Science, reason and value

ANDREW MCLAUGHLIN

S C I E N C E , R E A S O N A N D V A L U E

ABSTRACT. There is a relatively simple argument which shows that science is not, in any important sense, value free. Further, if science is not value free, it may be that the values involved in science rest upon moral considerations. In this paper the author examines one argument for the claim that science essentially involves value, and then looks at the types of values which may be an essential facet of scientific inquiry.

Two apparently unproblematic premises lead to a quite controversial conclusion about the relationship between science and value. It seems readily apparent that science, in some essential way, involves making decisions; and it is generally agreed that assessing the rationality of any decision involves appraising how well that decision promotes or fosters the achievement of the values sought. If these two premises are granted, then it follows that any scientific decision which claims to be rational must be so because of the relationship between that decision and the values involved in science.

Obviously, it is possible to deny that science essentially involves decision, as Richard Jeffrey 1 did in response to the claim by Richard Rudner 2 that science involves decision making, hence value. But then the question which arises is what such a 'decisionless' science would look like? It is, I think, clear that such a view of science is not adequate. To think of science as a wholly decisionless enterprise involves not only Jeffrey's denial that a scientist properly 'accepts' hypotheses, but also requires that one deny that scientists properly choose measurement procedures designed to yield an estimate of a parameter within a (chosen) degree of error, make choices among various experimental designs, decide upon fruitful questions to be pursued, and so on. The list could be extended indefinitely, but the point has been made before and need not be elaborated here. 3 The necessity of admitting that science essentially involves making decisions can be most clearly seen by noting that a science without decisions would be simply an indefinitely long series of

Theory and Decision 1 (1970) 121-137. All Rights Reserved Copyright �9 1970 by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht-Holland

122 A N D R E W M C L A U G H L I N

observations, ungraded as to reliability, relevance or importance. This is neither a description of science nor is it a defensible prescription. Thus, it seems clear that science essentially involves decisions.

To concede that science does involve decisions opens a whole range of issues, but since these sorts of problems are only tangential to the main concern of this paper, I shall mention only one. It would seem that decision making in science differs from decision making in, say, commercial industry, for commercial decisions have an intimate relation to future action. There the probable consequences of one decision as op- posed to another can be specified much more clearly than in science. Thus, decisions as to whether to increase inventories or not have fairly determinate consequences which can be foreseen and then appraised as to their utility. But decisions in science do not have this direct relation to action and, hence, it is much more difficult to envision the probable consequences of deciding one way or another. The point can be put simply by noting that the decisions involved in science are 'cognitive', while the decisions involved in industry are 'practical'. Although this distinction may be useful for a preliminary approach to the differences between scientific decisions and other types, it is ultimately unsuccessful. I f we did take very seriously the idea of 'cognitive' decisions as categorically

distinct from 'practical' decisions, we would be forced to the position that decisions in science are 'purely cognitive', having no relation to 'practical' matters at all. If this were true, it would come as a surprise to find that science is importantly related to practical matters and this fact gives rise to the trouble with the proposed bifurcation. For if we try to avoid the relationships between decisions in science and practice by claiming that such decisions are 'purely cognitive', we make science into a much less important activity than it actually is. How much interest would we have in science if it really had no relation to practice? On the other hand, there is a difference between decisions in science and those in industry. So one problem is spelling out the difference between 'cognitive' and 'practical' decisions without making science into a wholly 'useless' activity. Further problems along the same line involve such questions as "how behavioral an analysis should be given to the notions of 'belief' and 'decision'?" Obviously, beliefs and decisions are not un- related to action, yet they are just as obviously not equivalent to action. Both presumably involve adopting a disposition to behave in certain

SCIENCE, REASON AND VALUE 123

future circumstances which may or may not be realized. But trying to spell this out in a fully adequate way will lead to a whole nest of problems. For the purposes of this paper, it is enough to say that there is some sense of 'decision' and 'belief' as applied to science which is not wholly un- related to 'action'.

