The absolute status of science in the future society is actually just a belief system. Scientific theories are not absolute because they are changeable and subjective, and the persuasive power of science is due to its logic and tangibility.
What will human society look like in the future?
Imagine a human society of the future. What’s the first thing that comes to mind? Most people probably envision a technologically advanced world where self-driving cars drive around, artificial intelligence takes care of office work, and all diseases are diagnosed and treated early so that people can live to be 100 years old. This is probably how most people envision their labs, too. As you can see from the examples above, science is highly valued in modern society. When we say “science”, we’re not only talking about pure natural sciences and technology, but also math. In short, science is considered an absolute discipline. Objectivity, which is an important characteristic of the discipline, can only be achieved by proving it through scientific methods such as experimentation and analysis after observation.
In addition, economic physics, which applies theories from physics to economic phenomena, has arisen, and many disciplines use the scientific method of modeling and analyzing a given situation as their main research method. Scientists are also influential in social issues. In matters such as the installation of nuclear power plants, the analysis of scientists has a great influence on government policy decisions and the formation of public opinion. Science may seem like a very objective and reliable discipline that has such an overwhelming influence in modern society, but it’s not. Science is a religion, a belief system, just like Christianity and humanism. Let’s take a look at the reasons why science is just another religion.
The variability and limitations of scientific theories
History is full of examples of how scientific theories are not absolute. There have been cases where existing theories have collapsed and new ones have been formed. This is what happened with quantum mechanics. Before the advent of quantum mechanics, the prevailing thought in physics was that “there is no longer a phenomenon in the universe that cannot be analyzed.” Maxwell’s equations, which unified the previously problematic phenomena of magnetism and electricity, were thought to have solved all problems. But then phenomena were discovered that could not be explained by classical physics. Blackbody radiation, the line spectrum of hydrogen atoms, the photoelectric effect, etc. were either completely unexplained by classical physics, or the explanations were very different from the observed results.
Several scientists have proposed ideas to solve these problems, and the theories built on these ideas have been able to make predictions that are consistent with experimental results. However, many of these ideas contradicted common sense or existing concepts of physics, and the new theory, quantum mechanics, was different from classical physics. Initially, the two theories differed in how they viewed natural phenomena. While classical mechanics believes that if we have accurate information about the situation of an object (initial velocity, initial position, force received, etc.), it is possible to predict all of its motions and analyze them up to the past by analyzing them through theory, quantum mechanics believes that it is impossible to accurately measure all of the information of an object in the first place, and that the motion of an object is not deterministic but probabilistic and is determined to be in one state through our observations.
As we can see from the development of quantum mechanics, science is not a discipline whose content is fixed. When a phenomenon is discovered that cannot be explained by an existing theory, a new theory is developed to explain the phenomenon and replace the old theory. Therefore, changing theories can lead to different analyses and predictions than the previous ones, so it’s not correct to think of science as absolute.
However, it is rare for a theory to replace an existing theory with a completely new theory, such as the development of quantum mechanics. The reason why existing theories have been able to survive unchanged is that they have been able to explain the natural phenomena known to date. Therefore, it is very unlikely that scientific theories will change until something extraordinary is observed. From this perspective, science can be absolute for a short period of time. However, even if we accept this view, the results of applying the theory are not absolute.
The religious nature of science
Scientific theories themselves are not subjective; they are purely mathematical expressions, expressions, and logical progressions. Therefore, scientific theories themselves are absolute as long as they do not change. However, scientific theories themselves do not have any practical meaning; they are just laws that natural phenomena follow, and they do not give us any practical information. The only way to get practical information from a scientific theory is to analyze a given situation. For example, if a nuclear power plant is to be built in a certain area, we can apply theories based on the structure of the nuclear power plant and the topography and features of the area to predict the risk of an accident, or if a natural or man-made disaster occurs, we can analyze the surrounding environment after the accident to analyze the cause.
In this way, science has a practical meaning when we use analysis to infer past situations or predict what will happen in the future. Inevitably, this process involves the subjectivity of the scientist. Analysis in science is the process of analyzing data. Analyzing data is the process of analyzing data. If the relationship between the data or the trend of the data is exactly in line with the theory, the scientist’s subjectivity is not involved because it is only necessary to determine whether it is consistent or inconsistent. In reality, the influence of various external factors and the error of the measurement equipment itself cause errors that do not exactly match the predictions of the theory.
The process of interpreting these errors and the way they are handled differ depending on the scientist, so the subjectivity of the scientist is involved when analyzing in reality. Of course, there is a framework for analyzing data that takes these errors into account. However, even the results that are filtered by this framework can be analyzed differently depending on the subjectivity or perspective. You may think that the difference between the results you thought or predicted in an ideal situation and the actual experimental results is simply an error in the experimental process, but it may also be due to the influence of factors that you did not consider in the process of applying the theory. In other words, even if you analyze the same data, the results may differ depending on your point of view. This is why information obtained through science is not absolute.
