied to the political environment. Perhaps if you provided one, we might actually have the basis for a decent discussion of its application.



The application of business principles that I mentioned above.



Which is a very worthy goal, which I share. The question then is whether or not this is the appropriate method for reducing it. I would argue that although it might have its place, that goal would be better served by the application of business principles, for the reasons I outlined above. If you would provide an example of its use, it would be easier to discuss the pros and cons of each application.

1) Would you support such an ideal being embraced by the government, the idea being scientism.

A worse basis for government I cannot possibly imagine.

As noted, both by Hobbes and the article you reference (brief though it is), the social sciences do not strictly adhere to the scientific method because the social sciences simply cannot be experimented with the way other physical sciences are.

Let's say we wanted to discover, scientifically, which economic theory is better: capitalism or communism. We would need to set up parallel studies, trying to hold all of the possible inputs constant. It would literally be an impossible experiment to set up and get any results. Many supporters of communism point out that the communism of the Soviets and of China were not really communist systems. Which is arguably true. But can we discount that the Stalinism and Maoism are inevitable implementations of the system? Even with so many failed communist regimes, communists insist their system has never been tried, ignoring the possibility that their system, as they envision it, could never be practically implemented in an advanced economy.

What about politics? Why not use a scientism approach to politics? I'd bet a pure scientist would have told you that Bush would lose in 2004 or that Howard Dean would have won his party's nomination in 2004.

The fact of the matter is that politics is not logical and thus cannot follow the scientific method. We cannot say that one party or one political philosophy is the clear better one on an empirical basis. Everything is relative. What's important today in politics won't necessarily be important tomorrow. Just look at how Israel switches every few years from hard liners to more accommodating politicians. Politics ebbs and flows and is not constant.

2) What change do you think scientism would hold if emplaced or mandated to be used by government in all government based activity.

It would be impossible to make any decisions. There is no way to be certain what is the better choice in politics. There is no way to determine scientifically if we should invade Iraq or give aid to Lebanon or deploy a man to Mars. Yes, we can analysis risk vs. reward and return on investments, but even those analyses are very subjective. Why do certain companies pursue one marketing strategy while a second employs a different one? Because each is useful, depending upon where you place your emphasis. Why doesn't Walmart sell designer clothing?



You might think so, but it would be a pipe dream. Don't you think science can be corrupted to suit political ends? Didn't the Germans declare Jews to be genetically inferior to Aryans?



Again, this defies reality. You are saying that without scientism, politics devolves into fascism. But since scientism has never been used as the basis of a political system, then why haven't all political systems devolved into fascism?



So what happens when a scientific study says that we shouldn't supply AIDS relief to Africa? Isn't there a human motivation that goes beyond hard science? What happens when we logically conclude that Iran would not attack the US, because doing so would be suicide for their country, and then there is a mushroom cloud over New York City? It is easy with politics to get the inputs wrong because you judge others by your own value system. Since value systems are not universal, the logic of politics is inevitably illogical.

Of course I cannot fully grasp what politics would express if such a creature was scientific or used scientism, simply because it does not exist, my question really is hypothetical then because of such. Of course this is why I asked or posted the debate topic.

You advocated that scientism in politics would fail do to complexity involved, I went on to highlight various complex matters that the scientific method as used by the natural sciences comes to benefit people in terms of understanding such, like ecology.

IN my first post I also noted groups that have to use science as a means to provide data for pertaining goals, like the EPA in regards to the environment and of course the NSF when brought into the equation on matters such as cafe standards, they as federal organizations must adhere to or use the scientific method for a majority of matters they are responsible for, simply because talking on the issue alone or just perception is not enough for such matters.



Politics does resort into fascism, its always at that state really, being its run from nothing more then temporary and flawed perceptions.

Science establishes over time into knowledge about issues. The government does not run like that. This is one benefit I see if the government used a scientism approach. We all openly realize and accept the reality of complexity existing in most everything, and we see how difficult it is when attempting to gain a factual understanding on a great many issues. I do not favor this complexity being allowed to exist for it simply states that people should indeed basically accept to live in ignorance then.

Scientism employed would not stop decisions or policy from coming to exist, it would however require for accounting from birth to possible death of anything pertaining to such policy or decision making. This is the key part that most people I think are missing while envisioning some I Robot reality that I am not trying to put forward overall.

