View source for Scientism

{{Short description|View that science is the best/only truth}}

'''Scientism''' is the belief that [[science]] and the [[scientific method]] are the best or only way to render [[truth]] about the [[world]] and [[reality]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=Glossary Definition: Scientism |url=https://www.pbs.org/faithandreason/gengloss/sciism-body.html |date=1999 |access-date=2022-07-30 |website= PBS.org |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20001011010123/https://www.pbs.org/faithandreason/gengloss/sciism-body.html |archive-date=2000-10-11 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name= Metaphilosophy2020>{{cite journal |last1=Hietanen |first1=Johan |last2= Turunen |first2=Petri |last3=Hirvonen |first3=Ilmari |last4=Karisto |first4=Janne |last5=Pättiniemi |first5=Ilkka |last6= Saarinen |first6=Henrik | display-authors= 3 |date=July 2020 |title=How {{em|not}} to criticise scientism |journal= [[Metaphilosophy]] |volume=51 |issue=4 |pages=522–547 |doi=10.1111/meta.12443 |doi-access=free |quote=[Scientism can be divided] into four categories in terms of how strong (science is the only source of knowledge) or weak (science is the best source of knowledge) and how narrow (only [[natural science]]s) or broad (all sciences or at least not only the natural sciences) they are.}}</ref>

While the term was defined originally to mean "methods and attitudes typical of or attributed to natural scientists", some scholars, as well as [[politics|political]] and [[religious]] leaders, have also adopted it as a pejorative term with the meaning "an exaggerated trust in the efficacy of the methods of natural science applied to all areas of investigation (as in [[philosophy]], the [[social science]]s, and the [[humanities]])".<ref name=Metaphilosophy2020/><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scientism/ |title=Scientism |publisher=Merriam-Webster |website= [[Merriam-Webster]].com |access-date=April 6, 2021}}</ref>

==Overview==
[[Francis Bacon]] has been viewed by some scholars as an early proponent of scientism,<ref name="Robinson Whitney Trepanier Corey 2019 p. 80">{{cite book | last1=Robinson | first1=S. | last2=Whitney | first2=D. | last3=Trepanier | first3=L. | last4=Corey | first4=D.D. | last5=Harter | first5=N.W. | last6=Havers | first6=G. | last7=Morrissey | first7=C.S. | last8= Segrest | first8=S.P. | display-authors= 3 | title=Eric Voegelin Today: Voegelin's Political Thought in the 21st Century | publisher=Lexington Books | series= Political Theory for Today | year=2019 | isbn=978-1-4985-9664-0 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xnahDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA80 | access-date=2023-02-11 | page=80 | via= Google Books}}</ref> but this is a modern assertion as Bacon was a devout [[Anglican]], writing in his Essays, "a little philosophy inclineth man's mind to [[atheism]], but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bacon |first=Francis |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LdsAYAAACAAJ |title=The Essayes Or Counsels, Ciuill and Morall, of Francis Lo. Verulam, Viscount St. Alban |date=1625 |publisher=Iohn Hauiland |language=en | via= Google Books}}</ref>

With respect to the [[philosophy of science]], the term ''scientism'' frequently implies a critique of the more extreme expressions of [[logical positivism]]<ref>{{Cite journal | last = Rey | first= Abel | title = Review of ''La Philosophie Moderne'' | journal = The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods |volume = 6 | issue= 2 |date = 1909 | pages = 51–3 | doi= 10.2307/2011609| jstor= 2011609 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book | first = Abraham | last = Maslow| author-link= Abraham Maslow | quote = There are criticisms of orthodox, 19th Century scientism and I intend to continue with this enterprise | title = Toward a Psychology of Being | chapter = Preface | edition = 1st|year=1962}}</ref> and has been used by social scientists such as [[Friedrich Hayek]],<ref>{{cite book| first= Friedrich | last = Hayek | title = The Counter Revolution of Science: Studies on the Abuse of Reason | publisher = Liberty Fund | year = 1980}}</ref> philosophers of science such as [[Karl Popper]],<ref name="Popper-Hacohen">{{cite book |last = Hacohen|first = Malachi Haim| title = Karl Popper: the formative years, 1902–1945: politics and philosophy in interwar Vienna | date = 2002| publisher = Cambridge University Press| isbn = 978-0-521-89055-7}}</ref> and philosophers such as [[Mary Midgley]],<ref name="Beale2019">{{cite journal |last= Beale |first=Jonathan |date= January 2019 |title=Scientism and scientific imperialism |journal= [[International Journal of Philosophical Studies]] |volume=27 |issue=1 |pages=73–102 |doi= 10.1080/09672559.2019.1565316 |s2cid= 171857595 |quote=There are also several philosophers, in addition to Wittgenstein, for whom anti-scientism is a leitmotif in their work, such as Mary Midgley and the later Hilary Putnam.}}</ref> the later [[Hilary Putnam]],<ref name="Beale2019" /><ref name="Putnam">{{cite book| last= Putnam| first= Hilary | title = Renewing Philosophy | url= https://archive.org/details/renewingphilosop0000putn| url-access= registration|date= 1992|publisher= Harvard University Press|location= Cambridge, Mass. |page= x| isbn= 9780674760936 }}</ref> and [[Tzvetan Todorov]]<ref>{{cite book| author-link= Tzvetan Todorov| last= Todorov| first= Tzvetan| title= The Imperfect Garden: the legacy of humanism| publisher=Princeton University Press| year= 2001| page=
20| quote= Scientism does not eliminate the will but decides that since the results of science are valid for everyone, this will must be something shared, not individual. In practice, the individual must submit to the collectivity, which 'knows' better than he does.}}</ref> to describe (for example) the dogmatic endorsement of scientific methods and the reduction of all [[knowledge]] to only that which is measured or [[Confirmationism|confirmatory]].<ref name="Outhwaite22">{{cite book| last = Outhwaite | first = William | orig-year = 1988 | title = Habermas: Key Contemporary Thinkers | publisher = Polity Press | edition = 2nd | date = 2009 | page = 22}}</ref>

More generally, scientism is often interpreted as science applied "in excess". This use of the term ''scientism'' has two senses:

