Episode 11: Scientism

Published: Aug. 14, 2014, 10:48 p.m.

Good news everybody! Science-obsessed philosophers Richard Brown and Pete Mandik duke it out over which one is the most egregious purveyor of scientism, the view that anything worth knowing is worth knowing scientifically. Or is scientism just empiricism? And what the hack is that, anyway? Is it simply an affirmation of the superiority of sensory knowledge? Or is it at bottom a denial of necessary truths? Or is being a scientismologist just what happens when you label yourself as such to achieve greater societal respectability and sell more books? Put on your goggles have a clean beaker handy. It is time to science.