Abstract
In the twenty-first century, Stephen Hawking proclaimed the death of philosophy. Only science can address philosophy’s perennial questions about human values. The essay first examines Nietzsche’s nineteenth century view to the contrary that philosophy alone can create values. A critique of Nietzsche’s contention that philosophy rather than science is competent to judge values follows. The essay then analyzes Edward O. Wilson’s claim that his scientific research provides empirically-based answers to philosophy’s questions about human values. Wilson’s bold new hypothesis about the ‘social conquest of the earth’ challenges Nietzsche’s vision of philosophy’s mission. Confronting both Nietzsche and Wilson, the essay then considers three theoretical proposals for a consilience of philosophy, science, engineering and technology. The conclusion presents a working African model of consilience that addresses the existential problem of poverty in the Global South.
Highlights
I am still waiting for a philosophical physician, in the exceptional sense of the word—one who has to pursue the problem of the total health of a people, time, race or of humanity—to master the courage to push my suspicion to its limits1 3 Vol.:(0123456789)C
The inference is that answers to perennial questions about human values2 are to be discovered through the empirical sciences
While Nietzsche envisions the consilience of philosophy and science, he insists that only philosophy can create values
Summary
I am still waiting for a philosophical physician, in the exceptional sense of the word—one who has to pursue the problem of the total health of a people, time, race or of humanity—to master the courage to push my suspicion to its limits. While Nietzsche envisions the consilience of philosophy and science, he insists that only philosophy can create values He goes so far as to claim that philosophers are the “guarantors of the future” We are experiments: let us want to be such!” (ibid.) In his later period Nietzsche claims that philosophy must rely on science in order both to create new values and to rank values by a hierarchy. Does Nietzsche have an argument for his claim that philosophy alone has the power to create and rank-order values? Wilson claims that this disposition rather than kin selection explains altruistic acts Wilson imagines that his scientific research answers the philosophical question about human values. In the Gay Science (2001/1887, III [112]: p. 113), Nietzsche speaks of the false dichotomy of cause and effect: “there is probably never such a duality; in truth a continuum faces us, from which we isolate a few pieces....” Thinkers like Wilson impose the same duality on philosophy and science, but they too form an unbreakable bond
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