by educated men, we may place that of the true significance of
scientific method and the relations of such method to practical
affairs. This is especially apt to be the case in a country like our
own, where the points of contact between the scientific world on the
one hand, and the industrial and political world on the other, are
fewer than in other civilized countries. The form which this
misapprehension usually takes is that of a failure to appreciate the
character of scientific method, and especially its analogy to the
methods of practical life. In the judgment of the ordinary intelligent
man there is a wide distinction between theoretical and practical
science. The latter he considers as that science directly applicable to
the building of railroads, the construction of engines, the invention
of new machinery, the construction of maps, and other useful objects.
The former he considers analogous to those philosophic speculations in
which men have indulged in all ages without leading to any result which
he considers practical. That our knowledge of nature is increased by
its prosecution is a fact of which he is quite conscious, but he
considers it as terminating with a mere increase of knowledge, and not
as having in its method anything which a person devoted to material
interests can be expected to appreciate.
This view is strengthened by the spirit with which he sees scientific
investigation prosecuted. It is well understood on all sides that when
such investigations are pursued in a spirit really recognized as
scientific, no merely utilitarian object is had in view. Indeed, it is
easy to see how the very fact of pursuing such an object would detract
from that thoroughness of examination which is the first condition of a
real advance. True science demands in its every research a completeness
far beyond what is apparently necessary for its practical applications.
The precision with which the astronomer seeks to measure the heavens
and the chemist to determine the relations of the ultimate molecules of
matter has no limit, except that set by the imperfections of the
instruments of research. There is no such division recognized as that
of useful and useless knowledge. The ultimate aim is nothing less than
that of bringing all the phenomena of nature under laws as exact as
those which govern the planetary motions.
Now the pursuit of any high object in this spirit commands from men of
wide views that respect which is felt towards all exertion having in
view more elevated objects than the pursuit of gain. Accordingly, it is
very natural to classify scientists and philosophers with the men who
in all ages have sought after learning instead of utility. But there is
another aspect of the question which will show the relations of
scientific advance to the practical affairs of life in a different
light. I make bold to say that the greatest want of the day, from a
purely practical point of view, is the more general introduction of the
scientific method and the scientific spirit into the discussion of
those political and social problems which we encounter on our road to a
higher plane of public well being. Far from using methods too refined
for practical purposes, what most distinguishes scientific from other
thought is the introduction of the methods of practical life into the
discussion of abstract general problems. A single instance will
illustrate the lesson I wish to enforce.
The question of the tariff is, from a practical point of view, one of
the most important with which our legislators will have to deal during
the next few years. The widest diversity of opinion exists as to the
best policy to be pursued in collecting a revenue from imports.
Opposing interests contend against one another without any common basis
of fact or principle on which a conclusion can be reached. The opinions
of intelligent men differ almost as widely as those of the men who are
immediately interested. But all will admit that public action in this
direction should be dictated by one guiding principle--that the
greatest good of the community is to be sought after. That policy is
the best which will most promote this good. Nor is there any serious
difference of opinion as to the nature of the good to be had in view;
it is in a word the increase of the national wealth and prosperity. The
question on which opinions fundamentally differ is that of the effects
of a higher or lower rate of duty upon the interests of the public. If
it were possible to foresee, with an approach to certainty, what effect
a given tariff would have upon the producers and consumers of an
article taxed, and, indirectly, upon each member of the community in
any way interested in the article, we should then have an exact datum
which we do not now possess for reaching a conclusion. If some
superhuman authority, speaking with the voice of infallibility, could
give us this information, it is evident that a great national want
would be supplied. No question in practical life is more important than
this: How can this desirable knowledge of the economic effects of a
tariff be obtained?
The answer to this question is clear and simple. The subject must be
studied in the same spirit, and, to a certain extent, by the same
methods which have been so successful in advancing our knowledge of
nature. Every one knows that, within the last two centuries, a method
of studying the course of nature has been introduced which has been so
successful in enabling us to trace the sequence of cause and effect as
almost to revolutionize society. The very fact that scientific method
has been so successful here leads to the belief that it might be
equally successful in other departments of inquiry.
The same remarks will apply to the questions connected with banking and
currency; the standard of value; and, indeed, all subjects which have a
financial bearing. On every such question we see wide differences of
opinion without any common basis to rest upon.
It may be said, in reply, that in these cases there are really no
grounds for forming an opinion, and that the contests which arise over
them are merely those between conflicting interests. But this claim is
not at all consonant with the form which we see the discussion assume.