Little discussion of the claim that the rational appraisal of decisions involves reference to the values sought is necessary. There are many un- resolved problems in theories about rational decision making, but it seems quite clear that one essential root of the idea of a rational decision is that such a decision is conducive to the realization of the values or goals sought. It is certainly true that there are important controversies about the notion of rational decision, but such controversies do not involve the claim that rational decisions are, at a minimum, those conducive to the goals sought.

Thus, the argument that since science essentially involves decisions, and since the rationality of decisions is dependent upon the relationship between those decisions and the values sought, therefore science essentially involves values appears sound. It should be noted that the argument, as it stands, is invalid. The conclusion really must read that rational science involves values. Thus, while some science may proceed by justify- ing its decisions in some way other than by reference to values, rational scientific decisions must make reference to value. It seems fairly non- controversial to claim that rational science is better than either irrational or nonrational science. If rational science does involve values, the pressing question arises as to what sorts of values are involved. Particularly, do those values raise the same sorts of problems that moral philosophers have struggled with for so long? Are the values involved in decisions in science themselves moral values? Or are they dependent upon such values?

II

Some contemporary philosophers have agreed that science essentially involves value and have tried to develop a notion of scientific or epistemic utility. 4 This sort of utility is, it is claimed, the normative standard by which decisions in science can be appraised. Such a concept apparently allows one to grant the plausible premises that science involves decisions and that the justification of decisions requires reference to values, and


yet to avoid the conclusion that rationality in science raises any of the problems of moral philosophy.

The use of a concept of scientific utility to function as the standard of appraisal requires that a sharp distinction be drawn between pure and applied science. This need arises from the fact that it is mandatory that in applied scientific decisions, values other than (but not necessarily excluding) those of science must be considered. Thus, the decisions involved in the testing of medicines must take into account the possible dangers to the subjects of such experimentation. Presumably, the war- ranted risks of experimenting with and utilizing a new drug are directly related to the potential benefits and harm that may result, and these would vary with the type of disease and drug involved. In the context of applied research, the values which should be used as standards for appraising decisions may be difficult to determine, but it is clear that they must take cognizance of the particular situation involved. On the other hand, it is claimed, the notion of scientific utility is relevant when the decisions made are to be appraised within the context of 'pure' research. Thus the need for a sharp distinction between pure and applied science.

This need to sharply distinguish pure from applied science raises certain recalcitrant problems, for it is quite difficult in practice to draw a sharp line between pure and applied science. For example, is the distinction to be made on the basis of actual results (do they contribute to theory or to practical ends?) or by reference to the motives of the researcher? Neither characterization is adequate, since 'actual results' has an indefinitely large reference including results of both practical and theoretical importance; while reported motives are unreliable (and perhaps irrelevant) indicators, especially in the light of the higher prestige which attaches to 'pure science'. Thus, it is common-place for large industries in the United States to support laboratories for 'pure' science, but the results are expected to be profitable for the sponsoring company. In the context of the problem here under consideration, however, the difficulties of this question can be sidestepped. In our context, the 'cash value' of the distinction between pure and applied science is whether the decisions made in a particular piece of research should be justified by appealing to utilities relative to the particular problem under consideration or by the utilities taken to be applicable to all science. That is, different criteria of judgment are relevant in appraising pure and applied research, and


particular pieces of research can be distinguished as pure or applied by seeing which set of criteria is relevant. There may, of course, be borderline cases.

Some preliminary observations may be made about the notion of scientific utilities. In the first place, a distinction must be drawn between the goals which motivate particular scientists and the goals of science (scientific utility). If one is interested in what actually motivates scientists, one should turn to the growing literature on the psychology and sociology of science. This is the approach which tries to discover what actually motivates scientists to pursue scientific knowledge.