* The improper use of science or scientific claims.{{Sfn | Peterson | 2003 | p = 753 | ps =: "the best way to understand the charge of scientism is as a kind of logical fallacy involving improper usage of science or scientific claims"}} This usage applies equally in contexts where science might not apply,<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |first=Martin |last=Ryder |year=2005 |title=Scientism |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics |editor-last=Mitcham |editor-first=Carl |volume=4 |location=Farmington Hills, Mich. |publisher=Macmillan Reference USA |pages=[https://archive.org/details/encyclopediaofsc0000unse_k0a4/page/1735 1735–1736] |url=http://carbon.ucdenver.edu/~mryder/scientism_este.html |access-date=2007-07-05 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120630205732/http://carbon.ucdenver.edu/~mryder/scientism_este.html |archive-date=2012-06-30 |url-status=dead}}</ref> such as when the topic is perceived as beyond the scope of [[Scientific method|scientific inquiry]], and in contexts where there is insufficient [[empirical evidence]] to justify a scientific conclusion. It includes an excessive deference to the claims of scientists or an [[Critical thinking|uncritical]] eagerness to accept any result described as scientific. This can be a [[counterargument]] to [[argument from authority|appeals to scientific authority]]. It can also address attempts to apply natural science methods and claims of certainty to the social sciences, which Friedrich Hayek described in ''[[The Counter-Revolution of Science]]'' (1952) as being impossible, because those methods attempt to eliminate the "human factor", while social sciences (including his own topic of [[economics]]) mainly concern the study of [[praxeology|human action]].
* "The belief that the methods of natural science, or the categories and things recognized in natural science, form the only proper elements in any philosophical or other inquiry",<ref name = "ODP">{{cite encyclopedia |first= Simon |last= Blackburn |date= 2005 |encyclopedia= The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy | series = Oxford paperbacks |edition=2nd |publisher= Oxford University Press |isbn= 978-0-19-861013-7 |lccn= 2006271895 | url = https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofphil00simo/page/331 | title= Scientism |url-access= registration |pages= [https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofphil00simo/page/331 331–32] |quote= Scientism: Pejorative term for the belief that the methods of natural science, or the categories and things recognized in natural science, form the only proper elements in any philosophical or other inquiry.}}</ref> or that "science, and only science, describes the world as it is in itself, independent of perspective"<ref name= Putnam/> with a concomitant "elimination of the [[psychological]] [and [[spirituality|spiritual]]] dimensions of experience".<ref>{{cite web | first = Robert | last = Bannister | url = http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/rbannis1/AmCult/H47%2313.html | title = Behaviorism, Scientism and the Rise of The 'Expert'| year = 1998 | website= swarthmore.edu/SocSci/rbannis1/ |access-date = 2008-09-11 | archive-date = 2008-10-12 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20081012060301/http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/rbannis1/AmCult/H47%2313.html | url-status = live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book| last = Haack | first = Susan | date = 2003 | title = Defending Science Within Reason: Between Scientism and Cynicism | place = Amherst, New York| publisher = Prometheus Books}}</ref> Tom Sorell provides this definition: "Scientism is a matter of putting too high a value on natural science in comparison with other branches of learning or culture."<ref>{{cite book | last = Sorell | first = Thomas 'Tom' | title = Scientism: Philosophy and the Infatuation with Science | publisher = Routledge | date = 1994 | pages = 1ff}}</ref> Philosophers such as [[Alexander Rosenberg]] have also adopted "scientism" as a name for the opinion that science is the only reliable source of knowledge.<ref name = Rosenberg>{{cite book |last = Rosenberg|first = Alex| title = The Atheist's Guide to Reality| date = 2011| publisher = W. W. Norton| isbn = 978-0-393-34411-0}}</ref>

It is also sometimes used to describe the universal applicability of the scientific method, and the opinion that [[empirical science]] constitutes the most authoritative [[worldview]] or the most valuable part of human learning, sometimes to the complete exclusion of other opinions, such as [[history|historical]], philosophical, economic or cultural opinions. It has been defined as "the view that the characteristic inductive methods of the natural sciences are the only source of genuine [[factual knowledge]] and, in particular, that they alone can yield true knowledge about man and society".<ref name= Bullock>{{cite encyclopedia |last= Quinton |first=Anthony |author-link= Anthony Quinton |date=1999 |title= Scientism |editor1-last=Bullock |editor1-first=Alan |editor1-link=Alan Bullock |editor2-last=Trombley |editor2-first= Stephen |editor2-link=Stephen Trombley |editor3-last=Lawrie |editor3-first=Alf |encyclopedia=The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought |edition=3rd |location=London |publisher= [[HarperCollins Publishers]] |pages= [https://archive.org/details/newfontanadictio0000unse/page/775 775] |isbn=0002558718 |oclc=45667833 |url=https://archive.org/details/newfontanadictio0000unse/page/775 |url-access=registration}}</ref> The term ''scientism'' is also used by historians, philosophers, and cultural critics to highlight the possible dangers of lapses towards excessive [[reductionism]] with respect to all topics of human knowledge.<ref>{{cite journal| first = Michael | last = Collins | title = A Critical Analysis of Competency-based Systems in Adult Education | journal = Adult Education Quarterly | date = March 20, 1983 | volume = 33 | number = 3 | pages = 174–83| doi = 10.1177/074171368303300305 | s2cid = 142438118 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal| first = Irwin | last = Chargaff | title = In Dispraise of Reductionism | journal = [[BioScience]] | volume = 47 | number = 11 |date= December 1997 | pages = 795–7 | doi= 10.2307/1313101| jstor = 1313101 | doi-access = free }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal| first = R Keith | last = Sawyer | title = Connecting Culture, Psychology and Biology: Essay Review on Inghilleri's From Subjective Experience to Cultural Change | journal = Human Development | volume = 43 | date = 2000 | pages = 56–59| doi = 10.1159/000022658 | s2cid = 145691908 }}</ref><ref name="The New Republic">{{cite magazine| last= Wieseltier| first= Leon| title= Crimes Against Humanities| url= https://newrepublic.com/article/114548/leon-wieseltier-responds-steven-pinkers-scientism|access-date= 21 December 2013| date= 4 September 2013| quote= His essay, a defense of "scientism," is a long exercise in assimilating humanistic inquiries into scientific ones. By the time Pinker is finished, the humanities are the handmaiden of the sciences, and dependent upon the sciences for their advance and even their survival.|magazine= [[The New Republic]]| archive-date= 27 October 2013| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20131027190446/http://www.newrepublic.com/article/114548/leon-wieseltier-responds-steven-pinkers-scientism|url-status= live}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine|last= Lears|first= T.J. Jackson|title= Get Happy!!| date= 6 November 2013|url= http://www.thenation.com/article/177016/get-happy?page=full#|magazine= [[The Nation]] |access-date= 21 December 2013|quote= ...scientism is a revival of the nineteenth-century positivist faith that a reified "science" has discovered (or is about to discover) all the important truths about human life. Precise measurement and rigorous calculation, in this view, are the basis for finally settling enduring metaphysical and moral controversies—explaining consciousness and choice, replacing ambiguity with certainty.|archive-date= 13 November 2013|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20131113000458/http://www.thenation.com/article/177016/get-happy?page=full|url-status= live}}</ref>

