The development of the natural sciences and the discovery of the self shaped epistemological issues and the concept of morality in modern philosophy. These changes led to the separation of subject and object, skepticism about our cognitive abilities, and the emergence of a sense of morality to determine moral values.
Two important variables that characterized modern philosophy in the West were the development of the natural sciences and the discovery of the self, among others. The development of the natural sciences played a crucial role in enabling humans to understand nature objectively and, in turn, to explore and predict its laws. This was a major turning point in humanity’s transition from a medieval, God-centered worldview to a more human-centered way of thinking. The scientific method, with its emphasis on experience and experimentation, solidified the belief that truth can be reached through rational thought. However, what science shows us is limited to the world of scientific knowledge, the phenomenal world. Scientific inquiry is a useful tool for explaining and predicting nature, but it can’t explain everything. The objective knowledge that science provides inevitably focuses on the external aspects of the world, and maintains a certain distance from the internal world of human beings, the depths of subjective experience and the self.
This brings us to another variable. It is the discovery of the self. The discovery of the self is another important pillar of modern philosophy, alongside the natural sciences. The “philosophy of subjectivity,” which began with Descartes’ “I think, therefore I am,” led to the separation of the thinking subject (the self) from the thought object (the world). This led to the development of modern philosophy as an epistemology that grapples with the question, “How can a subject know an object as it is?” This philosophical turn put the human self at the center of philosophy and revolutionized the way we perceive ourselves and how we understand the world.
However, from its inception, this philosophy inevitably implied skepticism and agnosticism, for epistemology foreshadowed the fate of man as an exile from a “paradise” where the subject and object were not yet separated. In other words, from a life structure in which the “I” could not be perceived apart from its relationship to the things and people around it, the “I” with its own self-consciousness has now changed to a structure in which the objective world outside of me is viewed through my eyes. In a sense, the more self-conscious we become, the harder it is for us to understand other beings. And this is an inevitable consequence of the modern worldview. These epistemological issues have been a constant concern for philosophers and have been subject to various interpretations and debates in the development of modern philosophy. For example, epistemology has been at the center of philosophical inquiry from the opposition between empiricism and rationalism, to Kant’s critical philosophy, to deconstructionism in late modern philosophy.
In David Hume, the perfecter of modern empiricism, we find the skeptical conclusion that “we can never know an object as it is, because it is not a subject.” This is a challenge to the capacity of human reason. This implies a distrust of the human capacity for reason, a skepticism about the possibilities of human reason. This skepticism would become another hallmark of modern philosophy, constantly questioning the capacity of human cognition. This philosophical questioning would later be further radicalized by philosophers like Nietzsche, contributing to the deconstruction of the modern concept of the subject and the search for new philosophical endeavors.
The emergence of the concept of morality is closely related to the development of modern epistemology. In pre-modern, especially Platonic, worldviews, the moral good was understood from the perspective of the universe itself, that is, from the perspective of a self-revealing reality. The universe was seen as a space full of harmony and order, and it was believed that humans should find their place in it and lead a moral life in accordance with the laws of the universe. However, the mechanistic view of the universe and the concept of an emancipated subject who realized its independence through the Enlightenment led to a sharp distinction between subject and object.
The question arose as to what makes a subject recognize and aim for the good as an object. Thus, the concept of morality emerged, which assumes that the other sense organs recognize moral objects just as they recognize physical objects. All human beings have an “innate sense of what is good and beautiful” or “some natural sense of value that takes into account social relevance”. In moral matters, there is a moral sense or natural emotion that determines moral values. This refers to a special ability that all people are born with, which comes into play when we perceive moral objects (human actions and feelings). There is no normal person in the world who does not possess this sense of morality or natural emotion. They form an essential aspect of human society and help us make moral judgments in our relationships with others. They are also an important factor in enabling social harmony and coexistence, and provide the basis for the maintenance and development of human society.
