Naturalism (philosophy)
Naturalism is the view that the world is to be understood as purely illustrative nature events. This assumption, which is often pointedly by the saying Everything is natural, lets open by itself, as the concept of nature is to circumscribe. If we understand by "nature" alone physical nature, it is clear from the saying Everything is a materialistic nature or physicalist position. Such theories held that the mind or consciousness is part of the physical nature or, alternatively, not at all or at most exist as an illusion.
As naturalism may be referred to since the early 17th century, every doctrine which alone explains the nature of reason and the norm of all phenomena. This came out especially from the motivation to distinguish themselves from supernatural phenomena in the religious sense. A so -understood naturalism rejects from around the existence of miracles and supernatural beings.
In modern naturalistic theories since the early 20th century, however, often is the concept of natural science and not the concept of nature in the foreground. It is argued that the natural sciences would lead to the basic descriptions of the structures of the world and would consider philosophical, humanities and everyday practices in this sense. For a naturalist in this sense, the natural sciences are for the description and explanation of the world, " the measure of all things."
- 2.2 objection of normativity
- 4.1 Three problems of the naturalization of the mind
- 4.2 intentionality
Characteristics of naturalistic theories
Naturalistic theories share the challenge to design a world view that is oriented to the statement methods of the natural sciences. In this sense, let some typical features of naturalism identify: realism, physicalism, criticism of religion, reductionism, a limitation to the methods of the natural sciences and a rejection of metaphysics.
However, none of these features seems to be necessary, and therefore are very different versions of naturalism represented. In a general classification of naturalistic positions distinction is often made between an ontological and a methodological naturalism. While the ontological naturalism is a thesis about the nature of the world formulated (such as: the world consists only of physical particles and their properties ), the methodological naturalism considers the orientation to the methods of the natural sciences as a central feature of naturalism.
A naturalistic image of man gained greater popularity for the first time by the evolution theory of Charles Darwin. In this building, also represented by Marx and Engels a materialist, scientific worldview. However, Marxism contains numerous sociological and political components that are not part of the naturalism.
Modern naturalistic positions that are based on the findings of evolutionary and human biology and try to clarify traditional epistemological, sociological and psychological problems with the help of biology are the Evolutionary epistemology and sociobiology. Such approaches are referred to by their opponents as biologistically.
How does the naturalistic award of the natural sciences can be justified even argumentative, remains controversial in the debate. Anti naturalists hold the naturalistic perspective on the world, therefore, often for an unjustifiable attitude that is superior to other worldviews or belief systems argumentative in any way.
Criticism of religious ideas
First, natural phenomena in naturalism are often understood as opposed to religious or mystical phenomena. Religion critical component of naturalism has played especially in the U.S. in the first half of the 20th century a major role. The core thesis of this early naturalism is that there are no phenomena that are fundamentally oppose a scientific description. So said about Thelma Lavine: " The nerve of naturalistic principle is that the scientific analysis may not be restricted to a particular area, but can be extended to any domain of phenomena. "
With respect to religions This has two consequences. Firstly, there should be no religious phenomena that in principle elude a scientific description. This implies the rejection of an intangible God, but also of all supernatural phenomena such as miracles or supernatural experiences. In addition, a so -understood naturalism also contains the positive thesis of scientific Erforschbarkeit religious phenomena. A naturalized philosophy of religion in this sense is found in Ludwig Feuerbach, who understand religious phenomena as social psychology explainable projections. For naturalists and religions as a psychological, social or biological phenomena can be objects of scientific research. Such research is done about the psychology of religion. A newer discipline is the so-called neuro- theology, to be produced in the connections between brain processes and religious experiences.
Even today one can observe that naturalism is connected with its representatives with an offensive atheist setting. Examples are Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins. On the other hand, in the current naturalism debate plays the question of religious phenomena only a subordinate role. In particular, one can not define naturalism by its religion critical aspects, as most critical positions in contemporary naturalism are not connected with religious ideas. So it is often central to the current naturalism criticism to argue for the cultural and humanities autonomy or to refer to the problems of scientific theories of the mind. Another topic of current anti- naturalists is the subjectivity and perspective bondage of modern science. All these issues are independent of religious issues, which is why the critique of religion can not be regarded as the defining feature of the current naturalism. In addition, among other things by Gerhard Lenski and Robert Merton to the present day religious beliefs and religiously motivated behaviors of concern, namely Protestantism pietism and have created important foundations for today's science.