For [[social theorist]]s practising the tradition of [[Max Weber]], such as [[Jürgen Habermas]] and [[Max Horkheimer]], the concept of scientism relates significantly to the philosophy of [[positivism]], but also to the cultural [[rationalization (sociology)|rationalization]] for modern [[Western culture|Western civilization]].<ref name=Outhwaite22/><ref>{{cite book|last= Brunkhorst|first= Hauke|title= On Max Horkheimer: New Perspectives|date= 1995| publisher= The MIT Press|isbn= 978-0262522076|page= 74|editor= Seyla Benhabib|editor2= Wolfgang Bonss|editor3= John McCole|chapter= Dialectical Positivism of Happiness: Max Horkheimer's Materialist Deconstruction of Philosophy |chapter-url= https://books.google.com/books?id=ab7QuxwoguEC&pg=PA67|access-date= 2020-01-29|archive-date= 2021-01-26| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20210126110621/https://books.google.com/books?id=ab7QuxwoguEC&pg=PA67| url-status= live| via= Google Books}}</ref> [[Ernesto Sabato]], [[physicist]] and [[essayist]], wrote in his 1951 essay {{lang|es|Hombres y engranajes}} ("Man and mechanism") of the "superstition of science" as the most contradictory of all [[superstition]]s,<ref name="Sabato">{{Cite book |last=Sabato |first=Ernesto |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7eQLAAAAYAAJ |title=Hombres y engranajes |date=2003 |orig-year=1951 |publisher=Editorial Planeta / Seix Barral |isbn=978-950-731-378-3 |language=es |chapter=El Nuevo Fetichismo}}</ref> since this would be the "superstition that one should not be ''superstitious''". He wrote: "science had become a new magic and the man in the street believed in it the more the less he understood it".<ref name= "Sabato" />

==Definitions==
Reviewing the references to scientism in the works of contemporary scholars in 2003, Gregory R. Peterson{{Sfn|Peterson|2003}} detected two main general themes:
* It is used to criticize a totalizing opinion of science as if it were capable of describing ''all'' reality and knowledge, or as if it were the ''only'' true method to acquire knowledge about reality and the nature of things;
* It is used, often pejoratively,<ref>{{Citation | quote = The term scientism is ordinarily used with pejorative intent. | first = Donald R | last = Peterson | title = Science, Scientism, and Professional Responsibility | journal = Clinical Psychology: Science and Practice | volume = 11 | issue = 2 | pages = 196–210 |date=June 2004 | doi=10.1093/clipsy.bph072}}</ref><ref>{{Citation | quote = The term 'scientism' is sometimes used in a pejorative sense | first = C | last = Hakfoort | title = Science deified: Wilhelm Osstwald's energeticist world-view and the history of scientism | journal = Annals of Science | volume = 49 | issue = 6 | date = 1992 | pages = 525–44 | doi=10.1080/00033799200200441}}</ref><ref>{{Citation | quote = Scientism... a term of abuse since [[Friedrich Hayek]] first popularized it in the 1940s. | first = Robert C | last = Bannister | title = Sociology and Scientism: The American Quest for Objectivity, 1880–1940 | publisher = The University of North Carolina Press | date = 1991 | page = 8}}</ref> to denote violations by which the theories and methods of one (scientific) discipline are applied inappropriately to another (scientific or non-scientific) discipline and its domain. An example of this second usage is to term as scientism any attempt to claim science as the only or primary source of human values (a traditional domain of [[ethics]]) or as the source of [[Meaning (existential)|meaning]] and purpose (a traditional domain of [[religion]] and related [[worldview]]s).

The term ''scientism'' was popularized by [[F. A. Hayek]], who defined it in 1942 as the "slavish imitation of the method and language of Science".<ref name="Hayek1942">{{Cite journal |last=Hayek |first=F. A. v. |date=1942 |title=Scientism and the Study of Society. Part I |journal=Economica |volume=9 |issue=35 |pages=267–291 |doi=10.2307/2549540|jstor=2549540 }}</ref>

[[Mathematician]] [[Alexander Grothendieck]], in his 1971 essay "The New Universal Church", characterized scientism as a religion-like ideology that advocates scientific [[reductionism]], scientific [[authoritarianism]], political [[technocracy]] and technological salvation, while denying the [[epistemological]] validity of feelings and experiences such as love, emotion, beauty and fulfillment.<ref name=Grothendieck/> He predicted that "in coming years, the chief political dividing line will fall less and less among the traditional division between '[[right-wing politics|right]]' and '[[left-wing politics|left]]', but increasingly between the adherents of scientism, who advocate '[[Technological change|technological progress]] at any price', and their opponents, i.e., roughly speaking, those who regard the enhancement of life, in all its richness and variety, as being the supreme value".<ref name=Grothendieck>{{cite journal |last=Grothendieck |first=Alexander |author-link=Alexander Grothendieck |date=1971 |title=The New Universal Church |journal=Survivre et Vivre |issue=9 |pages=3–8 |url=http://publish.uwo.ca/~jbell/univ.pdf}} Translated by John Bell.</ref>

[[E. F. Schumacher]], in his ''[[A Guide for the Perplexed]]'' (1977), criticized scientism as an impoverished [[world view]] confined solely to what can be counted, measured and weighed. "The architects of the modern worldview, notably [[Galileo]] and [[Descartes]], assumed that those things that could be weighed, measured, and counted were more true than those that could not be quantified. If it couldn't be counted, in other words, it didn't count."<ref>{{Citation | url = http://www.schumachersociety.org/publications/orr_92.html | first = David | last = Orr | contribution = Environmental Literacy: Education as if the Earth Mattered | title = Twelfth Annual EF Schumacher Lectures | date = October 1992 | place = Great Barrington, [[Massachusetts|MA]] | access-date = 2011-03-24 | archive-date = 2005-11-08 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20051108183748/http://www.schumachersociety.org/publications/orr_92.html | url-status = live }}</ref>

In 1979, [[Karl Popper]] defined scientism as "the aping of what is widely mistaken for the method of science".<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/objectiveknowled00popp |url-access=registration |title=Objective Knowledge: An Evolutionary Approach |last=Popper |first=Karl R. |date=1979 |publisher=Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press |edition=Revised |lccn=79318586 |ol=OL4489088M|page=[https://archive.org/details/objectiveknowled00popp/page/185 185]}}</ref>

