The Foundations of Science: Science and Hypothesis, The Value of Science Science and Method Part 2

The detailed treatment which M. Poincare gives to the problem thus defined must be learned from his text. It is no part of my purpose to expound, to defend or to traverse any of his special conclusions regarding this matter. Yet I can not avoid observing that, while M.

Poincare strictly confines his ill.u.s.trations and his expressions of opinion to those regions of science wherein, as special investigator, he is himself most at home, the issues which he thus raises regarding the logic of science are of even more critical importance and of more impressive interest when one applies M. Poincare's methods to the study of the concepts and presuppositions of the organic and of the historical and social sciences, than when one confines one's attention, as our author here does, to the physical sciences. It belongs to the province of an introduction like the present to point out, however briefly and inadequately, that the significance of our author's ideas extends far beyond the scope to which he chooses to confine their discussion.

The historical sciences, and in fact all those sciences such as geology, and such as the evolutionary sciences in general, undertake theoretical constructions which relate to past time. Hypotheses relating to the more or less remote past stand, however, in a position which is very interesting from the point of view of the logic of science. Directly speaking, no such hypothesis is capable of confirmation or of refutation, because we can not return into the past to verify by our own experience what then happened. Yet indirectly, such hypotheses may lead to predictions of coming experience. These latter will be subject to control. Thus, Schliemann's confidence that the legend of Troy had a definite historical foundation led to predictions regarding what certain excavations would reveal. In a sense somewhat different from that which filled Schliemann's enthusiastic mind, these predictions proved verifiable. The result has been a considerable change in the att.i.tude of historians toward the legend of Troy. Geological investigation leads to predictions regarding the order of the strata or the course of mineral veins in a district, regarding the fossils which may be discovered in given formations, and so on. These hypotheses are subject to the control of experience. The various theories of evolutionary doctrine include many hypotheses capable of confirmation and of refutation by empirical tests. Yet, despite all such empirical control, it still remains true that whenever a science is mainly concerned with the remote past, whether this science be archeology, or geology, or anthropology, or Old Testament history, the princ.i.p.al theoretical constructions always include features which no appeal to present or to accessible future experience can ever definitely test. Hence the suspicion with which students of experimental science often regard the theoretical constructions of their confreres of the sciences that deal with the past. The origin of the races of men, of man himself, of life, of species, of the planet; the hypotheses of anthropologists, of archeologists, of students of 'higher criticism'--all these are matters which the men of the laboratory often regard with a general incredulity as belonging not at all to the domain of true science. Yet no one can doubt the importance and the inevitableness of endeavoring to apply scientific method to these regions also. Science needs theories regarding the past history of the world. And no one who looks closer into the methods of these sciences of past time can doubt that verifiable and unverifiable hypotheses are in all these regions inevitably interwoven; so that, while experience is always the guide, the att.i.tude of the investigator towards experience is determined by interests which have to be partially due to what I should call that 'internal meaning,' that human interest in rational theoretical construction which inspires the scientific inquiry; and the theoretical constructions which prevail in such sciences are neither unbiased reports of the actual const.i.tution of an external reality, nor yet arbitrary constructions of fancy. These constructions in fact resemble in a measure those which M. Poincare in this book has a.n.a.lyzed in the case of geometry. They are constructions molded, but _not_ predetermined in their details, by experience. We report facts; we let the facts speak; but we, as we investigate, in the popular phrase, 'talk back' to the facts. We interpret as well as report. Man is not merely made for science, but science is made for man. It expresses his deepest intellectual needs, as well as his careful observations. It is an effort to bring internal meanings into harmony with external verifications. It attempts therefore to control, as well as to submit, to conceive with rational unity, as well as to accept data. Its arts are those directed towards self-possession as well as towards an imitation of the outer reality which we find. It seeks therefore a disciplined freedom of thought. The discipline is as essential as the freedom; but the latter has also its place. The theories of science are human, as well as objective, internally rational, as well as (when that is possible) subject to external tests.

In a field very different from that of the historical sciences, namely, in a science of observation and of experiment, which is at the same time an organic science, I have been led in the course of some study of the history of certain researches to notice the existence of a theoretical conception which has proved extremely fruitful in guiding research, but which apparently resembles in a measure the type of hypotheses of which M. Poincare speaks when he characterizes the principles of mechanics and of the theory of energy. I venture to call attention here to this conception, which seems to me to ill.u.s.trate M. Poincare's view of the functions of hypothesis in scientific work.

The modern science of pathology is usually regarded as dating from the earlier researches of Virchow, whose 'Cellular Pathology' was the outcome of a very careful and elaborate induction. Virchow, himself, felt a strong aversion to mere speculation. He endeavored to keep close to observation, and to relieve medical science from the control of fantastic theories, such as those of the _Naturphilosophen_ had been.

