Philosophical guiding principles for research in the ... · PDF fileResearch in the Humanities ... and by his theory of general relativity (TGR) ... ly has an overview over several

Philosophical Guiding Principles for Research in the Humanities

Dr. Lothar Arendes

Abstract: On the basis of our modern scientific conception of the world heuristic guiding principles for research in psychology, sociology, and philosophy are described. Besides other problems research areas like the problem of consciousness, action theory, the ontological na-ture of social values and norms, factors of social change, and the elaboration of new social and international values for our globalized world are treated.

1. Methodology of science and of natural philosophy

During some centuries most scientists believed that science would come to truth by an induction from experimental data to all scientific theories. On the side of philosophy it was primarily Karl Popper (using ideas from David Hume) who put an end to the misconception of inductive proofs of theories. Shortly before Popper it was Einstein who demonstrated in his research that even very well confirmed theories (for example, Newton's great theories) can be replaced by new and better theories. There is neither any kind of logical method to get the basic concepts of scientific theories, nor is there a principle of induction with which you can make inductive, i.e., logically valid inferences from experimental data to theories (Popper 1935).

How scientific theory construction actually runs can well be described over-view-like with the help of a letter from Albert Einstein. In a letter to a friend he explicitly explained his epistemological opinions (Einstein 1960). In this letter he gives a sketch of the scientific method, and in this sketch there are three le-vels (Fig. 1). Directly given to us are sensual experiences which form the lowest level, the basis of research. The highest level is made up by theoretical axioms, and between the axioms and the sensual experiences there is the middle level of theoretical statements, the theorems. The scientist starts at the lowest level of sense data and tries to arrive at the highest level of axioms. Having reached this level he or she derives from the axioms the theorems which are finally again compared with the direct experiences of the lowest level to check their truth. Ac-cording to Einstein, in this cycle from sense experiences via axioms and theo-

rems back to experiences only the step from the axioms to the theorems is a lo-gical transition. Theorems are logically deduced from axioms. The step from ex-periences to axioms cannot be attained in a logical way, there is only an intui-tive, a psychological relation between both. According to Einstein, the testing of theorems by experience similarly belongs to the extra-logical sphere because the theoretical concepts of theorems have no logical connection with sense experi-ences. Altogether scientific research is not logical in two ways: On one hand we have to formulate axioms, on the other hand theoretical concepts must be brought into relation with sense data.

Fig. 1: Einstein's sketch of scientific methodology. A: system of axioms, S: sentence (theo-rem), E: direct experience (sense data).

The history of science, especially that of physics and biology, shows that scienti-fic disciplines pass through several methodological stages during their develop-ment. At least three stages can be distinguished. At the beginning scientists collect as many empirical data as possible about their research object and sum-marize these in general statements. Sometime questions emerge which cannot be answered with this method. Research now comes into the stage as described by Einstein in his letter: On the basis of observational data scientists try to formula-te axioms from which theorems can be derived which must be in agreement with experience. If a good theory has been found in such a way two things can happen. On the one hand it can occur that new experimental data cannot be ex-plained by the theory. Then scientists again try to find a new theory on the basis of these new data and in the way of Einstein's method of finding the new axioms by intuition. In this way quantum mechanics (QM) was discovered: A new theo-ry had become necessary in order to explain the intermittent atomic spectra. However, it can also occur the following: The available theory explains all known data but the scientists are dissatisfied with the fundamental principles, the basic concepts and the axioms, of the theory, and therefore they strive to find a new theory. A good example is the theory of gravitation. Einstein wanted to fulfill the principle of general relativity, and because of theoretical reasons he

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had to combine general relativity with gravitation. In addition he was dissatis-fied with the fact that Newton's force of gravitation was an action at distance, and by his theory of general relativity (TGR) Einstein eliminated this "spooky action at distance" from gravitational physics. Unfortunately action at distance again emerged short time later in QM. And again: Although QM can explain the experimental data very accurately Einstein wanted to have another theory.

In sum we can distinguish the following three research stages: 1. collecting em-pirical data and summarizing them in general statements; 2. the effort to come from empirical data to theoretical concepts and axioms, and to compare deduced theorems with experience; 3. the replacement of theories by new theories with more acceptable principles or characteristics. How such a better theory should look like is not prescribed by any methodological rule and is judged by many scientists differently. Here scientists are led by guiding ideas which I will ex-plain in more detail below. A new theory is accepted by the scientific communi-ty usually only if it correctly predicts new empirical results in addition to those of the old theory.

Fig. 2: Methodology of natural philosophy. A: system of axioms, S: sentence (theorem), E: direct experience, WV: world view, GP: guiding principles.