In 2003, [[Mikael Stenmark]] proposed the expression ''scientific expansionism'' as a synonym of scientism.<ref name="expansionism">{{Citation | first = Mikael | last = Stenmark | contribution = Scientism | editor-first = J Wentzel Vrede | editor-last = van Huyssteen | title = Encyclopedia of science and religion | edition = 2nd | publisher = Thomson Gale | date = 2003 | page = 783}}</ref> In the ''Encyclopedia of Science and Religion'', he wrote that, while the [[doctrine]]s that are described as scientism have many possible forms and varying degrees of ambition, they share the idea that the boundaries of science (that is, typically the natural sciences) could and should be expanded so that something that has not been previously considered as a subject pertinent to science can now be understood as part of science (usually with science becoming the sole or the main arbiter regarding this area or dimension).<ref name="expansionism" /> According to Stenmark, the strongest form of scientism states that science does not have any boundaries and that all human problems and all aspects of human endeavor, with due time, will be dealt with and solved by science alone.<ref name="expansionism"/> This idea has also been termed the [[myth of progress]].<ref>{{Citation | first1 = G | last1 = Monastra | first2 = MM | last2 = Zarandi | title = Science and the Myth of Progress | date = 2004}}</ref>

Intellectual historian [[T. J. Jackson Lears]] argued in 2013 that there has been a recent reemergence of "nineteenth-century positivist faith that a reified 'science' has discovered (or is about to discover) all the important truths about human life. Precise measurement and rigorous calculation, in this view, are the basis for finally settling enduring [[metaphysical]] and [[Morality|moral]] controversies." Lears specifically identified Harvard psychologist [[Steven Pinker]]'s work as falling in this category.<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Lears|first=T.J. Jackson|title=Get Happy!!|date=6 November 2013|url=http://www.thenation.com/article/177016/get-happy?page=full|magazine=The Nation|access-date=21 December 2013|archive-date=13 November 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131113000458/http://www.thenation.com/article/177016/get-happy?page=full|url-status=live}}</ref> Philosophers [[John N. Gray]] and [[Thomas Nagel]] have made similar criticisms against popular works by moral psychologist [[Jonathan Haidt]], atheist author [[Sam Harris (author)|Sam Harris]], and writer [[Malcolm Gladwell]].<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Gray|first=John|title=The Knowns and the Unknowns|url=https://newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/102760/righteous-mind-haidt-morality-politics-scientism|magazine=The New Republic|date=20 April 2012|access-date=22 December 2013|quote=These theories show the continuing appeal of scientism—the modern belief that scientific inquiry can enable us to resolve conflicts and dilemmas in contexts where traditional sources of wisdom and practical knowledge seem to have failed.|archive-date=24 December 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131224092408/http://www.newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/102760/righteous-mind-haidt-morality-politics-scientism|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine|last=Gray|first=John|title=Malcolm Gladwell Is America's Best-Paid Fairy-Tale Writer|url=https://newrepublic.com/article/115467/malcolm-gladwells-david-and-goliath-fairy-tales|magazine=The New Republic|date=22 November 2013|access-date=22 December 2013|quote=... the mix of moralism and scientism is an ever-winning formula, as Gladwell's career demonstrates.|archive-date=4 December 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131204193126/http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115467/malcolm-gladwells-david-and-goliath-fairy-tales|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine|last=Nagel|first=Thomas|title=The Facts Fetish|date=20 October 2010|url=https://newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/78546/the-facts-fetish-morality-science|magazine=The New Republic|access-date=22 December 2013|quote=Harris urges that we use scientific knowledge about humans to discover what will maximize their well-being, and thereby to discover the right way to live. This is an instrumental use of science, starting out from his basic moral premise.|archive-date=27 October 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131027065614/http://www.newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/78546/the-facts-fetish-morality-science|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Strong and weak scientism ===
There are various ways of classifying kinds of scientism.<ref name= Metaphilosophy2020/><ref>{{Cite book |title=For and against scientism: science, methodology, and the future of philosophy |date=2022 |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |isbn=978-1-5381-6334-4 |editor-last=Mizrahi |editor-first=Moti |series=Collective studies in knowledge and society |location=Lanham Boulder New York London}}</ref> Some authors distinguish between strong and weak scientism, as follows:

* {{em|Strong scientism}}: "of all the knowledge we have, scientific knowledge is the ''only'' 'real knowledge'"<ref name=":0">{{harvnb|Mizrahi|2022|p=106}}.</ref> (Moti Mizrahi), or, "the view that some proposition or theory is true and/or [[rational]] to believe if and only if it is a scientific proposition or theory"<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last1=DeWeese |first1=Garrett J. |title=Philosophy made slightly less difficult: a beginner's guide to life's big questions |last2=Moreland |first2=James Porter |date=2021 |publisher=IVP Academic |isbn=978-0-8308-3915-5 |edition=2nd |location=Downers Grove, IL |pages=143}}</ref><ref name=":2">{{Cite book |last=Moreland |first=James Porter |title=Philosophical foundations for a Christian worldview |date=2017 |publisher=IVP Academic, an imprint of InterVarsity Press |isbn=978-0-8308-8917-4 |edition=2nd |location=Downers Grove, Ill |pages=348}}</ref><ref name=":3">{{Cite book |last1=Moreland |first1=James Porter |title=Love your God with all your mind: the role of reason in the life of the soul |last2=Willard |first2=Dallas |date=1997 |publisher=NavPress |isbn=978-1-57683-016-1 |location=Colorado Springs, Colo |pages=146 |language=en}}</ref> ([[J.&nbsp;P. Moreland]]<!--Moreland was a coauthor for all of these books, but he was the only author in common between all of them, and they all give these definitions verbatim, so they should probably be credited to him.-->), or, "only science yields epistemically credible data"<ref name=":4">{{Cite book |last1=Taliaferro |first1=Charles |title=The Routledge companion to theism |last2=Harrison |first2=Victoria S. |last3=Goetz |first3=Stewart |date=2013 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0-415-88164-7 |series=Routledge philosophy companions |location=New York |pages=337}}</ref> ([[Michael W. Austin]])
* {{em|Weak scientism}}: "of all the knowledge we have, scientific knowledge is the ''best'' knowledge"<ref name=":0" /> (Moti Mizrahi), or, "science is the most valuable, most serious, and most authoritative sector of human learning"<ref name=":1" /><ref name=":2" /><ref name=":3" /> (J.&nbsp;P. Moreland), or, "scientific knowledge claims are the most credible knowledge claims"<ref name=":4" /> (Michael W. Austin)