Yet Virchow's researches were, as early as 1847, or still earlier, already under the guidance of a theoretical presupposition which he himself states as follows: "We have learned to recognize," he says, "that diseases are not autonomous organisms, that they are no ent.i.ties that have entered into the body, that they are no parasites which take root in the body, but _that they merely show us the course of the vital processes under altered conditions_" ('dasz sie nur Ablauf der Lebenserscheinungen unter veranderten Bedingungen darstellen').

The enormous importance of this theoretical presupposition for all the early successes of modern pathological investigation is generally recognized by the experts. I do not doubt this opinion. It appears to be a commonplace of the history of this science. But in Virchow's later years this very presupposition seemed to some of his contemporaries to be called in question by the successes of recent bacteriology. The question arose whether the theoretical foundations of Virchow's pathology had not been set aside. And in fact the theory of the parasitical origin of a vast number of diseased conditions has indeed come upon an empirical basis to be generally recognized. Yet to the end of his own career Virchow stoutly maintained that in all its essential significance his own fundamental principle remained quite untouched by the newer discoveries. And, as a fact, this view could indeed be maintained. For if diseases proved to be the consequences of the presence of parasites, the diseases themselves, so far as they belonged to the diseased organism, were still not the parasites, but were, as before, the reaction of the organism to the _veranderte Bedingungen_ which the presence of the parasites entailed. So Virchow could well insist. And if the famous principle in question is only stated with sufficient generality, it amounts simply to saying that if a disease involves a change in an organism, and if this change is subject to law at all, then the nature of the organism and the reaction of the organism to whatever it is which causes the disease must be understood in case the disease is to be understood.

For this very reason, however, Virchow's theoretical principle in its most general form _could be neither confirmed nor refuted by experience_. It would remain empirically irrefutable, so far as I can see, even if we should learn that the devil was the true cause of all diseases. For the devil himself would then simply predetermine the _veranderte Bedingungen_ to which the diseased organism would be reacting. Let bullets or bacteria, poisons or compressed air, or the devil be the _Bedingungen_ to which a diseased organism reacts, the postulate that Virchow states in the pa.s.sage just quoted will remain irrefutable, if only this postulate be interpreted to meet the case. For the principle in question merely says that whatever ent.i.ty it may be, bullet, or poison, or devil, that affects the organism, the disease is not that ent.i.ty, but is the resulting alteration in the process of the organism.

I insist, then, that this principle of Virchow's is no trial supposition, no scientific hypothesis in the narrower sense--capable of being submitted to precise empirical tests. It is, on the contrary, a very precious _leading idea_, a theoretical interpretation of phenomena, in the light of which observations are to be made--'a regulative principle' of research. It is equivalent to a resolution to search for those detailed connections which link the processes of disease to the normal process of the organism. Such a search undertakes to find the true unity, whatever that may prove to be, wherein the pathological and the normal processes are linked. Now without some such leading idea, the cellular pathology itself could never have been reached; because the empirical facts in question would never have been observed. Hence this principle of Virchow's was indispensable to the growth of his science.

Yet it was not a verifiable and not a refutable hypothesis. One value of unverifiable and irrefutable hypotheses of this type lies, then, in the sort of empirical inquiries which they initiate, inspire, organize and guide. In these inquiries hypotheses in the narrower sense, that is, trial propositions which are to be submitted to definite empirical control, are indeed everywhere present. And the use of the other sort of principles lies wholly in their application to experience. Yet without what I have just proposed to call the 'leading ideas' of a science, that is, its principles of an unverifiable and irrefutable character, suggested, but not to be finally tested, by experience, the hypotheses in the narrower sense would lack that guidance which, as M. Poincare has shown, the larger ideas of science give to empirical investigation.

V

I have dwelt, no doubt, at too great length upon one aspect only of our author's varied and well-balanced discussion of the problems and concepts of scientific theory. Of the hypotheses in the narrower sense and of the value of direct empirical control, he has also spoken with the authority and the originality which belong to his position. And in dealing with the foundations of mathematics he has raised one or two questions of great philosophical import into which I have no time, even if I had the right, to enter here. In particular, in speaking of the essence of mathematical reasoning, and of the difficult problem of what makes possible novel results in the field of pure mathematics, M.

Poincare defends a thesis regarding the office of 'demonstration by recurrence'--a thesis which is indeed disputable, which has been disputed and which I myself should be disposed, so far as I at present understand the matter, to modify in some respects, even in accepting the spirit of our author's a.s.sertion. Yet there can be no doubt of the importance of this thesis, and of the fact that it defines a characteristic that is indeed fundamental in a wide range of mathematical research. The philosophical problems that lie at the basis of recurrent proofs and processes are, as I have elsewhere argued, of the most fundamental importance.

These, then, are a few hints relating to the significance of our author's discussion, and a few reasons for hoping that our own students will profit by the reading of the book as those of other nations have already done.