Realism
A central assumption of most naturalistic theories is also the realism: There is an independent human- reality that is discovered and explored in the sciences. Nature is not an invention of the mind, as adopted by the subjective idealism of the naturalists. Rather, the Spirit is itself part of a found from human nature. As about the physics, biology and chemistry to describe real objects and not subjective, mental constructions, the realism is often an implicit assumption of naturalistic theories. Gerhard Vollmer makes this assumption explicitly, since it uses the demand as much realism as possible for the characterization of naturalism. However, He points out that naturalism is not set to a naive realism, which says that the world is exactly as it is perceived. A naturalistic realism seems rather to lead to many revisions of the everyday notions of reality. This results partly from the cognitive science knowledge that the world is not passively displayed in the perception or memory in the mind, but is actively designed. An example of this is the perception of a moving point, although only two lights alternately flash. The Naturalist Wilfrid Sellars went in his revisionist realism even so far as to say that reality is described only by the physics and it does not give everyday objects such as tables, houses or pens in reality.
The naturalistic realism is not only directed against subjective idealism, but also serves the determination of relativistic and subjectivist theories. The central thesis of relativism is, the truth of a proposition that is always from the historical or social context -dependent and there was therefore no universally true propositions. The general relativism extends these claims also to the natural sciences. In this sense, one can argue that the sentence " The Earth has a spherical shape " today is true, but in ancient China was wrong about a radical relativist. In contrast, a typical naturalist will explain that the natural sciences describe objective facts that are completely independent of social or cultural contexts. The sentence " The Earth has a spherical shape " then expresses a universal truth and was in ancient times the same validity as today.
Although realism is a key element of many naturalistic theories, it can not be regarded as a defining characteristic of naturalism. Firstly, it is not clear whether realism is necessary for naturalism. That was about Willard Van Orman Quine one of the most famous naturalists of the 20th century. Nevertheless, there are doubts as to whether one could call Quine's philosophy " realistic". Quine understands naturalism essentially an award of scientific research while rejecting of independent philosophical methods. Such methodological naturalism seems to presuppose any special, realistic proposition. In addition, the realism is certainly not sufficient for naturalism, as there are many realistic, nichtnaturalistische theories. For example, the traditional Christian dualistic theology is based on a realistic metaphysics.
Physicalism and reductionism
A central assertion of naturalistic theories is that the whole world, including the people is part of the natural order. Such a hypothesis immediately raises the question of what is meant by " natural order ". One possible answer to this question provides physicalism. According to this thesis is all there is, is physical in nature. Even human beings and all other living things turn out to be a composition of the smallest physical particles. To be part of the natural order, that means to be part of the physical order. Physicalism is particularly directed against the idea of an immaterial mind: If all stems from the composition of smallest physical particles, this must also apply to the mind.
Another interpretation of the claim Everything is part of the natural order is as follows: If something is part of the natural order, then it can be attributed at least in principle, by the natural sciences explain. This is the thesis of reductionism. Consistent reductionists assume that it is possible in principle also explain social or historical phenomena with the help of science. In addition, the reductionism presupposes a scientific explicability of consciousness.
