International Congress of Arts and Science, Volume 1: Philosophy and Metaphysics
Philosophy
International Congress of Arts and Science, Volume 1: Philosophy and Metaphysics
Conference proceedings; Medicine -- Congresses; Science and the humanities -- Congresses; Technology -- Congresses
We can say in general that the science of medicine or of engineering, of
jurisprudence or of education, contains, as science, no element of art,
but merely theoretical judgments which, as such, can find their place
somewhere in the complete systems of the theoretical sciences. If the
physician describes a disease, its symptoms, the means of examining
them, the remedies, their therapeutical effects, and the prophylaxis, in
short, everything which the physician needs for his art, he does not
record anything which would not belong to an ideally complete
description and explanation of the processes in the human body. In the
same way it can be said that if the engineer characterizes the
conditions under which an iron bridge will be safe, it is evident that
he cannot introduce any facts which would not find their logical place
in an ideally complete description of the properties of inorganic
nature; and finally, the same is true for the statements of the
politician, the jurist, the pedagogue, or the minister. Whatever is said
about their art is a theoretical judgment which connects facts of the
ideally complete system of theoretical science; in their case the facts
of course belong in first line to the realm of the psychological,
historical, and normative sciences. There never has been or can be
practical advice in the form of words, which is not in principle a
statement of facts which belong to the absolute totality of theoretical
knowledge. Seen from this point of view, it is evident that all our
knowledge is fundamentally theoretical, and that the conception of
practical knowledge is logically unprecise.
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