A 2023 research article by Rik Peels in the journal ''Interdisciplinary Science Reviews'' explores the concept of scientism, defining it as the belief that science is the only means of obtaining knowledge and truth. Peels distinguishes between ''weak scientism'', which limits the validity of science to specific areas, and ''strong scientism'', which extends this validity to all fields of knowledge. The author argues that strong scientism is untenable and self-confuting because science itself is based on [[common sense]] assumptions and non-scientific principles. He proposes that scientism can be considered a form of [[fundamentalism]], characterized by a [[Manichaeism|Manichean narrative]] that is reactive against other sources of knowledge. The article suggests that science can learn from mainstream religion when it comes to scientific fundamentalism, by promoting a more open and tolerant approach to other forms of knowledge.<ref>{{Cite journal|title=Scientism and scientific fundamentalism: what science can learn from mainstream religion|last=Peels|first=Rik|journal=Interdisciplinary Science Reviews|issue=2|doi=10.1080/03080188.2022.2152246|year=2022|volume=48|pages=395–410|doi-access=free}}</ref>

==Relevance to debates about science and religion==
Both religious and non-religious scholars have applied the term ''scientism'' to individuals associated with [[New Atheism]].<ref>{{Citation | last = Robinson | first = Marilynne | title = Hysterical Scientism: The Ecstasy of Richard Dawkins | newspaper = Harper's Magazine |date= Nov 2006}}</ref><ref>{{Citation | title = Stephen LeDrew on his 'The Evolution of Atheism' an Interview | url = http://positivists.org/blog/archives/5325 | date = 10 Dec 2015 | access-date = 10 March 2016 | archive-date = 10 March 2016 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160310205701/http://positivists.org/blog/archives/5325 | url-status = live }}</ref> [[Theologian]] [[John Haught]] argued that philosopher [[Daniel Dennett]] and other New Atheists subscribe to a belief system of [[scientific naturalism]], which includes the dogma that "only nature, including humans and our creations, is real: that God does not exist; and that science alone can give us complete and reliable knowledge of reality."<ref>{{cite book|last= Haught|first= John|title= God and the New Atheism: A Critical Response to Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens|date= 2008|publisher= Westminster John Knox Press|pages= X}}</ref> Haught argued that this belief system is self-refuting since it requires its adherents to assent to beliefs that violate its own stated requirements for knowledge.<ref>{{cite book|last= Haught|first= John|title= God and the New Atheism: A Critical Response to Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens|date= 2008|publisher= Westminster John Knox Press|page= 17}}</ref> Christian philosopher Peter Williams argued in 2013 that it is only by conflating science with scientism that New Atheists feel qualified to "pontificate on metaphysical issues".<ref>{{cite book|last= Williams|first= Peter S.|title= C.S. Lewis vs. the New Atheists|date= 2013|publisher= Paternoster|page= 1928}}</ref> Daniel Dennett responded to religious criticism of his 2006 book ''[[Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon]]'' by saying that accusations of scientism "[are] an all-purpose, wild-card smear&nbsp;... When someone puts forward a scientific theory that [religious critics] really don't like, they just try to discredit it as 'scientism'. But when it comes to [[fact]]s, and explanations of facts, science is the only game in town".<ref>{{Citation | url = http://www.newstatesman.com/200604100019 | first = Sholto | last = Byrnes | title = When it comes to facts, and explanations of facts, science is the only game in town | newspaper = New Statesman | date = 10 April 2006 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20111016131703/http://www.newstatesman.com/200604100019 | archive-date = 16 October 2011}}</ref>

Non-religious scholars have also associated New Atheist thought with scientism and/or with positivism. Atheist philosopher [[Thomas Nagel]] argued that philosopher [[Sam Harris (author)|Sam Harris]] conflated all empirical knowledge with scientific knowledge.<ref>{{cite magazine|last= Nagel|first= Thomas|title= The Facts Fetish|date= 20 October 2010|url= https://newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/78546/the-facts-fetish-morality-science|magazine= The New Republic|access-date= 22 December 2013|quote= He says that the discovery of moral truth depends on science, but this turns out to be misleading, because he includes under "science" all empirical knowledge of what the world is like&nbsp;... Harris urges that we use scientific knowledge about humans to discover what will maximize their well-being, and thereby to discover the right way to live.|archive-date= 27 October 2013|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20131027065614/http://www.newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/78546/the-facts-fetish-morality-science|url-status= live}}</ref> Marxist literary critic [[Terry Eagleton]] argued that [[Christopher Hitchens]] possessed an "old-fashioned scientistic notion of what counts as evidence" that reduces knowledge to what can and cannot be proven by scientific procedure.<ref>{{cite book|last= Eagleton|first= Terry|title= Reason, Faith, and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate|date= 2010|publisher= Yale University Press|page= 6}}</ref> [[Agnostic]] philosopher [[Anthony Kenny]] has also criticized New Atheist philosopher [[Alexander Rosenberg]]'s ''The Atheist's Guide to Reality'' for resurrecting a self-refuting [[epistemology]] of logical positivism and reducing all knowledge of the universe to the discipline of [[physics]].<ref>{{cite journal|last= Kenny|first= Anthony|title= True Believers|journal= Times Literary Supplement|date= June 2012|quote= The main tenets of this philosophy are bracingly summed up in a series of questions and answers: Is there a God? No. What is the nature of reality? What physics says it is.}}</ref>

[[Michael Shermer]], founder of [[The Skeptics Society]], discussed resemblances between scientism and traditional religions, indicating the [[cult of personality]] that develops for some scientists.  He defined scientism as a worldview that encompasses natural explanations, eschews [[supernatural]] and [[paranormal]] speculations, and embraces empiricism and [[reason]].<ref>{{Citation<!-- no bots--> | last = Shermer | first = Michael | authorlink = Michael Shermer | title = The Shamans of Scientism | journal = [[Scientific American]] | volume = 286 | issue = 6 | pages = 35 |date= June 2002 | doi = 10.1038/scientificamerican0602-35 | bibcode = 2002SciAm.286f..35S |archiveurl= https://web.archive.org/web/20061016163820/http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000AA74F-FF5F-1CDB-B4A8809EC588EEDF | archive-date = 2006-10-16|url= http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000AA74F-FF5F-1CDB-B4A8809EC588EEDF }}</ref>

The Iranian scholar [[Seyyed Hossein Nasr]] has stated that in the [[Western world]], many will accept the [[ideology]] of modern science, not as "simple ordinary science", but as a replacement for religion.<ref>{{cite book | last = Chittick | first = William | title = The Essential Seyyed Hossein Nasr | publisher = World Wisdom | location = Bloomington | date = 2007 | isbn = 978-1-933316-38-3}}</ref>{{page needed|date=February 2021}}

Gregory R. Peterson wrote that "for many theologians and philosophers, scientism is among the greatest of intellectual sins".{{Sfn|Peterson|2003}} [[Genetic biology|Genetic biologist]] Austin L. Hughes wrote in the conservative journal [[The New Atlantis (journal)|''The New Atlantis'']] that scientism has much in common with superstition: "the stubborn insistence that something&nbsp;... has powers which no evidence supports."<ref>{{cite journal | first = Austin | last = Hughes | title = The Folly of Scientism | journal = The New Atlantis | date = Fall 2012 | volume = 37 | pages = 32–50 | url = https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-folly-of-scientism | access-date = 26 July 2018 | archive-date = 22 July 2018 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180722125904/https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-folly-of-scientism | url-status = live }}</ref>