There is no in depth government accounting for much anything. The scientific method actually employed and open to the government and the populous of a democratic and or free nation would in my opinion be very positive. We know now that one cannot use genetics to employ inferiority and reason to be destroyed, that would be a fallacy easy to pick off, but on that same note our government can use morality and say some people like homosexuals are wrong and should be corrected, morality and faith being empty past matters of the heart and perception.

Relativity will not defeat the scientific method. The scientific method has to face this everyday within the natural sciences, its easy to see this I might add. To say launch a war would simply require the idea to be fully subjugated for what it is, birth to end. We do not have anything in place for such endeavors, so we live in a great deal of darkness overall attempting to facilitate the light of understanding on each other by pinging our perceptions of the issue on each other. This is the same thing in politics, or more idiots on a soap box that can tell you what they think but how often or not is that perception actually online with reality, or able to deal with it. This exists because we as a race or a society choose to live in ignorance even if we do not want to view it that way.

The scientific method as employed to study the natural sciences is what scientism is about. Such a method overtime reduces to and establishes factual understanding of matters, more often then not for what its constrained to it can lead to the understanding of those issues. Humanity would be lost to itself a great deal without science, it would not be known that feeding mercury to a child was bad, nor would a great deal of human society exist because of lack of tools and disease. Its again science that is hailing global warming as a threat and calling for change, and its not doing this on the idea of the idiot on a soapbox simply talking about his or her perception of reality, its objective, its open to peer review.

For science to become corrupt would require for everything it touches to accept such a notion of it being true, and this would then have to be able to survive in time also, this is why the scientific method as employed by natural sciences is able to weed out fallacy and corruption, because of the methods design, implementation and use.

When the government comes to talk about any issue, you get lots of bird chatter, then some of the chatter gets run with for a while and some study of its impact is taken into account. There is no real desire for factual understanding of our reality past that, such is disgusting to me, and where I call in fascism overall, because its perception making policy that does not require fact or care for it really.

take gun legislation for example, you might have some statistics as your big fact in making policy, besides that its word of mouth perception controlling reality, that’s manure to me. We lack as a race in total any real means to defeat this fog of war because we choose not to, we choose to live in the current trends and means while more is available to us. Would it slow down and bloat government, i would say no. It would implement a system of guidelines, a method or framework so actions taken can be understood in the lifespan they hold or the impact they come to have, a politician could actually be challenged in the position he or she establishes past some debate that relies on noting more then perception of the issue at stake.

We choose not to live like this, then we open ourselves up to a never ending new deal if you will, with short term political creatures coming and going and no way to tell what’s heads or tails in reality. If the scientific method as employed by the hard sciences can obtain factual understanding of highly complex matters which it can it should be employed for the useful tool in which is it made for, ending ignorance. It cannot establish such overnight, but simply choosing to ignore the potential it has is to favor the current means of existence, which is poor overall.

It is not simply that political and other social science issues are complex. Of course complex systems can be broken down somewhat using the scientific method.

The problem here is that there is not an unchanging set of rules underlying politics or (more generally) human behavior. At least there is not a set of rules which is generally accepted as true in all cases. Why is there crime in society? What is a reasonable tax rate? How do you balance individual freedoms versus public safety?

These are political issues--ones that may never be "solved". It is called the human condition. We have some general guidelines, but no hard and fast rules.

That is the problem with scientism. Science cannot measure men's souls or men's motivations. Thus political problems, such as the ones I've mentioned, cannot be determined through the scientific method.

1) Would you support such an ideal being embraced by the government, the idea being scientism.

No way. If my understanding of scientism is correct, it is just another form of socialism and opposed to the idea of freedom. Its the belief that there is a formulaic way to solve problems and that a certain method can yield maximum results for the maximum number of people. Socialism holds that all things should be decided by a central arbitrary power in order to bring about 'social justice' and 'greater equality.' The decisions are made by a minority and those decisions restrict what the masses are able to do. From the buying and selling of goods to the hiring and paying of employees. Scientism seems no different in my eyes as it would restrict people from doing what they should have the free right to do. I mean for instance, if the scientific method is applied to a certain issue and a policy is made on that issue to bring about the maximum results, then wouldn't it be logical to believe that certain people and certain actions would need to be restricted in order to follow the results that the scientific method yields?


But ecology has little to do with human interaction which is unpredictable and always changing. Amlord adequately pointed out that the social sciences are way too complex for any formula or method to yield good results.