Methodologically particularly interesting are the questions how the intuitive step from data to axioms of the second research stage (which Einstein described in his letter) does occur, and what kinds of principles scientists use in the third research stage. As cognitive psychology could show heuristic ideas play an important role during problem solving if the problems are very complicated (Dörner 1979). Heuristic ideas are guiding ideas which can eventually help to solve the problem, they are assumptions about the question what elements the

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solution of the problem could contain. Gerald Holton (1973) described such gui-ding ideas within the research of great scientists like Einstein and Kepler. These heuristic assumptions make clear why, for example, Einstein preferred certain theories and rejected others although they were confirmed by empirical data. In brief, Einstein used the following guiding ideas: preference of partial differential equations, unity and great range of theories, parsimony in the number of ontolo-gical entities, necessity, symmetry, simplicity, causality, completeness, and con-tinuum.

An important function of natural philosophy in science is therefore to supply heuristic guiding ideas to scientists. Nowadays scientific research is on the one hand highly specialized, on the other hand it is very time consuming so that a scientist has hardly the time to inform himself or herself about several other research areas or even about several other scientific disciplines. The pressure to publish is so high that there is hardly enough time for the epistemological analysis even of the own discipline. The philosopher of science, however, usual-ly has an overview over several disciplines, because of a thorough literature research, and has the necessary epistemological training to analyze and to com-pare the essential concepts and statements of several theories of different scienti-fic disciplines. The systematic analysis and the comparison of basic concepts and structures of theories from different scientific disciplines is therefore done primarily by philosophers today. In a second step the natural philosopher can try to integrate all the scientific details to a consistent synopsis which means to design a worldview or a global conception of the world. However, the synthesis of a global world conception does not only give a telescope-like summary of al-ready available scientific knowledge but can also serve the scientists for an orientation of future research. From a global world conception guiding ideas can be deduced which can be helpful during experimental research and during theo-ry construction. Democrit‘s worldview, for example, led to a search for the smallest building blocks, atoms, which nowadays led up to quark theory. Apart from the analysis of the essential statements of scientific theories and the syn-thesis of a global world conception the philosopher thus has the additional task to promote scientific research by supplying natural philosophical guiding ideas, derived from a global world conception.

In the following I will at first give a short summary of the conception of the world as it is indicated by present scientific theories. Subsequently, I will deal with basic problems of psychology and sociology, whereby I will make use of methodological-epistemological arguments and of the world conception de-scribed before in order to formulate guiding ideas for scientific research. These guiding ideas are not to represent irrefutable truth but are heuristic suggestions which will perhaps lead to empirically testable theories. In the last chapter I will

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briefly indicate what effects our world conception and the guiding ideas have for philosophical activities.

2. Fundamentals of the scientific world conception

In the twentieth century science came to a multiplicity of results but at the same time our overall view of nature became more and more unclear. For this reason I worked out the essential structures of our world how they are described by present theories of physics, chemistry, and biology in a book (Arendes b), and this scientific world conception can be summarized as follows:

The world consists of an unobservable and everywhere existant basic substance; an ether or prima materia. In this basic substance the laws of nature are imple-mented as an information which controls the creation of observable phenomena and their movements. Entities like the observable matter, spacetime, and con-sciousness are created from ether in processes of emergence. Several billions of years ago the observable matter was created in a Big Bang from the ether, or from vacuum as people call it in physics at present time. Since the Big Bang the universe permanently expands, and the initially homogeneous or random dis-tribution of elementary particles became, in the course of time by a process of self-organization, structured systems: at first atoms, thereafter molecules, organisms, societies, and finally systems of societies. Although all these systems consist of several objects, they are able to exist as whole units. This is most sali-ent with our own body. We consist of many molecules but nevertheless believe to be a unit with personal identity because the movements of the individual mo-lecules are co-ordinated with the behavior of the total organism. The demarca-tion of units in relation to the environment is very often not complete; individual units can again be components of superordinate systems. The organs of a body (stomach, heart, brain etc.) are units of its own but nevertheless parts of the enti-re organism. Many of the objects which developed in the course of self-organi-zation actually possess a very complex nesting structure. Nesting means that se-veral components together form a unit, several such units again form an even larger system, many of such systems again a superordinate system etc. In such a way several proteins, for example, form an ion channel, many ion channels form, together with other objects, a cell membrane, this is again part of a brain cell, many brain cells make up a brain nucleus, many nuclei are components of the brain which is part of a human who belongs to a society. This interlocking of objects corresponds to a hierarchical stratification of the natural laws which con-trol these objects. The lowest layers consist of those laws which control the simplest objects like liveless things. Above it the layer of the biological laws is

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situated, and above this layer are those of psychological, sociological and those of international subjects. Liveless objects are controlled by the laws of physics and chemistry; however, for example, if ions are parts of a body then their physical laws are modified by the laws of biology; similarly humans are mem-bers of a society, and their psychological behavior is shaped by social laws. Hence, this conception of a layering of laws means that the higher laws de-termine the exact form of the lower ones. This is also called downward causa-tion; the higher level of a system influences the behavior of the lower one, the behavior of the components of the system. Within the realm of microobjects (elementary particles) or of aggregates with a small number of particles chance seems to play a fundamental role, whereas the behavior of macroobjects, which consist of very many constituents, is subject to the causality principle. But the random behavior of microobjects can be carried over to the behavior of macro-objects in certain situations. The causality principle means that any change of an object movement is caused by another event. In addition to this principle, the processes of very complex systems – processes within an organism or the beha-vior of the whole organism – are generally teleonom, i.e. goal-directed.