Repeating common criticisms of logical positivism and [[verificationism]], [[philosophy of religion|philosopher of religion]] [[Keith Ward]] has said that scientism is philosophically inconsistent or even [[self-refuting]], as the truth of the two statements "no statements are true unless they can be proven scientifically (or [[logic]]ally)" and "no statements are true unless they can be shown empirically to be true" cannot themselves be proven scientifically, logically, or empirically.<ref>{{Citation | first = Keith | last = Ward | author-link = Keith Ward | title = Is Religion Dangerous?|year= 2006| title-link = Is Religion Dangerous? }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |first= William P |last= Alston |chapter= Religious language and verificationism |editor-first= Paul K |editor-last= Moser |editor2-first= Paul |editor2-last= Copan | title= The Rationality of Theism | location= New York | publisher= Routledge | date= 2003 | isbn= 978-0-415-26332-0 | pages= 26–34}}</ref>

==Philosophy of science==
{{main|Philosophy of science}}

===Anti-scientism===
Philosopher [[Paul Feyerabend]], who was an enthusiastic proponent of scientism during his youth,<ref>{{Cite SEP |url-id=feyerabend|title=Paul Feyerabend|first=John|last=Preston|date=21 September 2016}} "Feyerabend's youthful positivist scientism makes quite a contrast with his later conclusions."</ref> later came to characterize science as "an essentially anarchic enterprise"{{Sfn | Feyerabend | 1993 | p = vii | ps =: "[[Imre Lakatos]] loved to embarrass serious opponents with jokes and irony and so I, too, occasionally wrote in a rather ironical vein. An example is the end of Chapter 1: 'anything goes' is not a 'principle' I hold... but the terrified exclamation of a rationalist who takes a closer look at history"}} and argued emphatically that science merits no exclusive monopoly of "dealing in knowledge" and that scientists have never operated within a distinct and narrowly self-defined tradition. In his essay ''[[Against Method]]'' he depicted the process of contemporary scientific education as a mild form of [[indoctrination]], intended for "making the history of science duller, simpler, more uniform, more 'objective' and more easily accessible to treatment by strict and unchanging rules".{{Sfn | Feyerabend | 1993 | pp = [https://books.google.com/books?id=8y-FVtrKeSYC&pg=PA11 viii, 9, 11]}}

{{blockquote|text=[S]cience can stand on its own feet and does not need any help from [[rationalist]]s, [[secular humanist]]s, [[Marxist]]s and similar religious movements; and&nbsp;... non-scientific cultures, procedures and assumptions can also stand on their own feet and should be allowed to do so&nbsp;... Science must be protected from ideologies; and societies, especially democratic societies, must be protected from science&nbsp;... In a democracy scientific institutions, research programmes, and suggestions must therefore be subjected to public control, there must be a separation of state and science just as there is a separation between state and religious institutions, and science should be taught as one view among many and not as the one and only road to truth and reality.|author=[[Paul Feyerabend]]|title=''Against Method''|source=p.&nbsp;viii{{Sfn | Feyerabend | 1993 | p = [https://books.google.com/books?id=8y-FVtrKeSYC&pg=PA11 viii]}}}}

===Pro-scientism===
Physicist and philosopher [[Mario Bunge]] used the term ''scientism'' with a favorable rather than pejorative sense in numerous books published during several decades,<ref>{{cite book |last=Bunge |first=Mario |year=1983 |title=Epistemology & Methodology II: Understanding the World |series=Treatise on Basic Philosophy |volume=6 |location=Dordrecht; Boston |publisher=[[D. Reidel]] |isbn=9789027716347 |oclc=9759870 |doi=10.1007/978-94-015-6921-7 |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=HXb8U35LfKMC&pg=PA263 263]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Mahner |first1=Martin |last2=Bunge |first2=Mario |date=1997 |title=Foundations of Biophilosophy |location=Berlin; New York |publisher=[[Springer-Verlag]] |isbn=3540618384 |oclc=36630019 |doi=10.1007/978-3-662-03368-5 |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=6is9AggSLMcC&pg=PA135 135] |s2cid=6273758 |quote=Finally, we should add a version of ''scientism''&nbsp;... This is the thesis that anything knowable and worth knowing can be known scientifically, and that science provides the best possible factual knowledge, even though it may, and does, in fact, contain errors. This form of scientism should not be mistaken for the neopositivist unification program, according to which every discipline should ultimately be reduced to one basic science, such as physics or psychology.}}</ref><ref name=Bunge2006>{{cite book |last=Bunge |first=Mario |date=2006 |title=Chasing Reality: Strife Over Realism |series=Toronto Studies in Philosophy |location=Toronto |publisher=[[University of Toronto Press]] |isbn=0802090753 |oclc=61174890 |doi=10.3138/9781442672857 |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=6GraKxazuOQC&pg=PA264 264] |quote=As for scientism, it is the thesis that the scientific method is the best strategy for attaining the more objective, more accurate, and deepest truths about facts of any kind, natural or social.&nbsp;... True, Hayek (1955) famously claimed that scientism is something quite different, namely, the attempt on the part of some social scientists to ape their colleagues in the natural sciences, in ignoring the inner life of their referents. But this arbitrary redefinition involves confusing naturalism, or reductionist materialism (as practised, e.g., by the sociobiologists), with scientism.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Bunge |first=Mario |date=2017 |chapter=Scientism |title=Doing Science: In the Light of Philosophy |location=Singapore |publisher=[[World Scientific]] |isbn=9789813202764 |oclc=959200429 |doi=10.1142/10333 |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=SwGyDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA137 137] |quote=Scientism is the thesis that ''all cognitive problems are best tackled by adopting the scientific approach'', also called 'the scientific attitude' and 'the scientific method.' While most contemporary philosophers reject scientism, arguably scientists practice it even if they have never encountered the word.}}</ref> and in articles with titles such as "In Defense of Realism and Scientism"<ref>{{cite book |last=Bunge |first=Mario |title=Annals of Theoretical Psychology |chapter=In Defense of Realism and Scientism |date=1986 |volume=4 |pages=23–26 |publisher=[[Springer-Verlag]] |doi=10.1007/978-1-4615-6453-9_3 |quote=As for scientism, I take it to be quite different from Tennessen's 'belief in some sort of ''scientific world view'' miraculously emanating from the main bulk of the testimony of the senses or so-called scientific results.' The brand of scientism I defend boils down to the thesis that scientific research (rather than the navel contemplation or the reading of sacred texts) can yield the best (truest and deepest) possible knowledge of real (concrete, material) things, be they fields or particles, brains, or societies, or what have you.&nbsp;... I take the scientific method, rather than any special results of scientific research, to be the very kernel of scientism. Consequently, I cannot accept Tennessen's implicit approval of Feyerabend's antimethodology or 'epistemological anarchism'—the latest version of radical skepticism.|isbn=978-1-4615-6455-3 }}</ref> and "In Defense of Scientism".<ref>{{cite journal |last=Bunge |first=Mario |date=December 2014 |title=In defense of scientism |journal=[[Free Inquiry]] |volume=35 |issue=1 |pages=24–31 |publisher=[[Council for Secular Humanism]] |url=https://www.hpsst.com/uploads/6/2/9/3/62931075/in_defense_of_scientism.pdf |quote=Scientism is the thesis that all cognitive problems concerning the world are best tackled adopting the scientific approach, also called 'the spirit of science' and 'the scientific attitude'. While most contemporary philosophers reject scientism, arguably scientists practice it even if they have never encountered the word. However, the correct meaning of 'scientism' has proved to be even more elusive than that of 'science'... |access-date=2019-09-19 |archive-date=2019-09-18 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190918223231/https://www.hpsst.com/uploads/6/2/9/3/62931075/in_defense_of_scientism.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> Bunge said that scientism should not be equated with inappropriate reductionism,<ref name=Bunge2006/> and he dismissed critics of science such as Hayek and Habermas as [[dogmatist]]s and [[obscurantist]]s:
{{Blockquote|text=To innovate in the young sciences it is necessary to adopt scientism. This is the methodological thesis that the best way of exploring reality is to adopt the scientific method, which may be boiled down to the rule "Check your guesses." Scientism has been explicitly opposed by dogmatists and obscurantists of all stripes, such as the neoliberal ideologist Friedrich von Hayek and the "critical theorist" Jürgen Habermas, a ponderous writer who managed to amalgamate Hegel, Marx, and Freud, and decreed that "science is the ideology of [[late capitalism]]."|author=[[Mario Bunge]]|source=''Evaluating Philosophies''<ref>{{cite book |last=Bunge |first=Mario |date=2012 |title=Evaluating Philosophies |series=Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science |volume=295 |location=New York |publisher=[[Springer-Verlag]] |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=n1FFbie7pR8C&pg=PA24 24] |isbn=9789400744073 |oclc=806947226 |doi=10.1007/978-94-007-4408-0}}</ref>}}