Many naturalists are committed to physicalism and reductionism. Spoken in the philosophy of mind of a " naturalization of the mind", is usually a reduction meant. Nevertheless, the concept of naturalism is not synonymous with " physicalism " or " reductionism ". Some naturalists put the focus on the methods of the natural sciences, the center of its philosophy. This explains about Quine: " I represent the physicalism as a scientific position, but scientific reasons could be me one day dissuaded without dissuade me from naturalism "
Methods of the natural sciences
In most naturalistic conceptions of the present, the methods of the natural sciences play a central role. So Sellars explained in a famous passage of his work Science, Perception and Reality ". When it comes to describing and explaining the world, science is the measure of all things " Such a distinction of the natural sciences can on the one hand against the strong emphasis on the humanities be directed or social science approaches. In fact, many variants of the modern history of science or sociology of science have been criticized by naturalists. While it is recognized that the scientific community can be studied as a social and historical phenomenon, yet naturalists emphasize that the findings of science are fundamental and can not qualify by historical or social contexts. Also found in many naturalists a rejection about the post-structuralist literary theory and cultural studies, and psychoanalysis .. Nevertheless, there is a juxtaposition of science and the " soft sciences " is not in the center of naturalistic theories and usually it is argued that naturalism quite the with respect is combined humanities.
The central assumption of methodological naturalism is rather the rejection of an independent, philosophical method, which precedes the empirical research and justifying them. So writes about Quine of " the realization that the reality in the context of science itself must be identified, not in a prior philosophy " and of the " antecedent renunciation of the goal of science first philosophy. " Means a rejection of independent, philosophical methods particularly keen on the a priori. A priori knowledge are compared with empirical findings, as they should be independent of experiences of the world possible. A priori arguments can be found on the one hand in the great metaphysical systems of the history of philosophy. A classic example of this is Immanuel Kant, who argued in the Critique of Pure Reason, that space and time are not independent components of the human reality. This could not, however show only a priori ( " transcendental " ) argument, as all empirical sciences already presuppose space and time. Methodological naturalists want to replace such a priori metaphysics by empirical research. On the other hand, however, the methodological naturalism is also directed against the classical analytic philosophy, which assumed that there is an a priori analysis of the terminology, philosophical method. The term analysis should be a priori, as is taken with her only on the meaning of words and not to the world reference. The classic example of an analytic set is " All bachelors are unmarried ". If you know the meaning of words, you know that this sentence is true. One must not perform empirical study to verify the sentence. In analytic philosophy should in this sense central philosophical concepts such as " knowledge" or "justification" are analyzed on a priori manner.
Naturalist in the tradition of Quine reject the concept analysis from as an a priori discipline. Quine had in 1951 argued in the paper Two Dogmas of Empiricism, that there is no fundamental distinction between a priori and empirical - analytical - synthetical propositions. Later Quine argued that the absence of a priori knowledge also must lead to the abandonment of traditional, philosophical epistemology: If there is no a priori study of human cognition, one must restrict itself to empirical investigation. And the empirical research will not be driven by the philosophy, but by cognitive psychology. In Quine thus the naturalistic epistemology is ultimately absorbed in the empirical cognitive science. However, some naturalists do not go so far as to argue only that a modern epistemology must increasingly involve the insights of science.
Naturalism in epistemology
In contemporary philosophy distinction is often made between a strong and a weak epistemological naturalism. While the strong naturalism, the philosophical analysis of human knowledge ultimately will completely dissolve in empirical cognitive science, explain weak epistemological naturalists merely that the theory of knowledge must be supplemented and modified by empirical research. The classic formulation of the strong naturalism program can be found in Quine's Naturalized Epistemology essay: " But why all this inventive reconstructions, all this magic? Ultimately, yes, the irritation of one's own sensory receptors, the only thing you had to come to his picture of the world. Why not simply seek to determine how this construction is really going on? Why not be content with psychology? "
How has but just imagine such replacement of epistemology by the empirical sciences? The classic example of naturalists here is the analysis of the terms " knowledge" and " justification". According to a proposal from Plato's Theaetetus the concept of knowledge in the theory of knowledge was defined as true, justified opinion. Such a concept analysis seems quite convincing at first glance: If anyone knows that Brazil is the most populous country in Latin America, then he must also have a corresponding opinion. But an opinion alone is not enough, because with false opinions can not speak of knowledge one. Knowledge is thus at least true opinion, but this is not yet sufficient. One can about have a true opinion regarding the next lottery number, which does not mean that you know what is the next lottery number. Retrieved from " knowledge" is not talking about, because you can specify any convincing reasons for his opinion in such, future event. In this sense, the classical epistemology assumed that knowledge is to be defined as true, justified opinion.
