Understanding Philosophy: Branches, Ethics, and Science
The Branches of Philosophy
Any human activity can precede the expression “philosophy of …” to reflect on its limits and properties. There is thus a philosophy of mathematics, physics, religion, culture, etc. Despite this wide range of topics, philosophers have dealt with a common set of issues. Today, they have become philosophical disciplines.
The Main Branches of Philosophy:
- Epistemology: Considering the possibility, origin, and limits of knowledge. It also asks about the criteria of truth. Within epistemology is the philosophy of science, which studies what science is, defines it, and distinguishes it from other non-scientific or pseudoscientific discourse.
- Logic: The part of philosophy that studies valid reasoning, i.e., reasoning that guarantees true conclusions.
- Metaphysics: The reflection of all that exists and, for this reason, is the most general discipline. Historically, it is the most traditional branch and also the most criticized by philosophical sources, which consider that the problems it deals with are, in fact, false problems.
- Aesthetics: Addresses the problem of art and tries to answer what beauty is.
- Ethics: Addresses how each one should behave, what is good, or what constitutes happiness. It deals with individual behavior.
- Political Philosophy: Is about the community, what is the best way of living, and the organization of the State.
Theoretical Philosophy
(Epistemology, Logic, and Metaphysics)
Practical Philosophy
(Aesthetics, Ethics, and Politics)
The Scientific Explanation
Scientific explanations are answers to questions that arise from the contemplation of nature. Any natural phenomenon, like the movement of the stars, can become a scientific question. But unlike myths, science seeks to uncover the causes and mechanisms that led to these phenomena. The scientific questions are concrete and are aimed at solving a problem of nature.
Scientific explanations have led to many applications that currently pervade our daily lives: mobile phones, vaccines, etc.
The scientific breakthrough is based on the application of the hypothetical-deductive method comprising the following steps:
- Identify the problem to be solved.
- Formulate a hypothesis to explain the causes.
- Design experiments to compare this hypothesis with nature and whether it’s correct.
Scientific activity is developed by formulating hypotheses that must then be confirmed or rejected by experience. If a hypothesis cannot derive observable consequences or experiments, it is not a scientific hypothesis.
To achieve even more accurate data or to request information that is outside the threshold of the human senses, scientific instruments are used and developed.
As scientific discoveries have become more numerous and reality has become better known, new problems have arisen that have required specialization. Today, science is highly specialized, and the technical language used is based on very specific concepts and also uses the language of mathematics in sciences such as physics and biology.