On the basis of this scientific world conception I now want to discuss some fundamental problems of psychology and sociology.

3. Psychology

Psychology is the science of the psyche, and this means above all that psycholo-gists should examine cognition and consciousness. Besides the explanation of cognition, science has to describe consciousness and to explore how it is gene-rated and to which it serves. Today consciousness is not any more a phenome-non which cannot be investigated scientifically; it is perhaps a natural compound property of the brain which we can roughly compare with emergent properties of statistically distributed many-particle aggregates like temperature and entropy. In an earlier paper (1996) I proposed to conceive visual consciousness as a physical field analogous to spacetime (which is a correlate of energy according to Einstein's field equations). In addition it is possible that unconscious cogni-tive processes take place not only in the material brain but also in the ether or vacuum. These are, however, research topics which primarily belong to bio-physics and psychobiology, and therefore I will not go further into it here.

The fact that consciousness serves, among other things, to control behavior ma-kes psychologists examine the external behavior of humans and animals. In its extreme form this was degenerated in behaviorism in the way that psychologists

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denied the existence of consciousness, or that they declared it to be not explora-ble scientifically. Therefore they exclusively investigated the external behavior of living beings. But consciousness can be investigated with scientific methods. This is particularly obvious in psychophysics where lawful relations between physical stimuli and internal experiences of perceptual consciousness are explo-red (von Campenhausen 1981). The content of consciousness is objectively in-vestigable in the sense that all persons should be able to observe introspectively the claimed phenomena within themselves. Therefore introspective reports are again used in psychology. Very important are introspective descriptions of cons-ciousness when we try to solve the mind-body problem in psychobiology. To explain consciousness physiologically – this means at the beginning to correlate conscious phenomena with physiological processes – we need a very accurate and if possible a mathematical description of consciousness. Introspective rese-arch, as it was common in Germany at the beginning of the twentieth century (Hussy 1984), must again be done as much as possible in order to get a mathe-matical description of consciousness as a prerequisite for a biological mind-body theory. History of philosophy can give interesting guiding ideas to psychologists for this research project. In philosophical phenomenology Edmund Husserl, for example, tried to give a pure description of conscious phenomena, without any philosophical theorizing. Husserl's main research topic was one of the most dif-ficult aspects of consciousness, the experience of the semantic interpretation of conscious phenomena, which is called the aspect of intentionality in philosophi-cal phenomenology (Husserl 1993). There are many other authors in phenome-nology from which psychologists can get interesting suggestions. However, these ideas should not be accepted uncritically but must be explored intersubjec-tively with scientific methods by the psychological community. Philosophical authors – so also the late Husserl – are inclined to blend purely descriptive phe-nomenology with additional philosophical views. To psychology it is only important to describe that and how we, for example, experience patterns of co-lors, with which dimensions they can be described (hue, bright, saturation), how we experience their meaning in relation to reality, with which dimensions this aspect of intentionality can be described, what kind of scaling can be used for it etc.

Introspective research is done still too little in psychology but another important and now dominant psychological school developed after the end of behaviorism. This is the so-called cognitive psychology which investigates the kind of our in-formation processing. Cognitive psychology orients itself at the computer me-taphor for the investigation of thinking (Hussy 1984; Dörner 1979). Cognitive processes are described with flow charts, as it is common in computer science when writing programs, and are simulated with computers.

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Apart from the exploration of cognitive processes, which are very often uncons-cious, psychology should not ignore introspective methods. In addition there are other criticisms of cognitive psychology which I now want to mention. Neuro-physiologists can ask how the computer-like information processing is imple-mented in nature (in the brain or elsewhere). We know about the brain that it does process information very much in parallel which present computers do not do to such an extent. Cognitive psychologists can reply to this that on the one hand future computers will process information much more in parallel than present computers. On the other hand humans seem to have only little parallel processing on higher cognitive levels like that of conscious thinking (Hussy 1984). Another criticism from physiology is the fact that the brain has altogether only little similarity with the structure of a computer. The brain seems to have no separate memory or storage areas like the computer, and the dynamic behavi-or is also different: A computer processes its programs according to logical rules and thereby reaches its final states. But some of the present models of neural networks assume, for example, that neural assemblies change according to dyna-mical principles of non-linear differential or difference equations so that they, for example, reach their final states by running into attractors. The relaxation into an attractor in accordance with physical principles is a quite different pro-cess than the processing of logical rules or algorithms. It is true, the models of neural networks are simulated on computers but these are only simulations; the actual data processing of computers takes place according to the rules of compu-ter science and not as relaxation into attractors. Whether people can design computers in future which operate like our brains remains to be seen; but then the kind of description of cognitive psychology would have to change if psycho-logists furthermore wanted to use the computer metaphor. Beyond that cognitive psychologists can answer the following to these physiological criticisms. First of all it can be argued that scientific theories are anyway only approximations to truth, and it cannot be excluded that scientists will find more adequate forms of description later. In addition, it is also possible that our cognitive behavior con-tains both, decisions in accordance with logical rules as in computer science, and the movement of the system into an attractor. The kind of description with algo-rithms and flow charts could be adequate on a higher level of the decision tree; for example, when describing which sub-goals are to be achieved. But the reali-zation of the lowest sub-goals could take place in accordance with differential equations. As I elaborated elsewhere (Arendes 1996, a, b), it is conceivable that some information processing could take place within the ether in addition to pro-cesses within the brain, and it is conceivable that natural laws could consists of two levels: teleonomic processes for the fixation of attractors, and the usual cau-sal (mechanistic) movement into attractors. The teleonomic fixation of parame-ters of differential equations for the creation of attractors could take place in ether in accordance with principles of computer science and hence with cogni-