Nearly every one has a decided opinion on these several subjects;
whereas, if there were no data for forming an opinion, it would be
unreasonable to maintain any whatever. Indeed, it is evident that there
must be truth somewhere, and the only question that can be open is that
of the mode of discovering it. No man imbued with a scientific spirit
can claim that such truth is beyond the power of the human intellect.
He may doubt his own ability to grasp it, but cannot doubt that by
pursuing the proper method and adopting the best means the problem can
be solved. It is, in fact, difficult to show why some exact results
could not be as certainly reached in economic questions as in those of
physical science. It is true that if we pursue the inquiry far enough
we shall find more complex conditions to encounter, because the future
course of demand and supply enters as an uncertain element. But a
remarkable fact to be considered is that the difference of opinion to
which we allude does not depend upon different estimates of the future,
but upon different views of the most elementary and general principles
of the subject. It is as if men were not agreed whether air were
elastic or whether the earth turns on its axis. Why is it that while in
all subjects of physical science we find a general agreement through a
wide range of subjects, and doubt commences only where certainty is not
attained, yet when we turn to economic subjects we do not find the
beginning of an agreement?
No two answers can be given. It is because the two classes of subjects
are investigated by different instruments and in a different spirit.
The physicist has an exact nomenclature; uses methods of research well
adapted to the objects he has in view; pursues his investigations
without being attacked by those who wish for different results; and,
above all, pursues them only for the purpose of discovering the truth.
In economic questions the case is entirely different. Only in rare
cases are they studied without at least the suspicion that the student
has a preconceived theory to support. If results are attained which
oppose any powerful interest, this interest can hire a competing
investigator to bring out a different result. So far as the public can
see, one man's result is as good as another's, and thus the object is
as far off as ever. We may be sure that until there is an intelligent
and rational public, able to distinguish between the speculations of
the charlatan and the researches of the investigator, the present state
of things will continue. What we want is so wide a diffusion of
scientific ideas that there shall be a class of men engaged in studying
economic problems for their own sake, and an intelligent public able to
judge what they are doing. There must be an improvement in the objects
at which they aim in education, and it is now worth while to inquire
what that improvement is.
It is not mere instruction in any branch of technical science that is
wanted. No knowledge of chemistry, physics, or biology, however
extensive, can give the learner much aid in forming a correct opinion
of such a question as that of the currency. If we should claim that
political economy ought to be more extensively studied, we would be met
by the question, which of several conflicting systems shall we teach?
What is wanted is not to teach this system or that, but to give such a
training that the student shall be able to decide for himself which
system is right.
It seems to me that the true educational want is ignored both by those
who advocate a classical and those who advocate a scientific education.
What is really wanted is to train the intellectual powers, and the
question ought to be, what is the best method of doing this? Perhaps it
might be found that both of the conflicting methods could be improved
upon. The really distinctive features, which we should desire to see
introduced, are two in number: the one the scientific spirit; the other
the scientific discipline. Although many details may be classified
under each of these heads, yet there is one of pre-eminent importance
on which we should insist.
The one feature of the scientific spirit which outweighs all others in
importance is the love of knowledge for its own sake. If by our system
of education we can inculcate this sentiment we shall do what is, from
a public point of view, worth more than any amount of technical
knowledge, because we shall lay the foundation of all knowledge. So
long as men study only what they think is going to be useful their
knowledge will be partial and insufficient. I think it is to the
constant inculcation of this fact by experience, rather than to any
reasoning, that is due the continued appreciation of a liberal
education. Every business-man knows that a business-college training is
of very little account in enabling one to fight the battle of life, and
that college-bred men have a great advantage even in fields where mere
education is a secondary matter. We are accustomed to seeing ridicule
thrown upon the questions sometimes asked of candidates for the civil
service because the questions refer to subjects of which a knowledge is
not essential. The reply to all criticisms of this kind is that there
is no one quality which more certainly assures a man's usefulness to
society than the propensity to acquire useless knowledge. Most of our
citizens take a wide interest in public affairs, else our form of
government would be a failure. But it is desirable that their study of
public measures should be more critical and take a wider range. It is
especially desirable that the conclusions to which they are led should
be unaffected by partisan sympathies. The more strongly the love of
mere truth is inculcated in their nature the better this end will be
attained.
The scientific discipline to which I ask mainly to call your attention
consists in training the scholar to the scientific use of language.
Although whole volumes may be written on the logic of science there is
one general feature of its method which is of fundamental significance.
