Models, Politics, Populations, and Public Science in times of Pandemic (IV); on Ernest Nagel and the role of Philosophy of Science

In the midst of actual and impending disaster, men are inclined to listen to any voice speaking with sufficient authority; and during periods of social crisis, when rational methods of inquiry supply no immediate solutions for pressing problems, spokesmen for institu­tional and philosophic theologies find a ready audience for a sys­tematic disparagement of the achievements of empirical science. Ideas which the advance of knowledge had partially driven under­ground during periods of fair social weather, are then insolently proclaimed as panaceas for public and private ills. The assured methods of scientific control and understanding, because they effect no wholesale resolution of problems and because they yield no con­clusions beyond the possibility of error and correction, are then declared to be unsuitable guides for rational living.
The mounting economic and political tensions of our own age have not failed to produce a literature of this type. From various quarters-from men of science, historians of ideas, as well as out­spoken representatives of theological systems-there has come a flood of criticism of modern science and of the secular naturalism which has accompanied its growth. The criticism has been neither uniform nor consistent. But the common objective of much of it has been the limitation of the authority of science, and the institution of methods other than those of controlled experimentation for dis­covering the natures and values of things. Many recent evaluations of science have thus had an obviously malicious intent; and the pres­ent essay will seek to determine briefly to what extent, in the case of several influential types of philosophies of science, good sense has been sacrificed to such malice.--Ernest Nagel (1943) "Malicious Philosophies of Science" Partisan Review (10), jan-feb, reprinted in Sovereign Reason, (1054), p. 18.*

Today is the fourth in a series of posts (see the first here inspired by Phillipe Lemoine; and, inspired by Stegenga, the second here and third here).

I return (recall) to Nagel's brilliantly titled piece because Nagel is explicitly committed to defending the "authority of science," perhaps even unlimited authority of science in a time when it is under attack. In this piece from which I quoted Nagel does not define science, but inter alia he associates it with "controlled experimentation" and methods that allow "the possibility of error and correction" and "objective measures ((33)when discussing well-being). In addition, he clearly believes that science is often a "painfully slow road" (31), which is why there will be circumstances "where rational methods of inquiry supply no immediate solutions for pressing problems."  This entails that sometimes some questions will have to be answered with appeal to "brute facts" when theoretical resources have bottomed out (29). 

I was reminded of Nagel's piece because of the discussion in Stegenga's essay  "Fast Science and the Philosophy of Science" (first published at Auxiliary Hypothesis BJPS and then Dailynous). In it contemporary anxieties about the role of philosophy of science are explored with a wide variety of leading practitioners. At one point Stegena notes:

Many philosophers of science are concerned with the demise in public trust of science, evident in debates about teaching intelligent design in classrooms or in mistrust of climate science. Conversely, many philosophers of science are concerned about excessive trust in particular domains of science, exemplified by, say, unreliable research on pharmaceuticals.  Of course, it is perfectly consistent to hold that science is the best means to learn about our world, while also criticizing sloppy science. 

One further, underlying anxiety we philosophers of science have is to what degree is the authority of the fast, policy apt sciences worth defending.  As Jonathan Fuller puts it in a very thoughtful and illuminating essay, "The normal process of scientific scrutiny and peer review has given way to a fast track from research offices to media headlines and policy panels." Yet this fast science now lend(s) authority to policies with far-reaching consequences pursued by many governments. So, for example, I sense in my sometime co-author, Eric Winsberg, a concern that doubling down on this fast, policy apt science, will risk discrediting the authority of science down stream.  

Now, Nagel's essay is superb at discrediting the attempts by those who wish to argue for the  limitation of the authority of science. (He engages Gilson, Whitehead, Knight, Blanchard, Maritain, Balfour, etc.) Many of their arguments are familiar, and so his essay remains worth re-reading. And since Nagel is the great champion (within pragmatism) of scientific philosophy, his defense of the authority of science comes as no surprise. But if one happens to be reading Nagel in circumstances not entirely unlike the ones he diagnoses in the first sentence of the quoted passage, one is also left with an unexpected conundrum. Let me explain.