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tive psychology. The reaching of the final sub-goals, however, could occur by relaxations into attractors within the brain.

Beside the introspective research method and the question about the way of in-formation processing there is a third and very important problem area in psycho-logy which I want to treat here: the confrontation of behavior theory and action theory. In behaviorism there are two learning paradigms, classical and operant conditioning. Classical conditioning begins with a behavior which can be relea-sed in a reflex-like manner by an exterior stimulus; for example, the twinkling of the eye during an air blast against it. If you repeatedly pair such a stimulus with another stimulus (for example, a tone given at the same time) then this second stimulus can release the reaction alone (without the air blast) after some trials. In contrast to this you start in operant conditioning with a behavior which a person shows spontaneously and possibly casually now and then. Everytime this beha-vior occurs you give a reward to the person or animal; for instance, a food pellet. By such rewards or by punishments you make the person or animal execute certain behaviors more frequently or make them avoid it. Thus, taken together, outside events (as releasing stimuli or as rewards and punishments) play a central role in classical and operant conditioning, in behaviorism. In contrast to this, internal, mental states play a central role in action theory (s. Reimann et al. 1985). According to this theory humans are mainly concerned about goals which they want to reach. Behaviorism also assumes that there are internal, intervening variables between stimulus and reaction, but in behaviorism external events play the most important role whereas internal variables in action theory.

Behavior theory is not any more the dominating way of explanation for human activities in psychology but it is nevertheless very informative to realize why be-haviorism was the dominating psychological school in the middle of the last century. Behaviorism fulfilled two methodological demands in a particularly simple form. On the one hand it was against the introspective method which was rejected because we cannot measure internal states in such an objective way as the strength of an air blast or the number of food pellets. On the other hand be-haviorists wanted to orient themselves at the successful natural sciences which strive for causal explanations. Contrary to teleological explanations of action theory (achieving goals) stimulus-reaction relations of behaviorism fulfill causal patterns very well: If event A occurs (a stimulus) then event B will happen (a re-action). This is not so simple in the case of operant conditioning but behaviorists nevertheless found several laws which can be examined in an impressing way in the lab – mainly, however, with animals like rats and pigeons.

Behaviorism was replaced by cognitive psychology already some time ago. As described above, cognitive psychologists try to explain human activities on the

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basis of the type of information processing of computers, and since computers work by programs to reach certain goals it is an implicit part of cognitive psy-chology that humans want to reach goals. Action theory is often not treated in its explicit form at the universities in classes about »general psychology« but goals, motives etc. are explicitly discussed in classes about »motivation« and »perso-nality psychology«.

The fact that humans are not passive behavioral machines but active and goal-oriented is again accepted in psychology. Nevertheless I want to give some ar-guments in favor of action theory. That humans want to achieve goals is an in-trospective fact, and that it is fundamentally important for psychology to do in-trospective research was already mentioned earlier. Introspective reports can be objective in the way that everybody should be able to observe the reported phe-nomena in his or her own consciousness (objectivity as intersubjectivity). And the pretended phenomenon that humans want to reach goals does everybody know from himself or herself. Hence, it is objective or intersubjectiv. In addition to this argument it is worth to mention that psychologists should find goals as a form of explanation even when adopting a natural scientific way of research. Even many biologists believe that goals are needed to explain biological pro-cesses, and they call it teleonomic explanations (see Mayr 1991): The heart beats in order to make the blood circulate; one of the functions of kidneys is to deposit waste products; the brain serves to process information etc. The bio-physicist Chauvet (1995) suggested to describe goal-directed processes within the framework of non-linear differential equations (chaos theory) as movements from so-called sources to links. In a similar way I suggested (Arendes a) to ex-plain teleonomic processes on the level of the parameters of non-linear diffe-rential equations. The most important difference between biological and psycho-logical processes is that psychological goals are very often conscious whereas biological processes (for instance, in the kidneys) are unconscious; but the existence of consciousness is not denied by natural scientists. A further impor-tant difference is that processes within organs usually always fulfill their func-tions and this happens in an automatical way, whereas humans often have to fight for their goals and nevertheless often do not reach them. These differences clarify very well one of the theses of layer theory according to which similar laws but in a modified form can occur on different system levels; for example, on biological and psychological levels (Hartmann 1949a, 1950).