An anecdotal example of the nature of the motives of scientists is offered by Storer when he queried scientists regarding their willingness to publish their work anonymously. The overwhelming negative response is certainly not surprising, but it indicates that we would be quite mis- taken to view scientists as primarily motivated by a desire for knowledge. Rather, the truth lies closer to Storer's claim that "sharing one's creative product with others, in return for their response to it, is at the heart of exchange within science". 5 The important point to note here is that what actually motivates scientists should not be identified with the scientific utilities by which decisions in pure science are to be judged. It is the function of the social structure of science to translate the motives of individual scientists into the efficient achievement of the goals of the institutionalized activity called science. It is in this sense that inquiry into scientific utilities is not concerned with the motives and goals of particular scientists.

A second point which should be noted about the concept of scientific utility is that the simple value of truth is not sufficient to adequately characterize the goals of science. I f truth were the only aim of science, then the obvious decision rule would be to accept only those statements with the highest degree of probability. Thus, science would only accept statements with a probability of 1. Without raising the question of whether or not there are any synthetic statements of this sort, it is clear that much of what interests us in science are propositions which have probabilities lower than 1. Science is more than simply a search for truth - at the very least it is a search for interesting or informative truth. Hempel 6 has offered a definition of scientific utility which includes a measure of the new information contained in the hypotheses considered for adoption.


His procedure is an extension of work done by Carnap and requires: (1) a formalized language and: (2) that the decision problem is structured so that one appraises a set of mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive hypotheses on the basis of all the statements accepted into science at a particular time. It is apparent that there are serious problems involved in meeting these requirements, but they need not concern us here. Using a measure of the new information provided by the hypotheses to be considered, Hempel arrives at the decision rule which prescribes that if one of the hypotheses has a probability greater than �89 it should be accepted, if two have probabilities = �89 then accept either one or neither, if all have probabilities less than �89 then none should be accepted. As Hempel states, this procedure is too lenient. Moreover, he points out that other factors besides content and truth probably ought to be incorporated into the measure of scientific utility - factors such as explanatory power and logical simplicity. The point is that the goals of science expressed in the concept of scientific utility must be more complicated than simply 'the truth'.

A recent and fairly extensive treatment of scientific utility has been made by Levi. 7 He formulates an elaborate system of inductive logic using decision theory with direct reference to the problems of rational choice in science. Levi characterizes the goals of science as truth and relief from agnosticism, the latter being roughly equivalent to Hempel's notion of informational content. Levi makes a major improvement over Hempel's outline of scientific utility by allowing for a variable which expresses the degree of caution which an investigator exercises. 8 This variable, if chosen appropriately, avoids a consequence of Hempel's position that any hypothesis with a probability greater than �89 should be accepted. If the inquirer is fairly cautious, then he will set this variable high enough so that he does not accept all hypotheses with probabilities greater than �89 but rather suspends judgment on hypotheses with a probability greater than �89 but less than some higher figure.

However, the suggestion that what is required is the specification of not only the goals of science, but also a degree of caution appears to raise serious problems which threaten to undermine this whole approach to values and science. James Leach 9 has pointed this out quite dearly. If the choice of a degree of caution to be exercised is required in order to make decisions concerning accepting and rejecting hypotheses, this


would appear to open the door for the inclusion of utilities related not to the goals of science but rather to the utilities of a specific problem. Thus, according to Leach, "scientists qua scientists make value judgements regarding the seriousness of errors in acting upon accepted or rejected hypotheses. For, the different purposes for which one acts clearly require different cost factors ... [hence] the scientist must take into account in his decision to accept or reject hypotheses not only epistemic but also pragmatic utilities. ''1~ Although Leach apparently did not see Levi's book, which is more extensive treatment of some of the issues involved, it would appear that Levi, in his more recent work, does not escape the difficulties raised by Leach. And these are serious indeed, for they mean that the notion of scientific utility is inadequate to appraise the rationality of decisions in science. Levi tried to devise a means of determining, for a particular inquirer, what degree of caution he exercises. 11 But he concedes that the choice of a degree of caution is a 'subjective factor' reflecting attitudes of the particular inquirer. What such a choice amounts to is a "commitment on the part of the investigator to have his conclusions evaluated according to certain standards", 12 i.e. to be consistent with those standards which he decides to choose. Presumably Leach could well reply to that while it would be possible to set one's degree of caution arbitrarily, as Levi appears to condone, it would be better (more rational) to choose degrees of caution in terms of the factors involved in the particular problem at hand. If this is true, then pragmatic utilities come into scientific choice in precisely the way suggested by Leach. Moreover, it seems correct to say that when there is a choice between arbitrarily choosing whatever degree of caution one happens to prefer and choosing one on the basis of considerations of the goods and evils involved in the particular problem, one should take cognizance of the pragmatic utilities involved. Unfortunately, this means that the notion of scientific utility is inadequate as a standard of rationality in pure science.