I would argue that THAT is what has maintained freedom for so long and that it is the attempt to reach the absolute and everlasting that lead to fascism. Freedom is about trial and error and the unpredictability of man. Its about adaptation to the unforseen. The scientific method is hardly adequate to measure every circumstance and every factor concerned with every issue.

I would comment on the rest of your post, but it appears to be more of the same and I stand by statement that my understanding of scientism leads me to believe it to be a form of socialism.

EDIT: I'd like to add a few words from my boy Hayek:

socialsim from the source.
Any of various theories or systems of social organization in which the means of producing and distributing goods is owned collectively or by a centralized government that often plans and controls the economy.
The stage in Marxist-Leninist theory intermediate between capitalism and communism, in which collective ownership of the economy under the dictatorship of the proletariat has not yet been successfully achieved.
capitalsim from the source
An economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately or corporately owned and development is proportionate to the accumulation and reinvestment of profits gained in a free market.
scientism from the source
The collection of attitudes and practices considered typical of scientists.
The belief that the investigative methods of the physical sciences are applicable or justifiable in all fields of inquiry.

Source is dictionary.com

I would opt that scientism is neither capitalist or socialist.

Overall I can see that many points that people put forward such as amlord that it would be very difficult for scientism to be fully taken on simply because society is so volatile overall when considering in total human action, but this is not what I am trying to take on in my debate.

The idea I am trying to put forward is the government commits actions both domestically and foreign. These actions are typically brought on to govern for the most part from the position of the government, being its part of the system or society that exists day to day and holds influence on the system or society in total.

Such actions coming from them I feel should be made, operated from, maintained and used in conjunction with government activity overall from a scientism point of view, or from the scientific method. My main reasons for such is to begin a base of knowledge that politicians and the public could use in regards to both managing the idea or reality of government and politicians in general.

These would entail that gun legislation would then have to operate from data that pertains to such, not just what someone in power thinks should be done with gun legislation, this would be nice if it applied to legislation period. Such would also be openly viewable by citizens and other politicians, and could be used in of course the idea of new or different legislation or change to legislation will come along, it would not kill the necessity of adaptation in any environment, personally I think it would aid the process much more the harm it.

The ideas of it getting lumped with socialism like many feel about being green is because such an issue is not something that can be looked at as individualist, if one state decides to be overly polluting it affects far more then just the people making the actions, or its a global or federal issue. Scientism would just entail that current government actions would still occur but such would operate on the guidelines of the scientific method, thereby to me establishing knowledge overtime on any issue, be it guns to poverty to foreign policy, simply because overtime again factual understanding of such issues would come to exist. It would also do away with the large amount of fallacy our government and society is open to by people in power just operating from perception of an issue without needing or caring about facts relating to such policy generated or impact, or the after action review if you will on any policy. If an administration or politician decided to make a policy, the logic behind it would have to be visible, and more often then not I think combined minds would be able to see before it even came to life various wholes in the logic or fallacy, which of course exists in much of our current political reality, such visibility would also be open to the public, right now it’s a press release that is mostly controlled… that’s manure.

Absolute freedom does not exist. Society does though, and it has a government, I cannot just go outside and do whatever I want, and as such society provides very much an environment I have to adapt to and operate in, not vice versa. This society has a government which has control and influence, regardless of who is running it, I would find it very comforting if such a body had to run its activities it will commit regardless via the scientific method, simply because it would provide visibility, reduce fallacy/corruption, and overtime start to establish a more factual understanding of reality as it pertains to the role of government and society and the relationship between the two.

None of these are nearly as complex as studying human interactions in large groups. In ecology, individual behavior and thought is not an issue, ditto for advanced physics, etc. This is also the case for the animal behaviour you mention. Why do you think the social sciences developed new methods to begin with? Because the scientific methods in place did not work in their environment. Social interactions are immensely more complex and interactive than those environments you mention. Let's say you wanted to study the effect of a certain social policy. How would you apply it in a manner that the study group had no interaction with those not being studied? Can't be done....therefore rendering the scientific method inapplicable. That aside, isolating the various factors within the social policy to study them would be too time consuming. Again, the issues are just far too complex, with too many interrelated factors, for the scientific method to apply.

Let me turn the tables. Why do you think the scientific method would work better than normal business principles...especially given that those methods are already in place and are known to work in these environments? They would accomplish the same goals that you state, but without all of the various issues of the scientific method.

As for the database you describe, I believe that various think tanks and policy groups around the country do create such things. As has been discussed elsewhere, their results tend to mimic those desired by their sources of funding. Given the highly complex environments being studied, it is quite easy to perform studies that provide exactly the desired result. Since funding would have to be provided, and it would have to be from the government which is controlled by the very politics you are seeking to eliminate, how do you propose this issue be resolved?

