PHILOSOPHY, BRIDGING THE ARTS AND SCIENCES

Joseph Kenny, O.P.

Seminar: The Idea of a Nigerian University: A Follow-up
Monday, 21 November 2011

At The Dempsey Centre, Dominican Institute, Ibadan
under the auspices of the
Council for Research in Values and Philosophy (CRVP), Washington, D.C./ Beirut

The problem

Sixty—forty, the National Universities Commission decreed, will be the ratio of Science to Arts, that all universities must follow. Arts may fall below 40%, as in universities of Technology. The reverse is not allowed —there can be no university of Liberal Arts.

With scanty resources, Science complains it cannot perform up to standard. Arts, in turn, complains of marginalization, resulting in dehumanized education, in graduates who cannot express themselves, who know nothing of history, and its lessons. For instance, most Nigerian youth don't know who Nnamdi Azikwe was.

The problem boils down to: What principles should guide education planning? And which discipline specializes in these principles? —That discipline deserves the name "First Philosophy", and should be commander in chief of education planning. Which should it be? —There is a turf war.

Requirements for education planning

Educational planning requires a vision of the whole, and the order of all the parts. Along with wide knowledge of the components, it requires wisdom. It is the job of wisdom, Aristotle says, to sort and put order in chaos.

That reminds me of scavengers or waste managers. They can go through a refuse dump, sort it and recycle it, leaving nothing to go to waste.

Like refuse, there is no useless knowledge. The problem is to find its place in the total scheme of knowledge.

Specialists in each field sort and arrange the knowledge of that branch of knowledge. They cannot lay claim to wisdom, because they do not see what is beyond their own field. The wise man must have his feet on the ground. He must have a gentleman's familiarity with all branches of knowledge. But he need not, and cannot have a specialist's knowledge of every field.

The wise man is on the lookout for fundamental principles. Whether in Physics, the Social Sciences, Linguistics, or other fields of study, there are certain underlying driving forces, formulated as principles, which give meaning and unity to that branch of knowledge.

There are other forces, also formulated as principles, which give meaning to all reality and all sciences, taken as a whole. These common principles are the sphere of, what Aristotle calls, "First Philosophy".

First Philosophy should see the connectivity of all branches of learning to these first common principles. First Philosophy should see the harmonious interrelationship of diverse parts of knowledge. It should provide the basic guidelines for academic planning.

Where does First Philosophy reside? Conflicting claims

From the name, we might think first of all of the Philosophy Department. But we saw, above, other contenders, vying to host First Philosophy. Let us examine their merits first, and do some short-listing.

The short-listed candidates for First Philosophy

It is now time to interview the short-listed candidates. They are (1) Physical or "Natural" Science, (2) Religious Studies, (3) Philosophy.

Physical Science: In support of its claim, I quote Aristotle: "If there is no substance other than those which exist in the way that natural substances do, the philosophy of nature will be the first science; but if there is an immobile substance, this substance will be prior, and [the science which investigates it will be] First Philosophy, and will be universal in this way" (Metaphysics, VI, chapter 1, 1026a 28).1

Aristotle goes on to show that First Philosophy deals not merely with immobile, i.e. immaterial or spiritual, substance, but with the being that straddles the material and the immaterial worlds. The two are not equally being, because the immaterial is superior. Hence, "being" is predicated of them analogically.

The problem Aristotle faced, and which the modern world faces, is whether, in fact, there is any reality beyond the physical, and whose job is it to ascertain this.

Is it the job of First Philosophy, in the guise of Metaphysics, to establish its own subject: being inclusive of the immaterial world? For Aristotle, no science proves its own subject. That is a given. He devoted the 8th book of his Physics to establishing a first, immaterial mover. That was his gateway to Metaphysics. Metaphysics thereby became First Philosophy.

The philosophers of science in Aristotle's day, like most of them in our day, saw no evidence for the existence of anything immaterial. Traditional religion taught them otherwise, but that was a matter of faith, not reason based on hard evidence.

Religious Studies: Of all departments, only Religious Studies overtly asserts the existence of the immaterial world. There is the human soul, the spirits of the deceased, various benevolent or malevolent other spirits, and finally a supreme deity. Religious Studies researches empirical evidence of the activity of these beings.

Most of this evidence, however, is not in the public domain. Communication by dreams may be evident to the participants, but not to outsiders. Spirit infestation may take place, but can also be ascribed to psychological disorder.

The only public evidence Religious Studies can point to are verifiable signs: for example, the miracles of Christ attested by the Gospels, or the cures certified at Lourdes or in processes of canonization.

Such signs cannot be dismissed, and are evidence of causality that transcends the physical. Nevertheless, they are an extraordinary avenue to the immaterial, because they cannot be duplicated at will. There should be an ordinary avenue, using evidence that is accessible to any observer, at any time, anywhere. Religious Studies, therefore, can only provide a peripheral foundation for Metaphysics.

Furthermore, with the evidence it has of a spiritual world, Religious Studies differs from Metaphysics, because it does not study the attributes of being (as common to spiritual and material things), or the first principles of knowledge. Rather, it studies spiritual phenomena, and that from a phenomenological standpoint. From this point of view, it should be grouped with Metaphysics.