There is, however, a way out of the difficulty posed by Leach which has the merit of illuminating one very important aspect of the whole project for constructing scientific utilities. As Levi notes, the choice of a degree of caution is related to the choice of levels of significance in the Neyman-Pearson theory of testing statistical hypotheses.18 In that theory, the utilities requisite for choice come from the particular context. But in such tests, one must determine the tolerable degree of risk in rejecting a


hypothesis when it is true. The willingness to reject a true hypothesis is expressed by the 'level of significance'. Thus, if one is willing to reject a true hypothesis one out of ten times, then one's level of significance is 0.1; that is, one is willing to make this sort of error in 10~o of the cases. There is, it is obvious, a partial analogy between the level of significance and the notion of degrees of caution. Now, is the choice of a level of significance either an arbitrary caprice of the particular inquirer or determined by pragmatic values in pure research? No, for there is a well entrenched convention that there are generally acceptable levels of significance, namely, 0.05, 0.01, and, rarely, 0.001. These are quite firmly established and are, I believe, widely followed in fields where Neyman- Pearson tests of hypotheses are made. The essential point to notice is that the establishment of levels of significance, while not dictated by statistical theory, is not a matter left to the individual tastes of the inquirer nor to the pragmatic utilities of a particular problem. Rather, they are norms which are widely followed and only deviated from when there is good reason, e.g. if the problem is one of applied research and the pragmatic utilities involved dictate a different level of significance. Thus, if the analogy between levels of significance and degrees of caution can be maintained in this dimension, then there is no reason why conventional degrees of caution could not also be established. Indeed, as the use of the statistical theory upon which such degrees of caution are based becomes more widely utilized, it is reasonable to expect that 'proper' degrees of caution will be established. Without such conventional norms, the communication among scientists is seriously hampered. Given such conventions, the choice of the correct degree of caution is not based upon the subjective propensities of a particular scientist, nor is it based upon the pragmatic utilities of a particular context. Rather, the proper degree of caution becomes simply one part of an adequately developed concept of scientific utility. If we can take this programmatic view of scientific utility, which sees the spelling out of a notion of scientific utility as the more and more explicit characterization of implicit standards of research, then there is every reason to believe that other inadequacies of present notion of scientific utility can be met. What is required is the explication of the institutionalized values of a field of inquiry.

Thus, it appears that it is possible to agree that science involves decisions, and that the rational appraisal of decisions requires reference


to values, and that science essentially involves values, without having to deal with the difficult questions involved in moral philosophy. These difficult questions can be avoided through the use of the notion of scientific utility, or so it appears.