The layering character of the world can also be used to clarify the relation between behaviorism and action theory. That is to say three main levels of hu-man activities can be differentiated. The lowest level is the behavior which reflex physiologists and behaviorists explore: An air blast against the eye causes a twinkling, loud noise from the side causes an orienting reflex, sugar on the

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tongue causes salivation etc. This automatic and conditionable behavior is over-laid by the level of actions. Human activities are not primarily elicited by external stimuli but come from interior and serve to reach goals. Neurophysiolo-gically this layering relation of action and behavior is reflected in the fact that superordinate brain centers can adjust parameters of lower brain centers. Again overlaid are these two activity levels, which are examined primarily by biolo-gists and psychologists, by a third level which is examined by sociologists. This is the activity to fulfill social values and norms; this is called the "sociological theory of action" (s. Miebach 1991; Reimann et al. 1985). Values and norms of a society are, compared with the psychological level, something new, an emergent system property of the society what will be discussed in the next chapter about sociology. But the effort to fulfill norms and to realize values also has something in common with the two levels below. On the one hand social values and norms are given to us by other people, and in this sense they are something exterior like the external stimuli of reflex physiology or behaviorism. On the other hand va-lues and norms are internalized by the persons during the process of socializati-on. The values and norms are taken up and become, in addition to the more egoistic goals, further internal goals which the persons strive to reach, and in this sense they are relevant for psychological action theory.

4. Sociology

In sociology there are several ontological and in this way natural scientific re-search problems. These basic problems of sociology will be discussed in this chapter on the basis of the world conception presented in the second chapter. I will deal with the questions whether a society is an own ontological entity obey-ing to other laws than those of physics, whether sociology is to look for laws in-stead of just to describe the historical-cultural and unique social situation, whe-ther sociology is to look for an understanding instead of an explanation of social processes, which factors are decisive for social change, and what values and norms are.

One of the most important persons of the history of sociology is Durkheim who believed that a society would be a special ontological entity with its own laws (Jonas 1981). His critics answered that this would be a false metaphysical doc-trine; there would not be a metaphysical cloud above the heads of the individual persons which would be the social, instead a society would only consist of the individual persons and their actions. Durkheim's most important opponent was Max Weber. He believed that collective concepts like state, society, and group should be reduced to the actions of the individual persons, and therefore sociolo-

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gical explanations should only be based on the motives of persons. This point of controversy is similar to the biological problem of reduction which is the questi-on whether all biological processes can be explained with the physical laws of lifeless matter or whether there are special biological entities and laws. Since it is already accepted in physics and biology that there are emergent properties in nature on higher system levels we can assume that there are emergent phenome-na in sociology, too. Since there is emergence in physics (e.g., temperature, entropy, enthalpy) this is no metaphysical error but a scientific assumption which can be explored with the methods of science.

In each society there is a multiplicity of system properties which cannot be ex-plained solely by the actions of individual persons. Scientific rationality is a ty-pical compound property because without thorough literature study and without the criticizing publications of colleagues no single scientist could overcome his own idiosyncrasies and many of his favorite but wrong preconceptions. And science has made so much progress that today no young scientist can learn a research paradigm without the help of older scientists and without reading the li-terature. Other typical social system phenomena are art, moral, justice, role be-havior in family, and altogether the fulfillment of social norms. From an ontolo-gical point of view a society is a unit which contains individual persons but which is more than the sum of all persons, just as a body is not only the accumu-lation of molecules or cells. This difference between individual persons and global social conditions is called microsociology versus macrosociology. A so-ciety contains persons but especially our ultramodern societies contain substanti-ally more, also lifeless matter. To clarify this, imagine what would happen in the center of our big cities if all traffic signs, traffic lights etc. were suddenly remo-ved. The total traffic chaos would break out. Or imagine all books of laws and of DIN regulations would suddenly disappear.

The human being is a nested part of a superordinate system, a society, and this means with regard to natural laws that there should be a sociological layer with its own laws above the layers of biological and psychological laws. The diffe-rence between biology and sociology can easily be illustrated with some examp-les. The fact that the laws of social processes are partly different from those of biology becomes obvious when considering that a society and its state can have several different forms within a short period of time although the biology of the persons living in it only insignificantly changes. Biologically humans have a tendency to egoism; during the process of socialization and by social control, however, we can become a very social being. Certainly, there is a genetic predis-position to become social but this is realized by social mechanisms. It is also ob-vious that, for example, the motor traffic and our rightful behavior cannot com-pletely be explained by sociobiology because no other living being has a written

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language. Humans differ from animals in the way that humans are part of a su-perordinate social unit which does not exist in this way anywhere in biology (though there can be some rudimentary analogies). Therefore psychologists and sociologists, in contrast to biologists, are right to distinguish between animals and humans. Although, for example, bees and ants also live in a social arrange-ment but this structure does not consist of institutions – of values and norms – because animals do not have our very high ability of symbol processing and of linguistic communication by means of symbols. There are just as large diffe-rences between humans and animals as between animals and plants, even though all three have many properties in common. However, humans and animals differ from each other mainly on the psychological and sociological level and not so much on the biological.

