Such a question seems to involve the following points for consideration:
Firstly, what is it in the nature of the sciences that makes it impossible to pool their results in a general scheme of knowledge, on which we could draw whenever there is a need?
Secondly, is there anything in the nature of the social sciences that accounts for the difficulty in making use of them in the same way as we make use of the natural sciences?
The reason for this fact is simple:
Man's innatea interest in his environment is the starting point of all the sciences. But every science necessarily restricts its subject matter to such elements in the context of its environment as are susceptible to its method. Consequently the subject matter of the sciences will deviate from the original subject matter of the innate interest – the matrix. That is why physics, chemistry, and psychologyb do not “add up” to the model of a cat; nor can mathematics and botany, between them, produce the complete pattern of a meadow.
It is an intriguing question how the various sciences can deviate from the matrix in different and undefinable directions and yet describe true facts. But the origins of science in an innate interest account for this, too; man seeks guidance for his conduct in many different ways and in relation to many different aspects of his environment. In other words, both the innate interest and the matrix are composites. Scientific interest and scientific subject matter are the results of a process of mutual selective adjustment between the factors comprised in innate interest and the elements that form the matrix. Eventually a method is evolved through which some elements of the matrix are ordered in such a manner as to satisfy some factors of the innate interest, either through convenient classification or through direct prediction. In the course of this process of adjustment the sciences tend to become increasingly “selective” – or, with a more usual term, abstract, restricting themselves to elements adapted to their methods. Although ‡…‡c of them represents true facts, the various segments of the truth tend to resemble one another less and less.
Method is the key to what science can do and what it cannot; it is the general rule applicable to the operations constituting a particular science. That which is selected as its subject matter and that which is eliminated from it as “unscientific” matter are differentiated by method. It is to method that sciences are indebted for their definitions, and therefore for their grip on the elements selected, as well as for the rejection of that part of the matrix which now appears as “metaphysical.”
Science is, by method, out of matrix.d The birth of a science destroys the matrix in which it was conceived. Metaphysics is the remnant of the matrix surviving in incomplete science. To become a science, mathematics, for instance, eliminated the magic of numbers; physics rid itself of “matter”; chemistry shede alchemy; physiology eliminated the “life force”; logic divested itself of “truth.” To the extent that sciences are able to achieve this feat, they rank as theoretical sciences. The more mature they become, the farther they wander from the matrix.
Now, while all this has for some time been recognized in relation to the natural sciences, it appears much less obvious with respect to the social sciences. And yet the development of some of these sciences is strikingly similar to that of the natural sciences. The social sciences also start from our innate interest in the job of living, and only gradually attain that stage of development at which interest and subject matter are mutually adjusted through method. In the course of this process of adjustment those elements of the matrix that are intractable from the point of view of the method fade out, leaving only those elements that form part of the “situation,” as determined not by innate interest but by the strict application of the method in question. It may then appear that psychology is not concerned with subjective states of mind; that economics is not about production or gain; that politics is not the art of government. In this manner psychology may cease to be the science of the human soul; economics may cease to be the science of wealth and value; politics may cease to be the science of sovereignty.
Soul, value, sovereignty – these remnants of the matrix have no place left for them. Psychology may now redefine its field as that of behavior; economics, as that of choice; politics, as that of power; and so forth. The completed sciences will sometimes have no more than a historical reference to the original matrix. Moreover, after slimming almost to vanishing point, they may expand again in unexpected directions. Psychology may incorporate the behavior of animals and plants; economics may apply to ethical, esthetic, or religious situations indifferently, as long as they contain the crucial element of allocation of scarce means; politics may comprise any group in situations that give rise to power. And here, also, the more advanced the sciences are, the more completely they will tend to separate the various elements of the matrix from one another. Thus the social sciences as much as the natural sciences, in order to be effective, get differentiated from one another and distort methodologically the picture of the environmental universe to which man adjusts in the immediate task of living.