In 2018, philosophers [[Maarten Boudry]] and [[Massimo Pigliucci]] co-edited a book titled ''Science Unlimited? The Challenges of Scientism'' in which a number of chapters by philosophers and scientists defended scientism.<ref name="BoudryPigliucci2018">{{cite book |editor1-last=Boudry |editor1-first=Maarten |editor2-last=Pigliucci |editor2-first=Massimo |date=2017 |title=Science Unlimited?: The Challenges of Scientism |location=Chicago |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=0ApCDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA76 76] |isbn=9780226498003 |oclc=975442387 |doi=10.7208/chicago/9780226498287.001.0001}}</ref> In his chapter "Two Cheers for Scientism", [[Taner Edis]] wrote:
{{Blockquote|text=It is defensible to claim that scientific, philosophical, and humanistic forms of knowledge are continuous, and that a broadly naturalistic description of our world centered on natural science is correct&nbsp;... At the very least, such views are ''legitimate''—they may be mistaken, but not because of an elementary error, a confusion of science with ideology, or an offhand dismissal of the humanities. Those of us who argue for such a view are entitled to have two cheers for an ambitious conception of science; and if that is scientism, so be it.|author=[[Taner Edis]]|source="Two Cheers for Scientism"<ref name="BoudryPigliucci2018"/>}}

==Rhetoric of science==
{{main|Rhetoric of science}}
Thomas M. Lessl argued that religious themes persist in what he terms scientism, the [[public rhetoric]] of science.<ref name="Lessl1996"/> There are two methods of describing this idea of scientism: the epistemological method (the assumption that the scientific method trumps other ways of knowing) and the [[ontological]] method (that the rational mind represents the world and both operate in knowable ways). According to Lessl, the ontological method is an attempt to "resolve the conflict between rationalism and skepticism". Lessl also argued that without scientism, there would not be a scientific culture.<ref name="Lessl1996">{{cite journal|last=Lessl|first=Thomas M.|title=Naturalizing science: Two episodes in the evolution of a rhetoric of scientism|journal=Western Journal of Communication|date=Fall 1996|volume=60|issue=4|page=1|doi=10.1080/10570319609374555}}<!--|access-date=3/5/2014--></ref>

==Rationalization and modernity==
{{See also|Rationalization (sociology)|Antipositivism#Frankfurt School}}
In the introduction to his collected works on the [[sociology of religion]], [[Max Weber]] asked why "the scientific, the artistic, the political, or the economic development [elsewhere]&nbsp;... did not enter upon that path of rationalization which is peculiar to the [[Western world|Occident]]?" According to the German social theorist [[Jürgen Habermas]], "For Weber, the intrinsic (that is, not merely [[Contingency (philosophy)|contingent]]) relationship between [[modernity]] and what he called 'Occidental rationalism' was still self-evident." Weber described a process of rationalisation, [[disenchantment]] and the "disintegration of religious world views" that resulted in modern [[secularisation|secular]] societies and [[capitalism]].<ref name="Habermas1990">Habermas, Jürgen (1990), ''[[The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity]]'', Polity Press, {{ISBN|0-7456-0830-2}}, pp. 2–3.</ref>
{{blockquote|text="Modernization" was introduced as a technical term only in the 1950s. It is the mark of a theoretical approach that takes up Weber's problem but elaborates it with the tools of social-scientific [[Structural functionalism|functionalism]]&nbsp;... The theory of modernization performs two abstractions on Weber's concept of "modernity". It dissociates "modernity" from its modern European origins and stylizes it into a spatio-temporally neutral model for processes of social development in general. Furthermore, it breaks the internal connections between modernity and the historical context of Western [[rationalism]], so that processes of modernization&nbsp;... [are] no longer burdened with the idea of a completion of modernity, that is to say, of a goal state after which "[[postmodern]]" developments would have to set in.&nbsp;... Indeed it is precisely modernization research that has contributed to the currency of the expression "postmodern" even among social scientists.|author=[[Jürgen Habermas]]|title=''[[The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity]]''}}