As an analogy it is very instructive to compare a society with a biological body despite all differences between both. Already in the antiquity some authors com-pared society with the body of organisms. As the stomach serves surviving and growth of the body, handicraft and industry serve surviving and growth of the society. System theory (several individual parts form a connected unit with emergent compound properties) and functionalism (the processes of the components have the function to support the total system) are theories which were originally developed in biology but which were quickly transferred to so-ciology because of the analogies between body and society (s. Reinmann et al. 1985; Jonas 1981). Comparing it with the body of an organism, institutions (especially in the form of organizations) are the organs of the society; they are units with the goal to support the surviving of the superordinate system, the so-ciety. Institutions are systems of values, norms, and standards for the fulfillment of specific interests. The function of a family is the living together and the protection and education of the children, the function of a scientific institute is the production of knowledge, a function of politics is to establish law and order. The comparison with the body can also be used – as it has already been done above – to illustrate that a society is more than the sum of all persons, just as a body is more than the sum of all cells. And in the way as a body does not only consists of living cells but also of liveless bones (leaving aside the bone mar-row), a modern society does not only consist of persons but also of things like books and manufacturing plants. The comparison with the body naturally has also its limits; a higher ontological layer is not simply a repetition of a lower one. Not all institutions have the function to support the surviving of the society; there is also a lot of playing; for instance, unions of stamp collecting people or every genuine form of art.

Some of the most interesting entities of a society are the values and norms, and there has always been a lot of discussion in sociology about the ontological na-

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ture of it (s. Hechter et al. 1993). Having a look at chapter titles of books about values (e.g., Hartmann 1994b, Schorlemmer 1995, Wickert 1995) you can read terms like justice, liberty, truthfulness, responsibility, civil courage, charity, wis-dom etc. Those sociologists who believe that a society is only the sum of all per-sons do also believe that values are only the psychological preferences of per-sons. But in the context of our world conception it can be assumed that values are emergent compound properties of the whole society. In the same way as bio-logical processes within the organs of a body have to fulfill certain functions, values are the goal states of a society which primarily (but not only) have the functions to guarantee the existence of the society. This can be illustrated with computer simulations. If you want to write a computer program in order to simu-late a city then it is not sufficient only to write subprograms for the persons of the city; how the persons have to move their arms and legs, how they have to speak etc. To make a computer city function during a longer period, general boundary conditions, rules, must be given which the persons must obey so that the whole city (administration etc.) works properly. These rules could, for exam-ple, be fixed in such a way that the persons can read in books what they have to do, or that they are told to them by other persons, and that they then integrate the rules in their own person programs and that they then live upon it.

In this sense values are required goal states, and norms are instructions for attaining these goals (s. Laszlo 1996). But whether something is a value or a norm is relative. Goals can be subdivided in subgoals, and a subgoal can be seen as a value relative to a lower sub-subgoal and as a norm relative a higher goal. It is necessary for the existence of a society that its members do not mutually murder themselves. Besides such for the existence of a society necessary values and norms there are many other values and norms which a rather coincidental (for example, the value of technological progress) but which can contribute to the development of the society, and these values and norms make the societies of the world differ from each other. Which values and norms are necessary for the existence and which are coincidental, which of them exist in all societies and which only in some is a very interesting research question of sociology and eth-nology. But the knowledge about it is not only academicly interesting because it is to be made certain that the new generation internalizes existential values and norms during education. During education these values have to become the mo-tives and goals of the children. (If a person has internalized values then one also speaks of the virtues of the person.)

Since values and norms (roughly said the moral) are social entities, their fulfill-ment by the members of the society must be accomplished mainly by social means. It is true that humans have a genetic predisposition to be social but in view of criminal activities in all societies this obviously does not ensure a suffi-

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cient moral behavior. Philosophical-rational argumentations are also not suffi-cient to induce humans to show a moral behavior since nobody is guided only by rationality. Only those people who want to obey moral anyway do accept phi-losophical maxims like "Act in such a way at any time that the maxim of your will can be considered as a principle of a general legislation." (Kant) David Hume already stressed the fact that not reason, not rational insight, is the basis of institutions and of the "moral sense" but habit and education (s. Jonas 1981). Of course, rational arguments do also play a role in education and in daily life but not alone. For this reason it is particularly important to investigate scientifi-cally the mechanisms of the educational processes and of socialization in gene-ral so that we can use this knowledge to make children integrate the values and norms of the society in their own cognitive structures, which means to internali-ze them, so that the goals of society become their own personal goals. It is re-markable, for example, that norms are often experienced as troublesome obliga-tions at the beginning of the process of internalization. However, after their in-ternalization, when they are not felt troublesome any more, they are sometimes even regarded as their own personal goals or as means of self-realization. This can be illustrated very well with the training of driving cars. In driving school learning to drive is very often an unpleasant burden. But later if you have the driving licence and execute many of the necessary hand and foot movements un-consciously then these regulations are no longer a burden and you can use them to drive into the mountains, to the sea, or to a beautiful city, and you can dedica-te yourself to your hobbies and can realize your goals and desires there. The in-itial stress is annoying, the later capability can be a pleasure; this is also true for social etiquettes.