One basic and quite general difficulty remains, namely that of providing rational grounds for the adoption of any proposed specification of scientific utility. This problem perhaps became apparent when it was argued that degrees of caution could be independent of the whims of individual scientists and particular situations. It was claimed that such degrees of caution were conventional to the field of inquiry, but it should be obvious that mere conventionality is not rational justification. What appeal to convention does provide is a way of escaping the relativization of rationality in science to a particular context or inquirer, but all it achieves is a rationality relative to a particular group. While one important question is finding out what are, in fact, the customs of scientific communities and making those explicit, another important question is finding out whether or not those customs are rationally defensible. This is an important question, for what we wanted out of the proposal to appraise scientific decisions by scientific utilities was some basis for assessing the rationality of decisions in science. But, at this point, all that has been offered is social convention as the basis of rationality in science - and the question remains as to the rationality of those conventions. This difficulty is by no means restricted to the question of determining the proper degrees of caution which should be exercised by an inquirer. Much of scientific research is guided by conventions (implicit and explicit) whose rational justification is by no means obvious. For instance, quite the same sort of problem can be found in the establishment of criteria of 'reasonable agreement' between theoretical prediction and experimental results in both the natural and the social sciences. As is well known, the quantitative predictions derived from theory and the results of experiments rarely, if ever, agree precisely. The question of 'reasonable agreement' is how close must the agreement be for it to count as 'agreement'. On the basis of numerous examples from the natural sciences, Kuhn has argued that:

Scientific practice exhibits no consistently applied or consistently applicable external criterion, 'Reasonable agreement' varies from one part of science to another, and within any part of science it varies with time. What to Ptolemy and his immediate


successors was reasonable agreement between astronomical theory and observation was to Copernicus incisive evidence that the Ptolemaic system must be wrong. 14

This problem of the conventionality of the norms of science extends rather directly to the question of scientific utilities. Neither Hempel nor Levi have bothered to give any justification for the particular specifications of scientific utility which they have offered. The question arises whether the goals of science embedded in their specifications of scientific utility are merely conventional, or do they have a basis in reason? If so, what is that basis? Now this is a general problem which transcends the particular content of any proposed set of scientific utilities and is a problem which must be faced by any reconstruction which is prepared to admit that decisions are intrinsic to science and yet is hesitant to see rational decisions relativized to the conventional norms of a particular social group.

I I I

One possible way of avoiding the problem of the justification of a proposed conception of scientific utility would be to argue that all that is intended in such a concept is explication of the criteria actually employed in science for appraising decisions. Two points should be made about this line of reply. First, it is not a reply to the claim that no rational justification of the proposed goals of science have been provided. What this reply amounts to is simply a decision to restrict the range of one's inquiry to a clarification of decision criteria implicit in scientific inquiry and to leave open the question of the rational foundation of those criteria. While it is a wise strategy to provisionally restrict the range of inquiry in order to be able to make progress towards the answers to certain questions, it should not be forgotten that such a restriction is just that - a restriction - and it may be profitable to broaden the range of inquiry at certain times. Thus, to limit one's inquiry to the project of explication is simply to decide not to attempt to answer the question here under consideration.

Secondly, there is a danger in conceiving of the project of determining the goals of science as a matter of explication. The difficulty lies in the fact that there is significant controversy over the proper goals of scientific inquiry. This danger is exemplified neatly by both Hempel and Levi, for neither gives any indication of significant dispute over the goals of science.

S C I E N C E , R E A S O N A N D V A L U E 131

It is not true, however, that there is universal agreement among philosophers or scientists as to the goals of science. This disagreement indicates that there is room for dispute about the goals of science and, hence, dispute about which concept of scientific utility ought to be applied in appraising scientific decisions. Several important contemporary controversies may be construed as disputes which are, at least partially, about the proper goals of science. A list of these disputes would include at least the following: whether or not Weber's requirement of 'adequacy at the level of meaning' is an acceptable criterion of a fully adequate social science; 1~ the adequacy of the covering law model in historical explanation; 16 whether or not there are basically different uses for the natural and the social science; 17 whether statistical explanation is sui generis or simply a way station on the road to a fully deductive explanation. These controversies indicate that there is room for dispute over the proper goals of science. We must now see whether such questions can be resolved without raising normative questions of value.