Published in 1963 by the philosopher Edmund Gettier an essay in which he formulated the Gettier problem: There seem to be situations in which a person has a justified, true belief but has no knowledge. The classical concept analysis therefore had to be missed and soon philosophers set out to put forward new proposals definition. In 1967, Alvin Goldman However, the debate in a new direction by arguing that one does not get the concept of knowledge in more detail by an analysis of reasons and rational arguments. Rather, knowledge resulting from a causal and therefore empirically verifiable connection. If you look around the drawing of lotto numbers and notes that you have won, so one acquires knowledge, because there is a reliable causal link between the numbers drawn and the acquired opinion. If one has, however, the true opinion that you will win with a certain combination of numbers in the lottery, then it is not knowledge, since there is no causal connection between the ( undrawn ) numbers and their own opinion.
Goldman's analysis is naturalistic because they want to define the terms " knowledge" and " justification" by an empirically verifiable connection. If you want to know whether a certain opinion is justified or constitutes knowledge, must not look at the reasons and arguments of a person you. Rather, one must check whether the opinion of the person is in appropriate causal connections. Strong epistemological naturalists want to generalize such claims: the analysis of human cognition requires no more than an investigation of causal connections of opinions and their causes.
Objection of normativity
Against the concept of naturalistic epistemology has often been argued that to deal epistemology and the natural sciences with fundamentally different issues. For example, Jaegwon Kim has pointed out that epistemology is a normative enterprise. Treat Normative statements - as opposed to descriptive statements - not the question of what is the case. They describe rather, what should be the case. For example, the statement " The emission of CO2 should go back " normative and the statement " The emission of CO2 goes back " descriptive. Kim now indicates that the epistemology essentially treated normative questions, it is about the question of what conditions are to fulfill opinions, so you can accept it as justified. It does not represent the descriptive question of what criteria people consider de facto statements as justified. While the theory of knowledge thus treated normative questions, the sciences limited to descriptive topics. In the sciences, describes what is the case and not what should be the case.
If one accepts the identification of epistemology as a normative and the natural sciences as descriptive, it is not easy to see how the theory of knowledge could be replaced by the natural sciences. The natural sciences seem to have nothing to say on the issues of epistemology, since they deal with a completely different topic. Strong naturalist in the tradition of Quine respond to this objection by accepting that the questions of the traditional normative epistemology of naturalism in the program have no place. This explains Quine that traditional epistemology has failed with their program to provide criteria for justifications. Instead of a misguided philosophical program, one should prefer to orient in mind what is actually accepted as a justification in the sciences.
Such a radical departure from the classical theory of knowledge itself is rejected by most naturalists. They argue that they ultimately can not do without " When should you consider a statement to be justified? " On the normative question. Even scientists have to face the question of when to consider evidence of berücksichtenswert and when not. The strong epistemological naturalism is therefore often opposed by a weak naturalism. This will not replace the normative theory of knowledge by the sciences, but to supplement it by empirical findings. In this sense, instance, writes Susan Haack: "The results of the cognitive sciences may be relevant to the solution of traditional epistemological problems, and it is legitimate to use it." Simultaneously referenced by critics of naturalistic theories that they do not doubt, that empirical data in epistemology play a role. Consequently, between weak epistemological naturalists and naturalism critics rather controversial, what is the role of empirical data in epistemology, and the points at which they are useful.