If the government moves to make a social policy, which it does, its doing this for some reason. This policy has variables visible for reason in generation, it will also have a visible impact, such can be recordable. This is how the scientific method could work, overtime it would start to establish that in say a certain state, perceptions are this way or in another state perceptions are in another direction, I mean we do have red and blue states right? Right now government does not have to operate in this manner, some people in position to control policy can just talk with some other people and make policy... This seems a bit scary to me, simply because the logic behind the creation was never really studied nor the impact in any great deal, which is simply recording what is observable, and of course you can always talk to people and make nice little polls.

There is no visibility or attempt to gain such or understanding of government activity, in a temporary or long term sense. The application of the scientific method would change this by simply changing those two areas of government and its relation to the public it governs.

As for business strategy, they to should probably use the scientific method as much as possible, I mean after all the stock market is a nice snapshot of chaos day to day, with a general background extinction rate I am sure. Though a cost benefit model is pretty much in place for our troops, sad as that is.

If quantum mechanics, genetics or a myriad of other vastly complex issues can be reduced or are being reduced to a factual understanding, I think so could the reason people like coffee, or vote for a certain politician wearing his or her perception on his sleeve, like we know a majority of bias against homosexuality comes from religion, and its in the religion on why, Not vastly complex, not so much as genetics of even a protist or some other single celled eukaryote.

This is not a debate about establishing scientism in society, but in government activity, that is also another direction that keeps getting used improperly. Government activity run through the scientific method, it would simply entail accurate accounting on all ends of such activity, which would overtime produce more visibility and understanding, it will not occur overnight, but the other option again is to simply surrender to complexity and accept ignorance basically, if we choose to live like that from day one we would all still be hunter gatherers if lucky, but they still had to learn to live in reality, not in there perceptions.

They DO use the scientific method as much as possible. However, that is almost never, because it is simply neither possible nor profitable. The scientific method is simply not efficient or effective in prescribing actions in these environments. Rather than criticize them for NOT using it, you should take a look at why they don't, and learn from their lessons. This would, in fact, be what a true advocate of scientism would do, isn't it?

Ok, I am not trying to advocate the scientific method being used in a company or a business. They could not even if they wanted to because the system has structure itself in a way that if a company wanted to gain say full visibility of a competitor it would be breaking some laws, its a no go on that one. As in regards to a government using it, it could very well do such. Small changes would simply exist in a bill attempting to get pasted as one example. It would have the hypothetical section or hypothesis probably called the abstract chunk, or the logic behind wanting the bill passed, say for regulation on assault rifles for public consumption. This part would have to have data relating to the subject of assault rifles and there role in public life, or if none existed whatever data prior to the bill or data in any form or whatever is being used to generate the bill. That’s all that would have to exist in it, it could be open to the public also as much as to the rest of the government it comes in contact with. The after effect of the bill being passed or not could also then be studied from the hypothesis, thus starting to establish maybe something factual about it all, such as where did the bill pay off or fail as it came into action, which could also be reported on and used in further legislation or bills or whatever, thus after sometime establishing maybe theory on an issue, then possibly a responsible and effective law on an issue, being that’s the primary role of government, or its a system of laws or law overall.

It could be slipped into government activity without causing any severe damage in just that light form, which I would imagine and can only imagine at this point would start to produce visibility on government actions, and then of course accountability and reduction in government based fallacy and corruption.

Is it easy for an American to get the facts on what’s going on with our border to Mexico and immigration via the government? No its not, its confusing, difficult and clouded mess overall, with the government not being able to even stay on top of its own employees actions. The structure that would be required by implementing a light form of the scientific method like I described will end a lot of that, again by simply implying that accountability mainly via visibility. If I do a scientific study on chemistry, it would be rather odd if I did not work to record everything relating to it, from birth to death, and as is obvious in such fields this process does not reduce the ability for the chemist to actually study or make the field grow in an acceptable pace, and more so when there are many chemists just as the government currently and typically is always stocked with a rather large amount of employees. The only change I could obviously see is documents would have to be structured differently, and of course how they feed into various channels. The change to government structure or infrastructure if I may would not be so heavy in terms of accommodation of the scientific method. It would also make it more so if a politician does start something, they have to stick to it, or simply put they cant just run on words alone like they do many times.