S.B. – 9
Empiricism – Look and See!
1/25/18
| Related Humor The attorney demanded severely, “You testify that you saw the defendant strike the complaining witness, and yet you were three blocks away. Just how far can you see, anyway?” “Oh, I don’t know exactly,” the witness drawled, “about a quarter of a million miles, I expect – just how far away is the moon?”John read so much about the terrible effects of smoking that he’s decided to give up reading. |
Empiricism in science is shown in the degree to which it concentrates on behavior, and avoids myths such as ego and id. It is wary of vague terms such as attitude, self-actualization, and IQ until those terms are defined in precise behavioral variables. Of course, this position is not accepted by some psychologists and many other people; if it were, more people would understand what was being talked about, and much of the “mystery” would be gone.
“Let’s look and see,” is the mode of empiricism. Nerves at one time were thought of as hollow tubes through which “animal spirits were reflected.” (This is the origin of the word reflex.) When someone severed a nerve, they found that description to be untrue. Decisions today are still made without bothering to look and see. Even many of those passed off as conclusions are no more than speculations or assumptions, with no tie to observables.
Often it is not easy to directly observe the events scientists are interested in observing. Only recently have we been able to observe the surface of the moon at close enough range to accurately test some of our assumptions about it. The basic attitude of empiricism is one that must be affirmed regardless of our technical skill. We must always endeavor to look and see. Without this concerted effort, science becomes speculation and hearsay.
Some people state that scientists do have a strange air of confidence about them; it is the confidence that comes from having a viable means of evaluating a particular situation.