Of the person and of the life-work of our author a few words are here, in conclusion, still in place, addressed, not to the students of his own science, to whom his position is well known, but to the general reader who may seek guidance in these pages.

Jules Henri Poincare was born at Nancy, in 1854, the son of a professor in the Faculty of Medicine at Nancy. He studied at the ecole Polytechnique and at the ecole des Mines, and later received his doctorate in mathematics in 1879. In 1883 he began courses of instruction in mathematics at the ecole Polytechnique; in 1886 received a professors.h.i.+p of mathematical physics in the Faculty of Sciences at Paris; then became member of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, in 1887, and devoted his life to instruction and investigation in the regions of pure mathematics, of mathematical physics and of celestial mechanics.

His list of published treatises relating to various branches of his chosen sciences is long; and his original memoirs have included several momentous investigations, which have gone far to transform more than one branch of research. His presence at the International Congress of Arts and Science in St. Louis was one of the most noticeable features of that remarkable gathering of distinguished foreign guests. In Poincare the reader meets, then, not one who is primarily a speculative student of general problems for their own sake, but an original investigator of the highest rank in several distinct, although interrelated, branches of modern research. The theory of functions--a highly recondite region of pure mathematics--owes to him advances of the first importance, for instance, the definition of a new type of functions. The 'problem of the three bodies,' a famous and fundamental problem of celestial mechanics, has received from his studies a treatment whose significance has been recognized by the highest authorities. His international reputation has been confirmed by the conferring of more than one important prize for his researches. His members.h.i.+p in the most eminent learned societies of various nations is widely extended; his volumes bearing upon various branches of mathematics and of mathematical physics are used by special students in all parts of the learned world; in brief, he is, as geometer, as a.n.a.lyst and as a theoretical physicist, a leader of his age.

Meanwhile, as contributor to the philosophical discussion of the bases and methods of science, M. Poincare has long been active. When, in 1893, the admirable _Revue de Metaphysique et de Morale_ began to appear, M.

Poincare was soon found amongst the most satisfactory of the contributors to the work of that journal, whose office it has especially been to bring philosophy and the various special sciences (both natural and moral) into a closer mutual understanding. The discussions brought together in the present volume are in large part the outcome of M.

Poincare's contributions to the _Revue de Metaphysique et de Morale_.

The reader of M. Poincare's book is in presence, then, of a great special investigator who is also a philosopher.

SCIENCE AND HYPOTHESIS

INTRODUCTION

For a superficial observer, scientific truth is beyond the possibility of doubt; the logic of science is infallible, and if the scientists are sometimes mistaken, this is only from their mistaking its rules.

"The mathematical verities flow from a small number of self-evident propositions by a chain of impeccable reasonings; they impose themselves not only on us, but on nature itself. They fetter, so to speak, the Creator and only permit him to choose between some relatively few solutions. A few experiments then will suffice to let us know what choice he has made. From each experiment a crowd of consequences will follow by a series of mathematical deductions, and thus each experiment will make known to us a corner of the universe."

Behold what is for many people in the world, for scholars getting their first notions of physics, the origin of scientific cert.i.tude. This is what they suppose to be the role of experimentation and mathematics.

This same conception, a hundred years ago, was held by many savants who dreamed of constructing the world with as little as possible taken from experiment.

On a little more reflection it was perceived how great a place hypothesis occupies; that the mathematician can not do without it, still less the experimenter. And then it was doubted if all these constructions were really solid, and believed that a breath would overthrow them. To be skeptical in this fas.h.i.+on is still to be superficial. To doubt everything and to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; each saves us from thinking.

Instead of p.r.o.nouncing a summary condemnation, we ought therefore to examine with care the role of hypothesis; we shall then recognize, not only that it is necessary, but that usually it is legitimate. We shall also see that there are several sorts of hypotheses; that some are verifiable, and once confirmed by experiment become fruitful truths; that others, powerless to lead us astray, may be useful to us in fixing our ideas; that others, finally, are hypotheses only in appearance and are reducible to disguised definitions or conventions.

These last are met with above all in mathematics and the related sciences. Thence precisely it is that these sciences get their rigor; these conventions are the work of the free activity of our mind, which, in this domain, recognizes no obstacle. Here our mind can affirm, since it decrees; but let us understand that while these decrees are imposed upon _our_ science, which, without them, would be impossible, they are not imposed upon nature. Are they then arbitrary? No, else were they sterile. Experiment leaves us our freedom of choice, but it guides us by aiding us to discern the easiest way. Our decrees are therefore like those of a prince, absolute but wise, who consults his council of state.

Some people have been struck by this character of free convention recognizable in certain fundamental principles of the sciences. They have wished to generalize beyond measure, and, at the same time, they have forgotten that liberty is not license. Thus they have reached what is called _nominalism_, and have asked themselves if the savant is not the dupe of his own definitions and if the world he thinks he discovers is not simply created by his own caprice.[1] Under these conditions science would be certain, but deprived of significance.