Critique of methodological naturalism
The epistemological naturalism is a central aspect of the more general program of methodological naturalism. Methodological naturalism is defined by its relation to the scientific methods. In its strongest version, it claims that ultimately only the natural sciences to true descriptions of the world and there is no independent of the sciences, philosophical method. Such a radical naturalism has to leave the objection of inconsistency fallen since the accusations of methodological naturalism itself not scientifically justifiable statements are revealed. This problem of radical naturalism is known from the history of positivism and formulated in his mind criteria. So Ludwig Wittgenstein said in the Tractatus completed in 1918 that ultimately only empirically verifiable statements are meaningful. Here he was, however, even clear that the set only empirically verifiable statements are meaningful. itself is not empirically verifiable, and therefore according to his own criteria must be meaningless. Wittgenstein drew the conclusion: " My propositions serve as elucidations by the fact that they are the one who understands me eventually recognizes them as nonsensical. [ ... ] He must overcome these propositions, then he sees the world right " in this context usually also Wittgenstein's famous words are seen: ". . What one can not speak, thereof one must be silent "
Want methodological naturalists escape the problem of the early Wittgenstein, them there are various ways. For one, they can do without a general sense statements and provide easy without philosophical reasoning behind the methods of the natural sciences. In this case, however, it remains unclear why one should prefer scientific methods especially. Waived the naturalist on a support of his award scientific methods, he may be accused of unthinking partisanship a naturalism critics. This explains about Peter Janich: In this " case of the naturalist is like a fan of a successful football team, which follows the triumphal march through the city ." On the other hand, there is the methodological naturalists but also open to provide a philosophical justification for his award scientific methods. However, this train requires that the naturalist restricts the radicalism of his thesis. If he provides a philosophical justification for naturalism, he can not simultaneously reject philosophical methods in principle. In this sense, Vollmer calls for a minimal metaphysics, which excludes about the great metaphysical system designs the history of philosophy. However, such a position must explain how you can separate the acceptable minimum allowed metaphysics of the unacceptable, general metaphysics.
Naturalism in the philosophy of mind
The man himself proves to be a central "problem" naturalistic theories. It can be a part described by the natural sciences, human biology is an obvious example of this. At the same time it is only a part of man seems recorded with the scientific descriptions: People are creatures of nature, but they are also cultural beings who organize themselves into social communities, have a story and create some art and literature. The cultural aspect in turn seems to be understandable, because the human being with a complex mind are - because they can have desires, emotions, thoughts and memories, and because they dominate force of their mental faculties a language. It is not enough if a naturalist refers to the human or neurobiological studies of humans. If he wants to represent a general naturalistic program, he also needs to show that the spiritual aspects are not in conflict with the naturalistic saying everything has fallen nature.
Also in the philosophy of mind, naturalism takes various forms. Some naturalistic theories are characterized by a physicalism. Their central thesis is that the human being is not composed of a biological- physical body and an immaterial spirit. Rather, the spirit proves, in the opinion of physicalist naturalists as part of physical reality. A stronger version of naturalism, reductionism, according to which the mind is not only part of the physical world, but can be explained by science. However, many philosophers believe that the physicalist naturalism must lead to reductionist naturalism: If the mind is a biological- physical phenomenon, it must, at least in principle, could be explained by biology and physics. It is sometimes spoken in the philosophy of mind and in a much weaker sense of " naturalism ," said David Chalmers calls about his dualism " naturalistic ". Thus says Chalmers, that his conception does not contradict the basic assumptions of the natural sciences (such as the conservation of energy ) is no religious assumptions and makes - such as the existence of an immaterial soul.
Three problems of the naturalization of the mind
The naturalism of the philosophy of mind is problem-oriented. Naturalists try to determine characteristics of the spirit, which represent a problem for scientific descriptions. In the following, they try to show that these features can be analyzed but in the context of a scientific investigation. It is often assumed that three critical features of the Spirit:
Intentionality
The intentionality applies since Franz Brentano as a central feature of the mind. In 1874 published Psychology from an Empirical positions Brentano said:
Intentional events are thus distinguished by that they refer to something. Simple examples may illustrate this: The thought of the cow in the meadow refers to the cow in the meadow, the memories of the last trip refers to the last journey. Only through this intentional reference to other properties of mental states to understand. Thoughts may be about true or false because they refer to something in the outside world. The idea that " there is a cow on the meadow. " Is about exactly true if really is a cow in the meadow, and is false if you hold about a horse in the dark for a cow. If fought in the philosophy of mind about the naturalization of the mind, so it is mostly about the question of a scientific explanation of intentionality.
