REAWAKENING SKEPTICISM: A SECOND LOOK AT SCIENCE

Résumé

The issue of human subjectivity in scientific procedures and findings in recent years has made science synonymous with superstition and cluttered it with ambiguities and complexities that should not be so. One wakes up to realize that what he knew yesterday is no longer true today. Using the methods of philosophical analysis, this paper x-rays some of the conspicuous errors and blunders in science by frequently raising sporadic epistemic-inciting questions, employing the style of philosophical discussion. It reveals the most dominant factor responsible for them to be the human factor – subjectivity. It accuses some aspects of scientific findings of immodesty and recommends a version of skepticism that is both healthy and beneficial, a conservative way of preserving some of our beliefs against the onslaught of scientific subjectivity – soft skepticism. It submits therefore that it is more honorable to suspend judgment over certain matters than hold views with insufficient evidence; it is more scholarly and intellectually honest to say 'I don't know', 'I'm not sure', 'I lack sufficient knowledge in this field to make such conclusion', etc. than to claim to know almost everything and be able to give answers to virtually every phenomenon.