IV

The existing proposals concerning the concept of scientific utility make no claim to full adequacy. The two goals of truth and informational content are offered by both Hempel and Levi. The aim of truth, aside from the grave problems involved in spelling out exactly what truth is, is relatively unproblematic. Whatever theory of truth one supports, it would be generally conceded that one of the goals of scientific inquiry is truth. The goal of content, appealed to by both writers, is tied to the development of an ideal language within which some measure of content could perhaps be developed. Appeals to an idealized language are of a programmatic sort, involving claims about future developments which are hard to judge prior to the development of that language. But leaving that sort of problem aside, there is an important question involved in the appeal to informational content as a goal of science. While it seems clear that the goal of truth for science does need to be supplemented with something like the idea of informational content, spelling this out may raise some problems.

There seem to be two plausible meanings which can be given to the idea of content as a goal for science. On the one hand, 'content' might


simply mean information of any sort whatsoever or, on the other hand, 'content' might carry with it the idea of ' important ' information. If one chooses to define 'content' as simply information, without any regard to the importance of that information, then to set this as a goal for science is to claim that science should be simply a search for as much information as possible, whatever sort of information is obtained. That is, every item of information is regarded as equally valuable. It should be noted that this is not a description of science. There are typically (and necessarily, as long as resources are scarce) important decisions made as to what sorts of information should be sought. These decisions are made by politicians and administrators of science in their choices about what sorts of research to support, but they are also made by scientists in structuring their research within the confines of limited resources, such as time and money. Indeed, it is obvious that it is not possible to get information on every- thing, so decisions must be made as to what sorts of information ought to be sought. It would be clearly an irrational policy to refrain from ranking in importance different sorts of information, since the consequence of such a refusal would be to simply gather the most easily available (or cheapest) information, since that would be the way of getting the maximum amount of information. Clearly, it is preferable to gather information judged to be important, is It appears, then, that the idea of informational content, without qualification as to important and unimportant information, is inadequate as a goal for science.

We are led, then, to the idea of ' important ' informational content as a goal for science. The problem here is explaining what is meant by 'important ' information. The first order answer to this question, since we have already granted a sharp distinction between pure and applied science, is that some information can be judged more important than other information on the basis of the theories which are held at the time. That is, given certain theories, it is possible to judge bits of information as either theoretically important or unimportant. A trivial example of this would be that given Newtonian physics, we would judge information about the color of an object much less important than information about its mass if we wished to find out how far it would travel when struck by a certain force at a particular angle. This is a satisfactory first order answer, but a difficulty remains. It is clear that the dimensions of rational decision in science extend beyond that of judging bits of information as


more or less important. While that type of judgement can be made on the basis of theories held at the time, some decisions must also be made about whether or not it is worth developing theories about certain types of events and not about others. Decisions of this latter type cannot be made independently of answers to questions like 'what types of events are important?'. Presumably, this sort of question cannot be answered independently of judgements about human or pragmatic importance. This is the thin end of the wedge in breaking any sharp division between scientific utility and questions of pragmatic and moral value.

The strongest attack on any sharp break between scientific utility and other sorts of value arises out of the question of how one might justify a proposed conception of scientific utility. As argued above, this involves seeking the rational basis for scientific decisions, not simply the customary basis. This means that reason in science must be specified by reference to the proper goals of science.

Perhaps the most ready response to the request for the justification of a proposed set of goals for science is to claim that they are intrinsically valuable. The thrust of the claim of intrinsic value is to shortcircuit the request for justification, by tacitly saying that no justification is needed. Now the whole problem of intrinsic value is complex and several well known philosophic positions could be invoked. The crux of the difficulty with this approach to the question of justification is revealed by the simple query: how can one tell whether some particular proposal about the goals of science really specifies those which are intrinsically valuable? Without an adequate answer to this question it will not be possible to offer arguments for preferring one proposed conception of scientific utility to another. But this is a serious problem because, as has been noted above, serious disputes do exist over the proper goals of science, and the claim of 'intrinsic value' is of no use in adjudicating this type of dispute. Moreover, even if such disputes did not exist, it can be pointed out that modern views of science differ significantly from conceptions of science held in the past (e.g. Greek), and it is certainly possible that shifts in the views of the proper aims of science may occur in the future/9 In the face of actual and possible controversy over the proper goals of science, no appeal to 'intrinsic value' unsupported by extensive argument can be satisfactory.