[1] See Le Roy, 'Science et Philosophie,' _Revue de Metaphysique et de Morale_, 1901.

If this were so, science would be powerless. Now every day we see it work under our very eyes. That could not be if it taught us nothing of reality. Still, the things themselves are not what it can reach, as the nave dogmatists think, but only the relations between things. Outside of these relations there is no knowable reality.

Such is the conclusion to which we shall come, but for that we must review the series of sciences from arithmetic and geometry to mechanics and experimental physics.

What is the nature of mathematical reasoning? Is is really deductive, as is commonly supposed? A deeper a.n.a.lysis shows us that it is not, that it partakes in a certain measure of the nature of inductive reasoning, and just because of this is it so fruitful. None the less does it retain its character of rigor absolute; this is the first thing that had to be shown.

Knowing better now one of the instruments which mathematics puts into the hands of the investigator, we had to a.n.a.lyze another fundamental notion, that of mathematical magnitude. Do we find it in nature, or do we ourselves introduce it there? And, in this latter case, do we not risk marring everything? Comparing the rough data of our senses with that extremely complex and subtile concept which mathematicians call magnitude, we are forced to recognize a difference; this frame into which we wish to force everything is of our own construction; but we have not made it at random. We have made it, so to speak, by measure and therefore we can make the facts fit into it without changing what is essential in them.

Another frame which we impose on the world is s.p.a.ce. Whence come the first principles of geometry? Are they imposed on us by logic?

Lobachevski has proved not, by creating non-Euclidean geometry. Is s.p.a.ce revealed to us by our senses? Still no, for the s.p.a.ce our senses could show us differs absolutely from that of the geometer. Is experience the source of geometry? A deeper discussion will show us it is not. We therefore conclude that the first principles of geometry are only conventions; but these conventions are not arbitrary and if transported into another world (that I call the non-Euclidean world and seek to imagine), then we should have been led to adopt others.

In mechanics we should be led to a.n.a.logous conclusions, and should see that the principles of this science, though more directly based on experiment, still partake of the conventional character of the geometric postulates. Thus far nominalism triumphs; but now we arrive at the physical sciences, properly so called. Here the scene changes; we meet another sort of hypotheses and we see their fertility. Without doubt, at first blush, the theories seem to us fragile, and the history of science proves to us how ephemeral they are; yet they do not entirely perish, and of each of them something remains. It is this something we must seek to disentangle, since there and there alone is the veritable reality.

The method of the physical sciences rests on the induction which makes us expect the repet.i.tion of a phenomenon when the circ.u.mstances under which it first happened are reproduced. If _all_ these circ.u.mstances could be reproduced at once, this principle could be applied without fear; but that will never happen; some of these circ.u.mstances will always be lacking. Are we absolutely sure they are unimportant?

Evidently not. That may be probable, it can not be rigorously certain.

Hence the important role the notion of probability plays in the physical sciences. The calculus of probabilities is therefore not merely a recreation or a guide to players of baccarat, and we must seek to go deeper with its foundations. Under this head I have been able to give only very incomplete results, so strongly does this vague instinct which lets us discern probability defy a.n.a.lysis.

After a study of the conditions under which the physicist works, I have thought proper to show him at work. For that I have taken instances from the history of optics and of electricity. We shall see whence have sprung the ideas of Fresnel, of Maxwell, and what unconscious hypotheses were made by Ampere and the other founders of electrodynamics.

PART I

NUMBER AND MAGNITUDE

CHAPTER I

ON THE NATURE OF MATHEMATICAL REASONING

I

The very possibility of the science of mathematics seems an insoluble contradiction. If this science is deductive only in appearance, whence does it derive that perfect rigor no one dreams of doubting? If, on the contrary, all the propositions it enunciates can be deduced one from another by the rules of formal logic, why is not mathematics reduced to an immense tautology? The syllogism can teach us nothing essentially new, and, if everything is to spring from the principle of ident.i.ty, everything should be capable of being reduced to it. Shall we then admit that the enunciations of all those theorems which fill so many volumes are nothing but devious ways of saying _A_ is _A_?

Without doubt, we can go back to the axioms, which are at the source of all these reasonings. If we decide that these can not be reduced to the principle of contradiction, if still less we see in them experimental facts which could not partake of mathematical necessity, we have yet the resource of cla.s.sing them among synthetic _a priori_ judgments. This is not to solve the difficulty, but only to baptize it; and even if the nature of synthetic judgments were for us no mystery, the contradiction would not have disappeared, it would only have moved back; syllogistic reasoning remains incapable of adding anything to the data given it: these data reduce themselves to a few axioms, and we should find nothing else in the conclusions.