Incidentally, we did not trouble to define the natural and the social sciences more particularly but simply accepted the usual grouping of the disciplines. That distinction should always be regarded as relative to the question under discussion. The most stable line of demarcation between various disciplines appears to be that between purely historical sciences, which deal with the unique and nonrecurrent aspects of nature and society, and sciences dealing with generalizations such as laws or other abstractions. An even more important division, but of a broader kind, refers to all human experience. It would tend to put science on the one side and all nonscientific awareness of our environment, as it occurs in the course of living, on the other – whether such awareness would otherwise be described as artistic, moral, poetic, religious, personal, or simply as naive experience. Neither of these distinctions is, however, vital at this stage, as our introductory analysis of the nature of science has sufficiently shown why the cooperation of the social sciences, just like that of the natural sciences, cannot be sought through fusion, on the line of popular demandsf such as “economics should be more political, political science more economic.” The widely held view that the various social sciences should be “less abstract and one-sided” and should thus help to link the different spheres of practical interest is a serious fallacy, not uncommon even among eminent writers. Thorstein Veblen, himself an ardent positivist, actually reproached the economists for not being interested in value, an obviously metaphysical concept. More remarkably still, two decades later Robert Lynd still quoted Veblen's stricture with approval! In the natural sciences consciousness of method was achieved very much earlier. The elimination of metaphysics progressed greatly during the second half of the nineteenth century, in the period separating Robert Julius Meyer from Ernst Mach, but no serious scientist is known to have clamored for the reinstatement of the metaphysical concepts of “matter,” “virtual motion,” or “absolute space” into the science of physics. Not fusion of the conceptual instruments of theory, but either the creation of a new science or the application of the existing – separate and distinct – sciences to a specific task is the solution. For example: economic and political motives; economic and political institutions; economic and political power can be separated only with difficulty in practice. In premodern societies economic and political institutions actually formed a unity, and even after they had been differentiated into separate institutional bodies interaction was close and continuous. But does this imply, as is being overtly and covertly asserted, that the sciences of politics and economics should somehow be fused – two disciplines as different with respect to their subject matter and method as law and embryology? The right answer can be found only in one of two ways:
One is the creation of sciences more closely related to the subject matter of special interest than the existing ones. The relations between economics and politics, for example, are dealt with by various disciplines such as historical sociology, anthropology, and general sociology. Numerous sciences such as biochemistry or criminology came into existence in response to similar needs. There is no valid reason why this progress of scientific specialization should not proceed indefinitely. Whether a science will or will not emerge is a question of factual success, depending primarily upon how far a method can be found that will deal adequately with the circumstances concerning which guidance is sought.
Or the demand may be for an ad hoc cooperation of existing sciences by applying them to definite problems. There is, in principle, no reason why the social sciences should not cooperate in the same fashion as the natural sciences in the solution of practical problems. The use of the sciences of statistics, law, and economics in the mapping of a new branch of social insurance is an instance of such cooperation; they could be indefinitely multiplied.
To sum up, sciences cannot be pooled. This is as true of the natural sciences as it is of the social sciences. The characteristic of science, namely that it proceeds through the elimination of the metaphysical element and secures its grip on the facts by following up the peculiarity of its method, applies to all science. If the practical usefulness of the natural sciences has proved so much greater than that of the social sciences, this cannot be due to the lack of a “continuum of knowledge” (Robert Lynd)g in social matters, for the natural sciences too lack such a “continuum.” From the point of view of method the social sciences are hardly inferior to the natural sciences. It is elsewhere that we must look for the reason for the greater practical usefulness of the natural sciences.
It is most plausibly argued that the practical successes of the natural sciences are simply the result of the superior validity and precision of the knowledge they yield. Certainly this is to a large extent true. And yet it is doubtful whether this explanation does not cover up rather than reveal the essential features of the position.