It is that every term which it uses and every proposition which it
enunciates has a precise meaning which can be made evident by proper
definitions. This general principle of scientific language is much more
easily inculcated by example than subject to exact description; but I
shall ask leave to add one to several attempts I have made to define
it. If I should say that when a statement is made in the language of
science the speaker knows what he means, and the hearer either knows it
or can be made to know it by proper definitions, and that this
community of understanding is frequently not reached in other
departments of thought, I might be understood as casting a slur on
whole departments of inquiry. Without intending any such slur, I may
still say that language and statements are worthy of the name
scientific as they approach this standard; and, moreover, that a great
deal is said and written which does not fulfil the requirement. The
fact that words lose their meaning when removed from the connections in
which that meaning has been acquired and put to higher uses, is one
which, I think, is rarely recognized. There is nothing in the history
of philosophical inquiry more curious than the frequency of
interminable disputes on subjects where no agreement can be reached
because the opposing parties do not use words in the same sense. That
the history of science is not free from this reproach is shown by the
fact of the long dispute whether the force of a moving body was
proportional to the simple velocity or to its square. Neither of the
parties to the dispute thought it worth while to define what they meant
by the word "force," and it was at length found that if a definition
was agreed upon the seeming difference of opinion would vanish. Perhaps
the most striking feature of the case, and one peculiar to a scientific
dispute, was that the opposing parties did not differ in their solution
of a single mechanical problem. I say this is curious, because the very
fact of their agreeing upon every concrete question which could have
been presented ought to have made it clear that some fallacy was
lacking in the discussion as to the measure of force. The good effect
of a scientific spirit is shown by the fact that this discussion is
almost unique in the history of science during the past two centuries,
and that scientific men themselves were able to see the fallacy
involved, and thus to bring the matter to a conclusion.
If we now turn to the discussion of philosophers, we shall find at
least one yet more striking example of the same kind. The question of
the freedom of the human will has, I believe, raged for centuries. It
cannot yet be said that any conclusion has been reached. Indeed, I have
heard it admitted by men of high intellectual attainments that the
question was insoluble. Now a curious feature of this dispute is that
none of the combatants, at least on the affirmative side, have made any
serious attempt to define what should be meant by the phrase freedom of
the will, except by using such terms as require definition equally with
the word freedom itself. It can, I conceive, be made quite clear that
the assertion, "The will is free," is one without meaning, until we
analyze more fully the different meanings to be attached to the word
free. Now this word has a perfectly well-defined signification in
every-day life. We say that anything is free when it is not subject to
external constraint. We also know exactly what we mean when we say that
a man is free to do a certain act. We mean that if he chooses to do it
there is no external constraint acting to prevent him. In all cases a
relation of two things is implied in the word, some active agent or
power, and the presence or absence of another constraining agent. Now,
when we inquire whether the will itself is free, irrespective of
external constraints, the word free no longer has a meaning, because
one of the elements implied in it is ignored.
To inquire whether the will itself is free is like inquiring whether
fire itself is consumed by the burning, or whether clothing is itself
clad. It is not, therefore, at all surprising that both parties have
been able to dispute without end, but it is a most astonishing
phenomenon of the human intellect that the dispute should go on
generation after generation without the parties finding out whether
there was really any difference of opinion between them on the subject.
I venture to say that if there is any such difference, neither party
has ever analyzed the meaning of the words used sufficiently far to
show it. The daily experience of every man, from his cradle to his
grave, shows that human acts are as much the subject of external causal
influences as are the phenomena of nature. To dispute this would be
little short of the ludicrous. All that the opponents of freedom, as a
class, have ever claimed is the assertion of a causal connection
between the acts of the will and influences independent of the will.
True, propositions of this sort can be expressed in a variety of ways
connoting an endless number of more or less objectionable ideas, but
this is the substance of the matter.
To suppose that the advocates on the other side meant to take issue on
this proposition would be to assume that they did not know what they
were saying. The conclusion forced upon us is that though men spend
their whole lives in the study of the most elevated department of human
thought it does not guard them against the danger of using words
without meaning. It would be a mark of ignorance, rather than of
penetration, to hastily denounce propositions on subjects we are not
well acquainted with because we do not understand their meaning. I do
not mean to intimate that philosophy itself is subject to this
reproach. When we see a philosophical proposition couched in terms we
do not understand, the most modest and charitable view is to assume
that this arises from our lack of knowledge. Nothing is easier than for
the ignorant to ridicule the propositions of the learned. And yet, with
every reserve, I cannot but feel that the disputes to which I have
alluded prove the necessity of bringing scientific precision of
language into the whole domain of thought. If the discussion had been
confined to a few, and other philosophers had analyzed the subject, and
showed the fictitious character of the discussion, or had pointed out
where opinions really might differ, there would be nothing derogatory
to philosophers. But the most suggestive circumstance is that although
a large proportion of the philosophic writers in recent times have
devoted more or less attention to the subject, few, or none, have made
even this modest contribution. I speak with some little confidence on
this subject, because several years ago I wrote to one of the most
acute thinkers of the country, asking if he could find in philosophic
literature any terms or definitions expressive of the three different
senses in which not only the word freedom, but nearly all words
implying freedom were used. His search was in vain.