Another interesting research topic of sociology results from the question about the relation of the sociological levels to each other, their cooperating. Values and norms of a society (= macro level) do not cause their realization by humans (= micro level) in the way as the organs of an organism fulfill their functions. The teleonomic attainment of goals of biological processes mostly takes place infallibly and automatically. In contrast to this the values of a society only have the character of a request which humans often do not obey. This difference clari-fies once more that the laws of one ontological level do not simply repeat them-selves on a higher level. But the pressure of the state on the persons to obey the norms can – as the many democratic and dictatorial states of our world show – be differently strong. Therefore it is a very interesting question how much libe-rality is possible in a society, so that people feel comfortable in it, and how much political control is necessary, so that the society does not disintegrate into several particularist interests. Too much liberality has the effect that a few capi-talists suppress low social classes, too much political control has the effect that dictators or political parties suppress the whole population. To be able to exa-

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mine this relation of the micro and the macro level of society, but also that of the biological, psychological, and sociological layers to each other, we will probab-ly have to formulate the levels and their interrelations scientifically more pre-cisely, either formal mathematically or more qualitatively in the form of flow charts, networks etc.

Another important research problem of sociology is the question about the fac-tors of social change. Two opposite standpoints for this were given in the history of sociology by Karl Marx and Max Weber (s. Jonas 1981). To Marx societies were primarily economic societies in which economic motives and institutions play the crucial role. The material basis, production conditions determine social dynamics. In contrast to this Weber believed that cultural factors, the ideas and values of a society, were more important for social change. Marx wanted to ex-plain social dynamics from the bottom, Weber from the top of society. From the viewpoint of our world conception Max Weber should have been right. As physics and biology could show natural laws have a hierarchic structure; a lower level is the basis of a higher one but the higher controls the form of the lower one. This was shown in physics by synergetics (s. Haken 1982): In a laser, for example, the wavelength of one atom becomes an order parameter of the total system which controls the wavelength of the emissions of all other atoms. Of course, other levels than the higher one can have an influence on the develop-ment of a system, too. If, for example, the body of an organism does not get food then the brain will soon not be able any more to control the body. Similarly casual modifications of the manufacturing situation can drastically modify and continously change a society; for instance, after natural catastrophies which de-stroyed the harvest, or during a global change of climate which changes the pro-duction conditions and therefore the political organization. But usually the enti-ties of the higher levels have the more dominating influence on the dynamics. Especially the modern industrial societies make this clear. In the Western world, science developed because of the values of liberty of opinion and liberty of scientific research, and especially because of the value of natural scientific knowledge. On the basis of scientific knowledge our modern form of enginee-ring and thereby our material prosperity was generated. Modern society in our present form would not have developed without such values as truthfulness and liberty of opinion. Only the intellectual superstructure of the society enabled modern manufacturing conditions, although otherwise caused modifications of the economy can in reverse also have an influence on the intellectual part of so-ciety and on the level of values. The exact cooperation network of the different social levels is surely not enough known yet, just like in biology layer theory is still not enough elaborated. Modifications in the value system cause modifica-tions of the person's activities. But which factors play a role during value emergence and development? Are social conflicts the result or the cause of it?

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Can philosophy be some kind of crystallization point during value development in such a way that philosophers make values – which may already exist but which are still mainly unconscious to most people – more conscious and thereby increase their propagation velocity in the population? During the period of en-lightenment many philosophers had such an influence on the European societies and thus initiated the new cultural epoch of modern societies.

At the end of this chapter about sociology I want to address two methodological issues of this discipline, the topic "explaining versus understanding" and the to-pic "laws versus uniqueness" (s. Reimann et al. 1985). Those sociologists who do their research in a rather natural scientific way look for causal explanations (for causes of social processes) and for general laws. In contrast to this those so-ciologists who take sociology as a discipline of the humanities with their own research methods believe that every society is a historical-cultural uniqueness (for which you cannot find general laws) and that sociologists are not to find causal explanations but should try to understand the motives and goals of per-sons. But from the viewpoint of our world conception "explanations" by causes and "understanding" of goals and motives are not really contradictions. Already in biology, which is a natural science without any doubt, scientists look for func-tional goals. In biology the "understanding" of goals is a "teleonomic explanati-on". The difference between psychology and sociology on one side and biology on the other side is only that in psychology and sociology goals are partly con-scious so that this is called teleology. One does not need to fear an unsolvable contradiction to physics. The incompleteness of our knowledge of nature is on the side of physics but there are already some efforts to explain the goal-directed behavior in and of organisms by physical theories of teleonomic dynamics (Chauvet 1995; Arendes a).