That the natural sciences can be used for the purposes of medicine, technology, and so on is, inter alia, due to the fact that man's attitude toward his material environment is directed by definite ends, which are but little influenced by the rise of these sciences. The development of mathematical physics or biochemistry has, fortunately, not undermined man's interest in his health, in the safe crossing of chasms, and so forth. Thus it is possible to pool the results of the various sciences, not in a “continuum of knowledge,” but in a sheaf of different techniques cooperating toward the same ends.h Though the theory of relativity may have abolished space and time as nonscientific man understood them, he still wants to be able to cross a river without the risk of drowning. Agreement on the practical issues, a consensus unaffected by the proceedings of the sciences themselves, was the given condition of the successful use of the natural sciences in the advancement of technology or medicine.
Precisely the opposite was the case with regard to the social sciences. Man has hardly a wish or purpose with respect to his social environment that does not contain elements of ambiguity suggestive of conflicting conduct. The social sciences have in fact a dual function, and their usefulness must be judged by the balance of their achievements in both directions: it is not enough to inquire how far they assist us in attaining our ends; we must also ask how far they help or hinder us in clarifying them. Until recently, in effect, the attempt to clarify our conflicting wishes and ideals was almost the sole aim of the social sciences. It is human to crave for ends as opposite as “security and risk, coherence and spontaneity, novelty and latency, rivalry and mutuality” in one and the same “rhythm of living,” as Lynd put it recently.i We can add that man will crave for liberty and equality, for freedom and order, and other mutually exclusive ideals while seeking guidance on matters as diverse and complex as sex and war, crime and tradition, fashion and business, education and ecstasy. It is almost a miracle that he can make up his mind at all, even when unhampered by the unsettling effects of scientific analysis on the conventional background of his judgment. The crux of the matter is that, while the social sciences may have enhanced man's ability to attain his ends, they certainly diminished his faculty of knowing what they are.
For indisputably the social sciences have a massive influence on man's wishes and purposes. Take the impact of the popular sciences on the popular phenomena of economics, sex, morals, and politics in our time. Some assertions tended to be actually question begging in a rather unexpected way, by creating the very phenomena on the existence of which they were insisting – such as a utilitarian psychology in the businessman, sex consciousness in psychoanalyzed persons, or class consciousness in social groups. Others, again, tended to be self-refuting, such as the assertions concerning the psychology of propaganda or of the slump, cancelling, so to speak, the actions of the very laws they alleged to have discovered. But the most important effect of the social sciences, we submit, lay in the direction in which their influence was cumulative, namely in creating confusion in the minds with regard to the values underlying social adjustments.
To some degree such an effect was inevitable.
The elimination from natural sciences of the concepts of force, substance, matter, of ghosts and goblins, of the magic of numbers, of the illusion of the flatness of the earth, or of the simple nature of space and time did not necessarily disturb man in his job of living; in spite of Newton, Darwin, and Einstein, he continued to behave – in relation to space, time, and gravitation, wild animals and the surface of mother earth – very much like before. We do not wish to deny that some of the suggestions made by science caused perplexity, and even confusion. Traditional responses with regard to ghosts, the shape of the earth, and the stability of animal species turned out to be intimately related to theological dogmas that had a direct bearing on social existence; consequently, major adjustments had to be made. But ultimately these social adjustments were made, as the evident practical usefulness of the natural sciences worked decisively in favor of the reorientation of theological ideas. However, that the natural sciences were as useful as we assumed proved sufficiently that man's practical purposes had been but little affected by them. Man still wished weights to be lifted; sickness healed; rivers crossed without too much inconvenience. And the sciences themselves did not suggest to him that he should wish otherwise.
The gradual progress of the social sciences toward methodological purity involved a similar elimination of metaphysical remnants from the scope of these sciences. But the respective roles played by these elements in society and nature were very different: rivers run their course whatever we think of space, time, and gravitation; changes in our concepts of nature do not affect the laws of nature appreciably. On the other hand, changes in our concepts of society affect the laws governing social existence radically. Also, while natural science does not threaten the clarity of our practical purposes, the social sciences may very well do so, unless our directive values are deliberately protected from corrosive influence as the Roentgen manipulator's hands are from the effects of X rays.
