When you think about the world, at some point you have to ask yourself – what to make of science and the supposed body of knowledge it has acquired?
Is science merely a very successful tool for controlling nature, but says nothing about the underlying structure of the world? Or do certain scientific theories at least to some degree capture the actual truth?
The answer to this question determines how you are going to view the mind, think about language and talk about the metaphysics of space and time. Where you’re going to position scientific beliefs in your philosophical system, will have a significant effect on it.
The most commonly held view (at least by people in general) is that yes, scientific theories do tell us the truth, even if it’s just an approximation of what the world is actually like. We call this view scientific realism, which normally consists of the claim that:
- “Our best scientific theories about the world are approximately true – an approximation of what the world is actually like."