By Nagel's explicit lights, there will be circumstances in which slow science cannot offer "immediate solutions for pressing problems." Simultaneously, Nagel's position presupposes there is no such thing as fast science that does offer reliable solutions for urgent problems. To put this in terms of Kofi Bright and Bradley, "We are going to have to respond to COVID19 in absence of the sort of knowledge we should ideally prefer when making rational decisions of great social import." (I quote them because they represent the most accessible and pertinent example of the stance of a scientific philosopher today.)

That is to say, Nagel does not confront the circumstances in which the authority of science is imperfect (and known to be so), and where appealing to it may risk its further authority when it is needed and can be relied upon (again).  Jonathan Fuller's answer to these circumstances is that even so we must rely on imperfect science, all the while trying to "combine theory with evidence and make use of diverse data while demanding data of increasingly higher quality," but keep a "critical" attitude. Kofi Bright and Bradley advocate disciplined decision making, but with heroic awareness of the "responsibility of hard choices" and the possibility even inevitability of "tragedy." Neither Fuller nor Kofi Bright/Bradley really answer Winsberg's question whether relying on flawed science now is worth the risk if it undermines future credibility.

Now, one may think that 'given that we must choose, we may as well choose while relying on an imperfect instrument instead of no instrument. And if we live another day, and need to rebuild the authority of that instrument, we'll fight that battle then.' Perhaps, Winsberg's concern is overblown. 

Of course, it need not be true that an flawed imperfect** instrument is better than no instrument. Sometimes when imperfect means flawed then imperfect instruments can be worse than no instruments. There are, for example, a small sample of airplane crashes where if the pilot hadn't been so trained up, or reliant, on the instruments good sense could have saved the passengers. And if one knows one is in those circumstances then it is foolish to stick with imperfect tools.

The problem is that Nagel's version of scientific philosophy can't really acknowledge the possibility of the equivalent to good sense in my example in the previous paragraph. That's a problem with his philosophy of science.+

As an aside, it is pretty clear what works when a pandemic is about to develop, and Taiwan, New Zealand, and South Korea have all shown how to execute it in ways that are sensitive to scientific authority and respectful of political and civil liberties. The problem elsewhere is there is no obvious good sense once that moment has passed and so one is stuck with the imperfections of fast, policy apt science.

Let me close, Nagel is very disciplined about recognizing that there occasions when the authority of science also means one has no answers. I think, then, he would urge caution rather than relying on fast science. It would be nice to be able to say in such circumstances, let's gather more evidence first before we act. My own view is that, more often than not, we should be willing to delay until we have authoritative guide in science. But, of course, no action can also carry a cost, and there are times where this stance is also foolish. 

But if we must choose -- be it in the heroic-tragic mode of Kofi Bright and & Bradley or in the critical mode of Fuller (these are sometimes compatible) --, then I don't see why philosophy of science can't allow that one is guided by "mystery;" to pick an example that exercises Nagel, say, with the thought that "God is" her "own cause" (29) and, while choosing, embrace one's fate joyfully with prayer, or without.

*I thank Ádám Tuboly for research assistance.

+Another problem is that it is unclear how his science can help decide between alternative outcomes that may have different political values attached to it. So, it can be granted that:

every rational appraisal of values must take cognizance of the findings of the natural and social sciences; for if the existential conditions and consequences of the realization of values are not noted, acceptance of a scheme of values is a species of undisciplined romanticism. Accordingly, unless values are to be affirmed on the basis of un­controlled intuition and impulse, all the elements of scientific anal­ysis-observation, imaginative reconstruction, dialectic elaboration of hypotheses, and experimental verification-must be employed. (34)

But it doesn't follow that scientific analysis can decide which values and consequences to endorse.

**I thank Steve Downes for alerting me to the problem here.