Metaphysics v Positivism
Lights covering trees in Riverview, N.B. Global News, December 21, 2021
Preface
I edited and reformatted the 2012 article Metaphysics and placed it on Facebook (image lead) and my Facebook Business Page, yesterday.
I received some good feedback, including:
There is some material I can add. But first, some background from the 2012 article.
Defining Metaphysics
Louis P. Pojman defines metaphysics as beyond physics. The study of ultimate reality, which is not accessible/available through empirical senses. He lists free will, causality, the nature of matter, immortality and the existence of God as being within the study of metaphysics. Pojman (1995: 598).
Simon Blackburn explains the term was used for three books from Aristotle after 'Physics' and is a term that raises enquiry about questions that cannot be answered by science and its empirical methods. Blackburn (1996: 240).
Physics Aristotle
Cited
The Physics (Greek: Φυσικὴ ἀκρόασις Phusike akroasis; Latin: Physica, or Naturales Auscultationes, possibly meaning "lectures on nature") is a named text, written in ancient Greek, collated from a collection of surviving manuscripts known as the Corpus Aristotelicum, attributed to the 4th-century BC philosopher Aristotle.
I will cite two versions of this work as cited sources.
Versus Metaphysics
Blackburn mentions the hostility to metaphysics throughout modern times especially as David Hume mentioned having it 'committed to the flames' in 'Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding' book xii Pt 3. Hume (1748) Blackburn (1996: 240).
It is assumed by some naturalists that the scientific method would be the only way to answer any real questions that would arise within metaphysics. Blackburn (1996: 240).
Panayot Butcharov defines it generally as the philosophical investigation of nature, and its reality, in how it is constituted. The study of non-physical entities, for example God, would be addressed. Butcharov (1996: 489). Metaphysics would be rejected by positivism on the basis of being meaningless. Since it is not empirically viable. Butcharov (1996: 489).
Positivism being a form of empiricism viewing empirical science as the means of gaining knowledge and metaphysics, theology, and even aspects of philosophy as being viewed as questionable in obtaining knowledge.
Positivism
Referencing
John Kent states positivism is a philosophical position belonging to the empirical view according to which humankind can have no knowledge of anything but phenomena, and that is only what is apprehended by the senses empirically. Kent (1999: 454). The concept would be that positive knowledge is associated in particular with the sciences as in things must be observed and there is no questioning of knowledge beyond. Kent (1999: 454). Therefore other fields such as theology and metaphysics would be regarded as speculation. Kent (1999: 454).
The term 'positivism' was introduced by French socialist Saint-Simon (1760-1825) and noted by his student Auguste Comte (1798-1857). Both of these men rejected traditional Christianity and its working with the existing social system. Kent (1999: 454). Comte held that the highest or only form of knowledge is the description of sensory phenomena. Blackburn (1996: 294). This being the empirical. He held to three stages of human belief the theological, the metaphysical and the positive. It is a version of traditional empiricism. Blackburn (1996: 294).
Paul Weirich writes that Comte was influenced by Kant and held that the causes of the phenomena (or that phenomena realm one could state, my add) in themselves are not knowable. Comte was critical of speculation on such matters. It is stated that he went beyond many empiricists by denying knowledge other than from observable objects. Weirich (1996: 147). In other words he was a strict empiricist.
Comments
Positivism appears to me to at least risk at times to be what Blackburn describes related to the pejorative term of ‘scientism’ which categorizes things in the natural sciences as the only proper form of academic inquiry. Blackburn (1996: 344). In other words, positivism risks being a form of scientism. (please see archives)
Back to Pojman, he lists free will, causality, the nature of matter, immortality and the existence of God, as being within metaphysics. Positivism, a strict use of empirical senses, can measure problems of suffering, physical and mental, to degrees. For example, if a person jumps from a burning building, the physical damage to that person can be measured through empirical, medical science and data. But, the academic disciplines of philosophy, philosophy of religion, theology, psychology as examples, are required to deal with worldview issues associated with problems of suffering and problems of evil.
As I have noted previously, the existence of God, cannot be adequately dealt with empirically. John 4: 24 from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) states:
24 God is [a]spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” Footnotes John 4:24 Or Spirit
It is intellectually and academically, wrong-headed, to attempt, or expect to, empirically prove the existence of the infinite, eternal, first cause, that existed before finite, time, space and matter. This entity is the creator of all finite and physical realities. According to the New Testament, God is spirit and cannot be measured empirically as God is not physical.
Biblical Studies, biblical, divine revelation, theology and philosophy of religion serve as the main academic disciplines and practical means by providing proofs for the existence of God.
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