Nothing of this sort occurs in the practical affairs of life. All terms
used in business, however general or abstract, have that well-defined
meaning which is the first requisite of the scientific language. Now
one important lesson which I wish to inculcate is that the language of
science in this respect corresponds to that of business; in that each
and every term that is employed has a meaning as well defined as the
subject of discussion can admit of. It will be an instructive exercise
to inquire what this peculiarity of scientific and business language
is. It can be shown that a certain requirement should be fulfilled by
all language intended for the discovery of truth, which is fulfilled
only by the two classes of language which I have described. It is one
of the most common errors of discourse to assume that any common
expression which we may use always conveys an idea, no matter what the
subject of discourse. The true state of the case can, perhaps, best be
seen by beginning at the foundation of things and examining under what
conditions language can really convey ideas.
Suppose thrown among us a person of well-developed intellect, but
unacquainted with a single language or word that we use. It is
absolutely useless to talk to him, because nothing that we say conveys
any meaning to his mind. We can supply him no dictionary, because by
hypothesis he knows no language to which we have access. How shall we
proceed to communicate our ideas to him? Clearly there is but one
possible way--namely, through his senses. Outside of this means of
bringing him in contact with us we can have no communication with him.
We, therefore, begin by showing him sensible objects, and letting him
understand that certain words which we use correspond to those objects.
After he has thus acquired a small vocabulary, we make him understand
that other terms refer to relations between objects which he can
perceive by his senses. Next he learns, by induction, that there are
terms which apply not to special objects, but to whole classes of
objects. Continuing the same process, he learns that there are certain
attributes of objects made known by the manner in which they affect his
senses, to which abstract terms are applied. Having learned all this,
we can teach him new words by combining words without exhibiting
objects already known. Using these words we can proceed yet further,
building up, as it were, a complete language. But there is one limit at
every step. Every term which we make known to him must depend
ultimately upon terms the meaning of which he has learned from their
connection with special objects of sense.
To communicate to him a knowledge of words expressive of mental states
it is necessary to assume that his own mind is subject to these states
as well as our own, and that we can in some way indicate them by our
acts. That the former hypothesis is sufficiently well established can
be made evident so long as a consistency of different words and ideas
is maintained. If no such consistency of meaning on his part were
evident, it might indicate that the operations of his mind were so
different from ours that no such communication of ideas was possible.
Uncertainty in this respect must arise as soon as we go beyond those
mental states which communicate themselves to the senses of others.
We now see that in order to communicate to our foreigner a knowledge of
language, we must follow rules similar to those necessary for the
stability of a building. The foundation of the building must be well
laid upon objects knowable by his five senses. Of course the mind, as
well as the external object, may be a factor in determining the ideas
which the words are intended to express; but this does not in any
manner invalidate the conditions which we impose. Whatever theory we
may adopt of the relative part played by the knowing subject, and the
external object in the acquirement of knowledge, it remains none the
less true that no knowledge of the meaning of a word can be acquired
except through the senses, and that the meaning is, therefore, limited
by the senses. If we transgress the rule of founding each meaning upon
meanings below it, and having the whole ultimately resting upon a
sensuous foundation, we at once branch off into sound without sense. We
may teach him the use of an extended vocabulary, to the terms of which
he may apply ideas of his own, more or less vague, but there will be no
way of deciding that he attaches the same meaning to these terms that
we do.
What we have shown true of an intelligent foreigner is necessarily true
of the growing child. We come into the world without a knowledge of the
meaning of words, and can acquire such knowledge only by a process
which we have found applicable to the intelligent foreigner. But to
confine ourselves within these limits in the use of language requires a
course of severe mental discipline. The transgression of the rule will
naturally seem to the undisciplined mind a mark of intellectual vigor
rather than the reverse. In our system of education every temptation is
held out to the learner to transgress the rule by the fluent use of
language to which it is doubtful if he himself attaches clear notions,
and which he can never be certain suggests to his hearer the ideas
which he desires to convey. Indeed, we not infrequently see, even among
practical educators, expressions of positive antipathy to scientific
precision of language so obviously opposed to good sense that they can
be attributed only to a failure to comprehend the meaning of the
language which they criticise.