The Place of Science in Modern Civilisation, and Other EssaysVeblen, Thorstein
Philosophy
The Place of Science in Modern Civilisation, and Other Essays
Veblen, Thorstein
Economics; Science
Rightly seen from this ultra-modern point of view, this modern science
and this point of view which it affects are, of course, a feature of the
current cultural situation,--of the process of life as it runs along
under our eyes. So also, when seen from this scientific point of view,
it is a matter of course that any marked cultural era will have its own
characteristic attitude and animus toward matters of knowledge, will
bring under inquiry such questions of knowledge as lie within its
peculiar range of interest, and will seek answers to these questions
only in terms that are consonant with the habits of thought current at
the time. That is to say, science and the scientific point of view will
vary characteristically in response to those variations in the prevalent
habits of thought which constitute the sequence of cultural development;
the current science and the current scientific point of view, the
knowledge sought and the manner of seeking it, are a product of the
cultural growth. Perhaps it would all be better characterised as a
by-product of the cultured growth.
* * * * *
This question of a scientific point of view, of a particular attitude
and animus in matters of knowledge, is a question of the formation of
habits of thought; and habits of thought are an outcome of habits of
life. A scientific point of view is a consensus of habits of thought
current in the community, and the scientist is constrained to believe
that this consensus is formed in response to a more or less consistent
discipline of habituation to which the community is subjected, and that
the consensus can extend only so far and maintain its force only so long
as the discipline of habituation exercised by the circumstances of life
enforces it and backs it up. The scheme of life, within which lies the
scheme of knowledge, is a consensus of habits in the individuals which
make up the community. The individual subjected to habituation is each a
single individual agent, and whatever affects him in any one line of
activity, therefore, necessarily affects him in some degree in all his
various activities. The cultural scheme of any community is a complex of
the habits of life and of thought prevalent among the members of the
community. It makes up a more or less congruous and balanced whole, and
carries within it a more or less consistent habitual attitude toward
matters of knowledge--more or less consistent according as the
community's cultural scheme is more or less congruous throughout the
body of the population; and this in its turn is in the main a question
of how nearly uniform or consonant are the circumstances of experience
and tradition to which the several classes and members of the community
are subject.
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