Brentano explains that intentionality is a feature of mental phenomena, while physical phenomena are non-intentional. Physical events are indeed in cause- effect relationships, but they do not relate intentionally to an object or a situation. This can also be illustrated by examples: Think a person " Herodotus was a historian ," as it relates to Herodotus and her thought is true, as Herodotus was actually a historian. However, the neural (or physical) events in the person do not seem to relate to Herodotus. It seems that we therefore can not say that neural (or physical) events are true or false. What should it mean to say, " This neuron firing is wrong."? Want naturalists avoid an irreducible, mental intentionality, so they have to explain how arise intentional, non-intentional mental events, biological or physical events.
A popular starting point for naturalistic conception of intentionality is the concept of representation. From representations is now also widely spoken in psychology, artificial intelligence and neuroscience. It is a naturalist therefore tempting to claim that if a state is intentional, it is a representation. Since there are about neural representations, intentional states can be easily traced back to the corresponding representations in the brain. So there is the thought "There is a cow in the meadow. " Because there is an internal representation of a cow on a meadow. The reference to representations it can not be done. If one does not simply move the problem, so you have to provide a naturalistic interpretation of the concept of representation. At this point is where the theory of the philosopher and cognitive scientist Jerry Fodor. The simplified thesis is: A state X represents a different state of Y when X is caused by Y. If a certain condition in a system caused by some cows on meadows, this state represents cows on meadows. The idea that " there is a cow on the meadow. " Gets its intentional content according to Fodor so because it is caused by cows on meadows. However, Fodor sees himself that his analysis leads to problems. The idea that " there is a cow on the meadow. " Can also be caused by a horse in poor visibility conditions. How can you explain in such a causal connection that the idea is from a cow and not a horse? Fodor has indeed developed for this problem, proposed solutions, there remains controversy as to whether a causal analysis of intentionality is possible.
The philosopher Daniel Dennett believes that Fodor's approach is ultimately doomed to failure. According to Dennett, we must be a Naturalist no explanation for intentional states offer because they are no longer as useful fictions. Thoughts or desires are so according to Dennett not part of an objective reality, but fictions with which one can predict behavior. Dennett tries to justify his thesis by pointing to various settings that you can take over a system. First, there is a physical setting: One can describe a system to its physical properties and thus predict its behavior. The behavior of a system in physical setting to predict but is often not possible for reasons of complexity. At this point, one can resort to a functional setting: In order to understand a clock and predict their behavior, one must only their operation and the principles of the blueprint know, the concrete physical conditions for their functioning can be neglected. But sometimes systems are even too complex to get at them in a functional setting. This is the case of humans and animals. This is where the intentional setting: The behavior of a system is explained by ascribes his thoughts. So we say about the behavior of chess computers ahead: "He thinks I will sacrifice to the tower. " Nevertheless, a chess computer is not mysterious, mental states, which would pose a challenge to naturalism. The use of intentional vocabulary is simply a pragmatic strategy for behavior prediction. According to Dennett, it does not behave at people differently, there is strictly speaking no intentional states, that would be a problem for naturalism. Against Dennett's approach has been argued about by Fodor, that he can not explain why the intentional setting is so successful. It is not understandable that based on thoughts and desires psychology works so well when there is actually no thoughts and desires. Even Dennett has his approach now weakened significantly.
About the proper handling of the phenomenon of intentionality prevails in the philosophy of mind still great disagreement. So try something like Ruth Millikan and David Papineau intentional states by evolutionary analysis to explain. Patricia and Paul Churchland want the entire folk psychology (ie all intentional terms ) replaced by a scientific language and explain naturalism critical theorists such as Hilary Putnam and John Searle, that you should just give the whole program a naturalization of the mind.
Naturalism in metaethics and ethics
The term " Naturalism " has in relation to ethics, two different meanings:
- For ethicists and spoke analytic philosophers is " naturalism " is the technical term for the direction of meta-ethics.
- For biologists and evolutionary theorists is discussed, what place has the ethics in a naturalistic worldview. From supporters of evolutionary epistemology, or Evolutionary Psychology Evolutionary attempts to derive ethics from it. This belongs in the applied ethics, that is, deals with the determination of standards. This raises the metaethical question of the relationship between the normative, moral statements and the descriptive descriptions of the natural sciences.