Philosophy Now Forum

Is naturalism the same as positivism? Very confused. Please help.

I thought I would bump this up again as nobody has replied. Does this reflect a lack of knowledge or a lack of interest?

Does this reflect a lack of knowledge or a lack of interest?
LOL! Are you asking those who don't know or those who don't care?

I think they may be one and the same.

Yeah, I have to say I'm not sure which I am, but I guess I am the first because I am the second. The trick with issues like these is to put a little more into your post, to pique interest. Paint a picture of the problem in words and see if you can engage some of us. What lies behind the dry naturalism v positivism terminology?

Mick

If I could put more in the post I wouldn't need to ask the question!

I don't see how that can be. You must know quite a bit more than you have put in the post to understand your own question and to care about the answer.

I was only joking. However, the reason I decided not to put more in my original post was that I didn't want to skew the discussion by introducing faulty definitions of naturalism and postivism.

I don't understand your concern here. The discussion generated by a faulty definition might be interesting and even useful. I would have thought it was exactly what you are looking for. I'd say go for it!

Hi Rort,
One reason why no replies might be because with a name like Rortabend we think, you think, you might have an answer. So we might as well wait to read what it is

I wondered why rortabend might be a scholarly sounding name so I googled it. No famous folk appeared, but I did find a profile on another forum for a Rortabend M.A. (Hons), M.A. Ph.D.
OooOooo

Rortabend is a combination of Rorty and Feyerabend. It is the name Larry Laudan gives to his relativist in Science and Relativism.

Hi Rortabend,

While surfing this morning, I happened upon this Web site: http://www.centerfornaturalism.org/ It's companion site is http://www.naturalism.org/ .

It should be helpful to you regarding your question. The site describes naturalism as a worldview which, to me provisionally, seems to be a much broader concept than positivism. What do you think?

I'll have to do some reading on the site since I reacently read a book on natural theology.

Tom

Rortabend wrote:Is naturalism the same as positivism? Very confused. Please help.

Thanks for the links Tom.

Hi Rortabend

You have put a quite natural question to the board, thank you.
Maybe you should acquire the dictionary I'm using: The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy by General Editor, Robert Audi. ISBN 052148328X
It even has a quote of Richard Rorty in it.

Richard Rorty wrote:The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy is very comprehensive, thoroughly up-to-date, and probably the best short reference book in English on philosophy.

The dictionary is only one volume. Now, the dictionary contains both the concepts of naturalism and positivism. I also hold that the two concepts refer mainly to Philosophy of Science.

Naturalism: “the twofold view that (1) everything is composed of natural entities – those studied in the sciences (on some versions, the natural sciences) – whose properties determine all the properties of things, persons included, abstracta (abstract entities) like possibilia (possibilities) and mathematical objects, if they exist, being constructed of such abstracta as the sciences allow; and (2) acceptable methods of justification and explanation are commensurable, in some sense, with those in science."

Positivism (logical positivism): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_positivism

The Philosophy of Science, Couvalis wrote:... developed an empiricist account that used the new formal techniques to produce a daring new view of the nature of science, logic and language. They hoped to eliminate metaphysics from the domain of significant discourse by proposing an account of the nature of meaning according to which terms derive much of their meaning directly from experience.

The book is: The Philosophy of Science - Science and Objectivity by George Couvalis ISBN 0761951016.
A.
P.S. Sorry that it has taken so long.