Habermas is critical of pure [[instrumental rationality]], arguing that the "Social Life–World" of subjective experiencing is better suited to literary expression. Where the sciences select experiences that can be expressed in [[formal language]] using general definitions, the literary arts select private, unrepeatable experiences where definitions are generated through "[[intersubjectivity]] of mutual understanding in each concrete case".<ref name="Olson2008">{{cite book |first=R. |last=Olson |date=2008 |title=Science and scientism in nineteenth-century Europe |publisher=University of Illinois Press |isbn=978-0-252-07433-2 |lccn=2007005146 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=h8C7fe50J0AC&pg=PA1 |page=4 |access-date=2016-01-27 |archive-date=2016-07-31 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160731183052/https://books.google.com/books?id=h8C7fe50J0AC&pg=PA1 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first1=J |last1=Habermas |first2=JJ |last2=Shapiro |date=1971 |title=Toward a rational society: student protest, science, and politics |format=paperback |publisher=Beacon Press |isbn=978-0-8070-4177-2 |lccn=73121827 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cW7PmVj7kzQC&pg=PA50 |pages=50–51 |access-date=2016-01-27 |archive-date=2016-07-31 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160731182652/https://books.google.com/books?id=cW7PmVj7kzQC&pg=PA50 |url-status=live }}</ref> Habermas quoted writer [[Aldous Huxley]] in order to juxtapose the "social life-world" and the "worldless universe of facts" underscoring the duality of literature and science:
{{blockquote |text=
The world with which literature deals is the world in which human beings are born and live and finally die; the world in which they love and hate, in which they experience triumph and humiliation, hope and despair; the world of sufferings and enjoyments, of madness and common sense, of silliness, cunning and wisdom; the world of social pressures and individual impulses, of reason against passion, of instincts and conventions, of shared language and unsharable feelings and sensations.
[...]
[The scientist] is the inhabitant of a radically different universe--not the universe of given appearances, but the world of inferred fine structures, not the experienced world of unique events and diverse qualities, but the world of quantified regularities.
|author=[[Aldous Huxley]]|title=''[[Literature and Science]]''}}

==See also==
{{Portal|Philosophy|Religion}}
{{Div col|colwidth=20em}}
* [[Anti-technology]]
* [[Antireductionism]]
* [[Cargo cult science]]
* [[Conflict thesis]]
* [[Consequentialism]]
* [[Déformation professionnelle]]
* [[Demarcation problem]]
* [[Eliminative materialism]]
* [[Francis Bacon]]
* [[Greedy reductionism]]
* [[High modernism]]
* [[Materialism]]
* [[Non-overlapping magisteria]]
* [[Pseudoskepticism]]
* [[Radical empiricism]]
* [[Relativism]]
* [[Science and the Catholic Church]]
* [[Science of morality]]
* [[Science wars]]
* [[Scientific management]]
* [[Scientific mythology]]
* [[Scientific realism]]
* [[Scientific reductionism]]
* [[Scientific imperialism]]
* [[Scientific skepticism]]
* [[Scientistic materialism]]
* [[Sokal affair]]
* [[Technological dystopia]]
* [[New Frontier]]
* [[Post-scarcity economy]]
* [[Technocentrism]]
* [[Technological utopianism]]
* [[Techno-progressivism]]
* [[Progress]]
* [[Worldview]]
{{div col end}}

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}

==Bibliography==
* {{Citation |last1 = Feyerabend | first1 = Paul | date= 1993 | title= Against Method | edition=3rd |publisher=Verso |isbn = 978-0-86091-646-8 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=8y-FVtrKeSYC|orig-year=First published 1975}}.
* {{cite journal |last=Haack |first=Susan |author-link=Susan Haack |date=2012 |title=Six Signs of Scientism |journal=Logos & Episteme |volume=3 |issue=1 |pages=75–95 |doi=10.5840/logos-episteme20123151 |url=https://philarchive.org/archive/HAASSOv1 |quote=We need to avoid both under-estimating the value of science, and over-estimating it.&nbsp;... One side too hastily dismisses science; the other too hastily defers to it. My present concern, of course, is with the latter failing. It is worth noting that the English word 'scientism' wasn't always, as it is now, pejorative.|doi-access=free }}
* {{Cite journal |last=Mizrahi |first=Moti |date=July 2017 |title=What's So Bad About Scientism? |journal=[[Social Epistemology (journal)|Social Epistemology]] |volume=31 |issue=4 |pages=351–367 |doi=10.1080/02691728.2017.1297505 |s2cid=151762259 |url=https://philarchive.org/archive/MIZWSBv1 |quote=I have argued that scientism should be understood as the thesis that scientific knowledge is the ''best'' knowledge we have, i.e., ''weak scientism''. I have shown that scientific knowledge can be said to be better than non-scientific knowledge both quantitatively and qualitatively.}}
* {{Citation | first = Gregory R | last = Peterson | quote = the best way to understand the charge of scientism is as a kind of logical fallacy involving improper usage of science or scientific claims | date = 2003 | title = Demarcation and the Scientistic Fallacy | journal = [[Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science]] | volume = 38 | number = 4 | pages = 751–61 | doi = 10.1111/j.1467-9744.2003.00536.x| doi-access = free }}.
* {{cite book |editor1-last=Ridder |editor1-first=Jeroen de |editor2-last=Peels |editor2-first=Rik |editor3-last=Woudenberg |editor3-first=René van |date=2018 |title=Scientism: Prospects and Problems |volume=1 |location=New York |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |isbn=978-0190462758 |oclc=949911467 |doi=10.1093/oso/9780190462758.001.0001 |quote=This collection is one of the first to develop and assess scientism as a serious philosophical position.}}

==External links==
{{Wiktionary|scientism}}
* {{Citation | url = https://www.lewissociety.org/scientism/ | title = CS Lewis: Science and Scientism | date = 9 April 2018 | publisher = Lewis society}}.
* {{Citation | url = http://www.aaas.org/spp/dser/dialogue/community_dialogue/burnett.shtml | publisher = American Association for the Advancement of Science | title = Community dialogue | last = Burnett | contribution = What is Scientism? | url-status = dead | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120702182233/http://www.aaas.org/spp/dser/dialogue/community_dialogue/burnett.shtml | archive-date = 2012-07-02 }}.
* {{Citation | url = http://biologos.org/blog/monopolizing-knowledge-part-1-science-and-scientism | publisher = The Biologos Foundation | contribution = Science and Scientism | title = Monopolizing knowledge | type = [[World Wide Web]] log | access-date = 2012-07-29 | archive-date = 2015-04-27 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150427162736/http://biologos.org/blog/monopolizing-knowledge-part-1-science-and-scientism | url-status = dead }}.
*{{Cite IEP |url-id=sci-ideo/#H6 |title=Science and Ideology § Science as Ideology: Scientism |first=Eric C. |last=Martin}}

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