If the appeal to intrinsic value is denied, then the justification for any


proposed set of goals for science requires reference to matters beyond science itself. This means that the goals of science must be justified by reference to what we want to do with science. What we seek in science depends upon what we want to use it for, and what shouM be sought in science depends upon what we ought to want to do with it. Clearly, deciding what we ought to do with science, requires answering the sub- stantive questions which are the business of ethics and social philosophy. Apparently, at some point the epistemic collapses into the moral. If true, this means that it is not possible to maintain a sharp bifurcation between science and value. There is, however, one way to avoid this consequence and yet not be forced into the view of dogmatically asserting a set of 'intrinsically valuable' goals for science and this position must be dis- cussed.

It is possible, in some cases, to justify the pursuit of a goal without raising the question of the desirability of the further ends for which this goal is instrumental. Cases in which this type of justification are applicable are those in which the achievement of a particular goal is necessary for the pursuit of any other goal at all. In such a case, the pursuit of the goal necessary for all others is justified no matter what other goals one adopts. A clear example of the sort of goal necessary for all other aims whatsoever is the avoidance of nuclear war. The question is whether science is an activity which can be justified in this way. R.B. Braithwaite has argued that science is such an activity necessary for all other ends. z~ He takes prediction, without further specification, as the goal of science. There is a broad sense in which prediction is the goal of all science, since prediction can be taken as essentially the forma- tion of expectations. It is clear that any inquiry which has any pretense to being empirical (which all science does) must involve minimally the process of formulating expectations and seeing whether or not these expectations are realized. Without some such process of relating ideas to the world no inquiry could claim to be empirical. But reflection on this point leads fairly directly to the fact that the goal of prediction, without further qualification, is not sufficiently concrete to serve as a specification of the goals of science. This is so simply because there are many types of predictions, and not all are satisfactorily characterized as scientific predictions. For example, there is no doubt that astrology involves making predictions, but there is widespread agreement that


astrology is not a science. This means that prediction as the goal of science must be elaborated more fully in order to serve as a specification of the goals o f science. Prior to considering such qualifications it is worth noting that Braithwaite is probably correct in claiming that if prediction (in this abstract sense) is the goal of science, then it is necessary for all other ends and, hence, requires no justification. The thrust of what has been said above is simply that the antecedent of this conditional is unsatisfactory.

Can the notion of prediction, claimed to be the goal of science, be more fully specified in a way which does not beg the questions concerning the proper goals of science? One of the major goals of participant ob- server studies is Weber's adequacy at the level of meaning - i.e. understanding the way the world appears to the subjects being studied. This method has been used by sociologists and anthropologists for a long time and methodological rules or guidelines for such studies have been developed. 21 One of the indications that the inquirer has adequately understood the meaning which certain actions have for social agents is the inquirer's ability to anticipate their reactions to his actions as a participant in their social world. Thus, his 'predictions' may take the form of being able to act successfully within the community he is studying. It is clear that this sort of prediction differs substantially from the type of prediction involved in the deduction of a statement from general laws and initial conditions. The prediction involved in successful social action and the warrant it gives to attributions of subjective meaning is embedded in a whole set of methodological rules governing participant observation - and this method is directed towards fulfilling Weber's requirement of subjective adequacy. But whether this is a proper goal of social science is subject to controversy. Consequently, any specification of prediction as the goal of science which rejected the types of predictions involved in participant observation would beg the question about subjective adequacy as a proper goal for social science. On the other hand, it is clear that if the notion of prediction as a goal for science is not clarified, but rather is left vague enough to encompass all sorts of predictions, then this includes the kind of prediction found in participant observation and begs the question put by those who claim that the proper goals of science do not include the type of knowledge sought by participant observers. This result is not surprising since the proper goals of science are controversial and any formulation which hides this controversy should be

136 ANDREW MCLAUGHLIN

highly suspect. It seems then that Braithwaite is correct in claiming that prediction (in the abstract sense of expectation) is a goal of science which needs no justification because it is necessary to all other goals. But prediction, in this most general of senses, is surely not sufficient for developing a notion of scientific utility by which decisions in science can be appraised as to their rationality.