Objectivity and truth in science
Scientific theories can change over time, and the results of analyzing them depend on the subjectivity and perspective of the scientist, so science cannot be considered absolute. However, the fact that science is not absolute does not justify it being a religion like humanism. Let’s take a look at what characteristics of science make it religious. A religion can simply be defined as a belief system shared by many people. Religions are formed by people who believe in a basic set of beliefs and expand on those beliefs. Christianity is a belief system founded by people who believe that the Bible is the true story of God, and humanism is a belief system founded by people who believe that the proposition that all humans are the same is true.
Because religion is a belief system that people share, people who don’t share it don’t understand it. People who don’t believe in Christianity won’t understand the story of Noah’s Ark, and people in societies that believe that humans are inherently divided into classes won’t accept humanism, which holds that all humans are of equal value. Religion also provides a framework for people who believe in it to see the world. People who believe in a religion try to explain things that happen in the world within that belief system, and they think those explanations are valid. From a Christian perspective, humans are superior to other animals because we are God’s chosen species. From a humanist perspective, humans are more important than other animals because all value is based on how humans feel, and therefore the experiences of other animals have no value.
Both of these arguments seem irrational, but people who live in each belief system believe them to be valid. Science has all of these characteristics of religion. First, science has developed under the belief that phenomena in nature can be expressed in terms of mathematical laws. In other words, science has developed many theories based on the assumption that there are certain laws that govern natural phenomena and that nothing can happen that violates those laws. If this assumption were wrong, the purpose of science would be lost, and all the hard work that has gone into it would be largely meaningless.
The current interpretation of quantum mechanics is that things in nature are unpredictable and that everything we do, even our very existence, changes the direction in which natural phenomena occur. In other words, it’s hard to be certain that there are laws that are independent of human influence. There may be laws for approximate outcomes, but there may not be laws that are actually the most fundamental. Furthermore, scientists work under the belief that the theories they have previously discovered or perfected are correct. Of course, unlike other religions, their existing theories have been proven through supposedly objective experiments, but they can be characterized as religious in that they believe in things they have not verified and expand their belief system based on that.
Those who are ignorant of science will not be able to accept its explanations. Science has all the characteristics of religion because it provides us with a framework for understanding natural phenomena, but it is also a belief system made up of many beliefs.
Science’s persuasive power and social influence
Why is it that science, which, like Christianity and humanism, is a belief system, has become more influential in modern society than other religions? This is because science’s main weapons are logic and visibility. Most of the claims made by other religions are things that we cannot observe and verify. But the claims of science can be observed and verified. Therefore, people who don’t believe in science are bound to be persuaded by its claims if they are consistently confirmed.
Of course, you can argue that existing religions are also easily convinced by spiritual experiences, but they are less convincing than science because very few people have such experiences. However, I have yet to have such an experience myself, so it’s hard for me to logically refute this argument. Science draws a variety of logical conclusions from a few basic principles (laws), and “logic” seems to be universally embedded in all humans. Not only science, but also previous religions have tried to persuade people with logic.
Where religions have failed, science has succeeded. This is because once you can make people believe in the most fundamental principles, it’s easy to spread other beliefs. Religion has failed because it is too hard to get people to believe in its fundamental principles, whereas science has gotten to this point because it is easy to see what the belief system says, and it is easy to expand on it in a logical progression. The fact that so many people believe in science, and trust what it says, has elevated its status. Science has taught us that transparency (common sense) and logic are the keys to persuasion, and human society has come to value them as important virtues.
Objectivity and limits of science
We think of science as an objective discipline because of these two virtues. We think of science as having objectivity, which means seeing or thinking about things from a third party’s point of view, outside of one’s own relationship with them, because logic is shared by all humans, and what you see is what everyone else will observe. I don’t want to deny that science is an objective discipline. Logic is shared by humanity, and observation is the same, so it is definitely an objective discipline. However, being objective does not mean that it is true, or that it is the truth. It simply means that everyone would think so in the current situation, but it does not mean that nature actually behaves that way, or that global warming is actually happening.
This is because science is a religion, a belief system, and not an actual principle of nature. We only believe in science because it describes nature well, so it’s entirely possible that its predictions are wrong, and its analyses are wrong because they can be interpreted differently by different scientists. In other words, science may not be the truth. The results of science are just what we believe to be happening at the moment.
Conclusion
Science, like humanism, is just a belief system (a religion), and its content is not absolute. However, it has become the world’s dominant religion because of the persuasive power of its logic and visibility (common sense). These characteristics of science have made it an objective discipline, which has led to more people trusting it. However, we have seen that being objective does not mean that science is true. The mask of objectivity that science wears often fools us into thinking that science is truth. Because science is not the truth, we must always live with the suspicion that it could be wrong when we accept its findings.
In everyday life, this doubt is not so necessary because, as mentioned above, there are still things that can be explained well by scientific theories and therefore can be considered absolute knowledge. However, when we look at the results of applying scientific theories and analyzing them, we need to have doubts. Science itself is imperfect, and the scientist’s analysis may not be the truth, but it is also not objective. Rather than blindly trusting science, I think it’s a good idea to take a step back and examine the perspectives of different scientists.
