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What does one mean by the term explanation? This is a very complex question in the philosophy of science. It has been extensively discussed and debated by philosophies. But we shall consider it from a relatively simple point of view. To clarify the idea of explanation, let us consider the following situations: First take the…
Kafka’s hero is, above all a hero for our time, a godless age in which power endowed with a higher meaning has been replaced with a vacuous power of tradition and legal and bureaucratic norms, that is, by human institutions. Man, deprived of all means and all weapons in his effort to achieve freedom and…
“The aim of science,” wrote Karl Pearson, “is nothing short of the complete interpretation of the universe.” Thus the goal of science is to understand and explain every aspect of the universe. This is to be accomplished by adopting the scientific methodology. By the universe one means directly or indirectly perceived physical reality. The working…
What is urgently needed in the debate on the future of Europe is the substitution of old Machiavellian paradigms based on “real politick” considerations with new imaginative ones based on humanistic considerations. Unless we manage that substitution we shall end up pouring new wine in old putrid wineskins. One of the cultural guides for discovering…
Most people even mildly interested in evolution have heard about the “selfish gene.” The concept is simple yet with counterintuitive implications. Richard Dawkins, who coined the term, argues that the best way to understand evolution is to imagine that genes selfishly want to preserve themselves, and so produce elaborate replicator vehicles (us) designed to help…
Bioengineering and genetic enhancement will bring the posthuman age in which humans live longer, possess new physical and cognitive abilities, and are liberated from suffering due to aging and disease. Moreover, humans will attain “cognitive immortality.”
One does what one can to give science, religion, art, and culture a good name, but sometimes all you get is a load of Bovine Excrement (and if we didn’t laugh, we’d crack!): 1. Australian catastrophist Tim Flannery has argued that a good way to fight global warming is by pumping sulphur into the atmosphere. The…
What does it mean to be human? What is the purpose of human life on earth? From whence does life come? How are we to treat other humans? Other life forms? These are questions that sages and thought systems animated by questioners in various contexts perpetually address.This paper examines a traditional thought system generally silenced…
The scientific revolution of the sixteenth century was significant not so much in the discarding of geocentricity though this was one of its earliest steps; not so much in the discovery of Kepler’s laws though this opened our visions to hitherto hidden features of planetary motions, not so much in the formulation of the laws…
The term “Dark Ages” was once erroneously applied to the entire millennium separating late antiquity from the Italian Renaissance (500-1500 AD). Today’s scholars know better. There is a widespread acknowledgment among them (see David Knowles’ The Evolution of Medieval Thought, London: Longman, 1988) that the 14th century i.e., the century of Dante and Petrarca’s Humanism,…