V

We arrive, then, at the position that the proper goals of science are neither intrinsically justified nor are they rationally justifiable independently of whatever goals are desirable. This means that the determination of the goals which should rationally be sought in science depends upon the determination of the general goals which ought to be sought in human life. Science, in this very general sense, is instrumental. The proper goals of science are those which are instrumental in the achievement of the good life. This does not mean that there should be no pure science. Rather, it offers a fruitful perspective from which to view the question of the proper mix of pure and applied research. This question can be answered by facing the question of how much pure science ought to be conducted to maximize the prospects of achieving the good life for all. If, as seems fairly clear, some substantial amount of pure science is justifiable, then rationality within that context would be determined by reference to some yet to be developed notion of scientific utility. That notion would derive its justification from science's role in rationalizing man's world. Thus, the important question becomes not whether or not values are essentially involved in science, but rather which values ought to be used as standards of reason in science. The standards of reason in science, then, depend upon the standards of reason in life, and reason in life depends upon moral knowledge. Troublingly enough, moral knowledge depends upon our knowledge of the world, so while science cannot be divorced from ethics, ethics cannot be divorced from science.

City University of New York, Lehman College

N O T E S

1 R. C. Jeffrey, 'Valuation and Acceptance of Scientific Hypotheses', Philosophy of Science 23 (1956).


3 Richard Rudner, 'The Scientist Qua Scientist Makes Value Judgments', Philosophy o f Science 20 (1953). 8 C. West Churchman, 'Science and Decision Making', Philosophy of Science 23 (1956). 4 For instance, cf. Carl Hempel, 'Inductive Inconsistencies', Synthese 12 (1960), reprinted in Hempel's Aspects of Scientific Explanation, Free Press, New York, 1965 (page references are to this volume); I. Levi, Gambling With Truth, Knopf, New York, 1967. 5 Norman Storer, The Social System of Science, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1966, p. 57. 6 Hempel, op. cit., pp. 75-79. 7 Levi, op. cir. s Ibid., p. 86-90. 9 j. Leach, 'Explanation and Value Neutrality', British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 19 (1968). z0 Ibid., p. 106. 11 Levi, op. tit., pp. 233-34. 12 1bid., p. 89. 13 Ibid., p. 89. 1-4 T. S. Kuhn, 'The Function of Measurement in Modern Physical Science', in Quantification (ed. by H. Woolf), Bobbs-MerriU, New York, 1961, p. 36. 15 M. Weber, The Theory of Social and Economic Organization (ed. by T. Parsons), Free Press, New York, 1947; Carl Hempel, 'Typological Methods in the Natural and the Social Sciences', in his Aspects of Scientific Explanation, op. cir. in A. Kaufman, 'The Aims of Scientific Activity', Monist 52 (1968). 17 T. Mischel, 'Pragmatic Aspects of Explanation', Philosophy of Science 33 (1966); see also A. R. Louch, Explanation and Ituman Action, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1966, esp. Ch. 8. 18 For further development of this point, see my 'Rationality and Total Evidence', Philosophy of Science 37 (1970). z9 For such a claim, see E. A. Burtt, In Search of Philosophic Understanding, New American Library, New York, 1965, Ch. 7. 30 R. B. Braithwaite, 'Moral Principles and Inductive Policies', Proceedings of the British Academy XXXV1 (1950). 21 S. T. Bruyn, The I-Iuman Perspective in Sociology, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, 1966.

Science, reason and value

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