With regard to the problem "uniqueness" of the historical-cultural conditions versus searching for "laws", cosmology is a natural science without any doubt although its research object is a unique object with a unique process – the uni-verse and its processes. But cosmologists not only describe unique processes, they also explore general laws (s. Vollmer 1986). So this should also be possible in sociology, no matter whether sociology belongs to the humanities or to the natural sciences. Within our world conception singular incidents are possible everywhere – on the levels of physics and biology, and on the levels of psycho-logy and sociology. The information processing within the ether can cause not only regular processes but also unique incidents, just like a computer program can be written which makes certain events occur only one time. In no discipline scientists have only the task to find general laws. It is the task of science to find out how nature actually is. Regular processes, when occuring, are to be ex-

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plained by laws; singular events, when occuring, are to be described as singular. However, you will only find existing laws when you look for it.

5. Love for wisdom

As the preceding chapters showed natural philosophy can give many hints to sci-entists in which way they can approach some of their basic problems and about which new research questions they should be concerned. So far we have only discussed how philosophical guiding ideas can support scientific research, but our world conception can also have effects on the activities of philosophers. Literally translated »philosophy« means »love for wisdom«. What is wisdom, and which should be the most important task of philosophy if philosophers really want to strive for wisdom? As described above our world has a laminated structure, and on one of the highest system levels, the sociological, values and norms exist which influence the humans’ actions. Within the framework of our world conception wisdom is the profound knowledge of ourselves and of the world and the effort to realize and to develop the values of society, but with the stoic calmness of people who know that at least a large part of nature is con-trolled by (natural) laws in relation to which we are powerless. Therefore one of the most fundamental tasks of philosophy is the investigation of values and norms, briefly said the investigation of moral or ethic. But philosophers should not only think and talk about it, they should truly internalize it and live upon it.

If you think about it only for a while it immediately becomes clear that it is not one of the highest values always to possess the newest models of our consumer goods. And it is not wisdom at all to get the money for it even with criminal or at least with immoral means. Modesty has always been a characteristic of wis-dom. But this does not mean that wise people reject the pleasant things which fall to them. Wisdom means internal independence from outside goods and not asceticism. The philosopher Nicolai Hartmann wrote about wisdom in his »Ethic«: "The mind of a wise person is modest because of his or her self-know-ledge and is directed toward ethical values." And at another place: "Sapientia is the ethical taste, the fine, differentiated, value-discriminating, cultivated taste, the culture of the moral sense, it is directed to life abundance, it is the feeling of everything, and an affirming, analysing attitude toward everything that is valu-able" (Hartmann 1949b: 428f; my translation from the German text).

The wise person does not only think of his or her own life but also, since he or she lives in a society, of the well-being of the whole society. Therefore one of the most important tasks of philosophers (together with sociologists) is to ex-

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plore the values of the society, to make other people become aware of them, to develop them, supervise their realization in society, and – together with politi-cians, writers, journalists etc. – to establish new values if necessary. This task, to establish new values, is necessary especially today in the period of globalization. Two examples are to illustrate this: In science it will be important in future to stress the value of humanities as against engineering and natural sciences (without neglecting these). Our present technical abilities, based upon our sci-entific knowledge, is already sufficient to nourish all people of the world and to enable them to have an existence worth of a human being. However, we know relatively few about the psychology and sociology of humans, thus about ourselves; why humans are not able to give something from their over-foaming wealth to poor people, why rulers deceive and lie to their own people, why money is a high value and moral not. To improve the method of moral education and to keep alive a functioning state in which the government is competent and the voting people are sufficiently sophisticated to see the attempts of mass media to manipulate them, to all this a better knowledge about humanities is necessary for which we also need more research.

The second example for the establishment or development of values concerns the concept of co-operation. In line with the darwinian theory of evolution a partly ruthless competition mentality developed which started to ruin the West-ern civilization. But during the last decades a lot of progress has been made in the research of evolution. Manfred Eigen (1971, 1996) developed a theory about the emergence of biological information, the genes, in which co-operation is the most important factor of evolution, in addition to Darwin's selection principle. Considering that the almost homogeneous or chaotic aggregation of elementary particles after the Big Bang became very complex systems during the evolution of the universe – at first atoms, then molecules, then cells, organisms, societies, and finally huge civilizations –, it is obvious that co-operation must be a very important factor of evolution. Big progress is made primarily by co-operation, and we should pay attention to this on the social and especially on the interna-tional level much more than it is done today. On the international level we should, for example, strengthen the UN in order to be able to advance interna-tional co-operation and in order to drive back competition (war, exploitation, and cultural suppression).

Taken together, philosophy is the place where the values of the society are to be discussed. Philosophy is an ivory tower which is to radiate sense and orientation.

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