Philosophy and Science: From Ancient Greece to Modernity
The Questions
Philosophy and science came to light in Greece around the sixth century BC, a place and a time characterized by political liberty, the seed of democracy, and, therefore, freedom of expression and thought.
Cosmological Stage
In its first stage, the focus of research was the universe, nature, physis, considered as a great living organism, within which changes occur, not a supernatural and cosmic order governed by a constant and regular human reason that must be discovered and translated into legislation. This order led them to consider nature as something perfect, so there must be an arche, a principle, origin, and cause of all the reality that emerges. Thus, the birth of philosophy is characterized:
- To go beyond the sensitive data, appearances, in order to reach a universal unity.
- For the purpose of research, which focuses on nature, man is another element as human nature.
Anthropological Turn1
In the 5th century BC, the human being became the main topic of reflection. During the “Age of Pericles,” political and social life consolidated, and with it, a philosophical view based on knowledge of human nature from the standpoint of psychology, ethics, and politics.
From the study of human beings as such, philosophy is oriented towards practical issues. Given its dual dimension, as an individual and as a citizen, we investigated what the moral virtues should be. It is believed that ethics and politics are mutually implicated because if the citizens are virtuous, a just society can be achieved in which the individual can achieve happiness.
Thus, the concern to discover natural laws evolved towards the approach of the nature of political law, nomos, unquestionable, untouchable, because it is the “expression of the will of the citizens.” Thinkers like Plato and Aristotle went beyond to consider what we know as a philosophical system, that is, a set of theories covering virtually all aspects of reality, interrelated and linked by internal consistency, trying to give a vision of all reality and not just a specific part.
Christian Thought: Reason and Faith
Of these two opposite ways of interpretation, it was Christianity that led to a fundamental change of approach to reality.
Christianity, as a religion, is based on a set of supernatural beliefs and truths whose origin is the revelation of God. The main tool of knowledge is faith, by which it must reach the indisputable, universal, eternal truth.
The creation of the world from nothing, two alien concepts in the Greek world, where it was unthinkable that something could come from nowhere.
The medieval worldview, theocentrism, places God, the Supreme Creator and Almighty Being, as the necessary and sole cause of the order of the universe. In contrast, people are contingent and finite.
The Epistemological Period
Implications of the Scientific Revolution
The first critical reaction came from the hand of the Renaissance (15th-16th centuries), during which a broad cultural movement known as Humanism emerged. Humanistic thinkers, recovering the classical authors, substituted theocentrism for an anthropocentric and naturalistic vision.
The Scientific Revolution challenged the Greco-medieval worldview.
- Heliocentrism: The sun is the center of the universe.
- Mechanicism: The order of the universe is like a perfect machine, so you can know exactly the laws of its operation.
- Mathematicization of Reality: The new methodology Galileo provided became a scientific and quantitative vision of reality.
- Experimentation: Not simply looking for what is well known but to dominate and transform nature.
Modernity
The Rationalism of Descartes
The initiator of Modernity, Descartes advocated total confidence in the possibilities of reason while having contempt for the senses. From a series of innate ideas and modeled ona mathematical deduction, reason can, by itself, without recourse to experience, discover the fabric of reality. From this derives the conception of philosophy as knowledge of indubitable certainties able to reach all areas of the real. However, this overconfidence led to a dogmatic attitude.
British Empiricism
Against rationalism, empiricism claims that the origin and the value of knowledge depend on the data of experience perceived through the senses. Reason can only function from the data that provide the senses; however, these are limited and subjective. With these theories, human knowledge loses the status of absolute truth to become merely probable, which will lead to skepticism2.
Kant’s Transcendental Idealism3
From the experience given to the senses, we know the way things are in themselves.