In other words: man's life is a process of adjustment directed toward an environmental universe that consists precisely of the elements of the matrix that science tends to eliminate as metaphysical. Hence the opprobrium attaching to metaphysics when itj can be shown up as the hopeless attempt of anti-scientific forces to compete with science through a vain conceptualization of those elements. But hence also the dignity of metaphysics in its insistence on the comprehensive character of common human awareness as the matrix of art, religion, morality, personal life, and science. In order to use science as an instrument, the matrix and the innate interest of life – or, in conceptualized form, the valuations of life – must be maintained, out of which science arose, the difficulty being that the social sciences naturally tend to influence these valuations themselves.
The implications of such a postulate must make us halt. Can the matrix of science be preserved without interfering with the progress of science, or at least with its choice of the most effective method of pursuing its aims? Should a conservation of the matrix be sought at all cost, or is it not rather to be desired that our wishes and purposes themselves should be clarified and ennobled in the light of science? How should mankind progress, if we are to exclude the influence of science on the core of life? And yet, how should these instruments of enlightenment be secured without confusing the ends of life in the process? Is a creative compromise possible, which would leave scope for progress, while protecting us from the danger of losing our way in our search for it? And, if so, what are the requirements of such a directed progress?
The answer to these questions would involve no less than the critique of a civilization practicing the indiscriminate use of science and the wholesale disregard for the essentially different ways in which knowledge affects man. The abstraction “all knowledge is good” is as vague as the maxim that “all freedom is good” or that “all order is good.” One of the most recent examples of the dangers of the propaganda of science is the use made by fascism of the attitude of scientific skepticism with regard to human ideals. By a slight leger de main,k the general methodological postulate of skepticism is transformed into a material doubt of the validity of these ideals. The typical progressist is thrown into a veritable panic today by the realization of the ambiguous effects of such a use of the social sciences on all but those who have trained themselves to withstand them. The answer lies in the courageous facing up to the issue, which implies no less than the transcending of the liberal axiom of the indiscriminate usefulness of all types of knowledge.
If we know one thing about knowledge, it is the fact that some types of knowledge affect man's life radically and immediately, while other types are merely instrumental in the sense of serving his formulated ends and aims. The distinction is basic. While the broadcasting of instrumental knowledge should be fostered through all the means at the disposal of the community, knowledge that, by its nature, might be destructive of man's external and internal life should be handled under the intellectual safeguards of social responsibility where education or medicine is concerned. It is through a mature comprehension of the relation of man to science that the fascist reaction against an abstract liberalism in the handling of knowledge must be forestalled.
In a time of rapid growth and decreasing existential pressure, lack of clarity about man's end and aims in life may pass unnoticed, or may even be felt advantageous in facilitating swift adjustment. Yet, more or less unconsciously, the community is even then aware of the high price it is paying for the ease of transition and remains vaguely suspicious of the very sciences to the authority of which it owes lip service. Of this there is convincing proof. Let us suppose an emergency call on the community for a clear and categorical definition of its basic values, and the world stands aghast at the vehemence of the reaction against the disintegrating influence of the sciences. We agree with Koffka's penetrating remark on the subject: “The denunciation of the intellect which has assumed such tremendous proportions in some part of our world with such far-reaching consequences, seems to me the outcome of the wrong scientific attitude, although for that reason it is no less wrong itself.”l
One thing is certain: whatever safeguards the mind will devise to protect itself against the dangers of the scientific handling of human affairs, their purpose cannot be to stop human progress, either collectively or in terms of the individual himself. Man will continue to change, and one of the main factors in this change will be, and should be, the impact of the social sciences. Thus, inevitably, innate interest will evolve, and man will not remain what he was.
It is at this point in our discourse that the need for a directed existence looms large. Unless man can define his destiny, he cannot hope to master it. Unless his social purpose is present in the individual man, he cannot assimilate the new knowledge without losing his way. Unless his interest in life and the universe fixes for him the direction in which his own evolution shall proceed, it is vain to expect that he can remain master of his own changing nature and not lose his grip on life.
The use of the social sciences is not a technical problem of science. It is a matter of providing such a definition of the meaning of human society as will maintain the sovereignty of man over all instruments of life, including science.