Religious Studies thereby differs from its cousin, Theology, which studies God as its primary subject, and that from the standpoint of revelation. Theology studies all of creation as well, but only in so far as it relates to God. It thereby differs from Metaphysics, which has the being of material and immaterial creation as its subject, whereas God is an extrinsic principle of being. Theology, however, uses Revelation, not observation, as its fundamental principle of argumentation. Therefore, it stands apart not only from Metaphysics, but from all the human sciences. It also has an important input to offer all of education, as well as all of life and society.

Religious Studies and Theology, therefore, cannot host Metaphysics or do its job on its own terms and method. They can only touch on it indirectly.

Philosophy: If Physical Science is incapable of discovering immaterial being, then there is no ground for Metaphysics. In that case, Physical science becomes First Philosophy, the arbiter of all reality. Metaphysics is the cornerstone of the Philosophy Department. Without it, other courses, like Philosophy of Mathematics, Philosophy of Law, could be dispersed to their corresponding departments. Epistemology and Philosophy of Science could be handled in the methodology of Physical Science. The Philosophy Department, now melted down to bankruptcy, could shut its doors.

On the other hand, if Physical Science can discover immaterial being, it has provided Metaphysics with its subject. That is a task, Aristotle complained, the physical scientists ran away from. He endeavored to do it, and his intellectual heritage persisted through Arabic and European philosophy to the Middle Ages. Modern science, however, like its ancient predecessors, for the most part dodges the task.

How can Physical Science do so? There are two principal ways. The first is by examining evidence for the survivability of the human soul. This can be shown from its knowledge of material things in an immaterial, universal way. That indicates that the intellect is an immaterial power, of an immaterial soul.

The second way is to show the dependence of the physical universe on an immaterial cause. This is not the place to elaborate on these arguments. It is simply to observe that without them, Metaphysics has no foundation, and tumbles. But if any of these arguments stands, then Metaphysics stands, as an independent science, above all other human sciences, the arbiter and queen of them all. It is First Philosophy.

First Philosophy, however, comes last, in the order of learning, as Thomas Aquinas puts it:

So the proper order of learning will be the following. First, boys should be instructed in logical matters, because logic teaches the method of the whole of philosophy. Second, they are to be instructed in mathematics, which does not require experience and does not transcend the imagination. Third, they should be trained in the natural sciences which, though not transcending sense and imagination, nevertheless require experience. Fourth, they are to be instructed in the moral sciences, which require experience and a soul free from passion, as is said in the first book. Fifth, they should be taught matters concerning wisdom and divine science, which go beyond the imagination and require a vigorous mind.2

Metaphysics at work: academic planning

Aristotle's division of sciences is still useful for contemporary academic planning. He recognized four broad areas:

  1. theoretical science,
  2. the combination of theory and art to modify matter, like engineering, medicine etc.,
  3. the combination of theory concerning man with prudence to modify or regulate human behavior,
  4. the adjunct science and art of organizing thought, found in logic in its many branches.

Then too, he distinguished phases within a science. The first is exploratory or dialectical. The second is synthesis, the formulation of results and conclusions. In our time, these phases are sometimes allotted to distinct disciplines, as we have pointed out with regard to history and the social sciences.

  1. Theoretical sciences, for Aristotle, are fundamentally three, based on the way matter is involved in the definitions and principles of the science:
    1. Natural Science considers things in their full materiality. It only abstracts from individual variations in order to deal with things in the universal. Fundamentally one science, Natural Science has many branches and sub-branches, the first being:
      1. Physics
      2. Chemistry
      3. Biology
    2. Mathematics strips material things of all sensible qualities except shape and number.
      Aristotle also made provision for "mixed sciences", that is, the study of physical reality in the light of mathematics mathematical measurement —the hallmark of modern science. We could add the study of human society in the light of statistics.
    3. Metaphysics starts with spiritual beings totally separated from matter, and considers what these have in common with material beings. Taking this analogically common being as its subject, it analyzes its intrinsic principles, its transcendental properties, and finally its extrinsic principles.
  2. Sciences applied to matter are innumerable.
  3. The sciences of human behavior revolve around:
    1. the individual —in ethics, and now in practical psychology and psychiatry (with medical means)
    2. the family —for Aristotle, "economics" (now metamorphosed into money management)
    3. the "city" or wider society
  4. Logic:3
    1. formal, with regard to:
      1. Terms/concepts (Categories)
      2. Judgments/statements (Interpretation —Peri Hermeneias)
      3. Reasoning/syllogism (Prior Analytics)
    2. applied, to:
      1. Science, starting with Dialectics (Topics), refuting errors (Refuting Sophistry), leading to demonstration (Posterior Analytics)
      2. Drama, encompassing the fine arts (Poetics)
      3. Persuasion (Rhetoric), now part of Communications.

How this applies to planning of faculties and departments

The Philosophy Department, which hosts Metaphysics, should be a unit apart from all Faculties. It should work hand in hand with the university administration, and senate curriculum committee, in academic planning. It should provide the theoretical input, while administration takes care of practical details of implementation.

The Philosophy Department should also work closely with the Science Faculty, assisting it with "philosophy of science", and its own methodology. That job that really belongs to science, but science seems to find it intimidating.

Similarly, the Philosophy Department should work with other faculties, for the same purpose.

A faculty of Physical Science is a key component of a university. Its content is theory. Standing near each of its components are faculties or departments that apply this theory.

At the base of Physical Science is Physics, with many sub-branches. A certain knowledge of Physics is presupposed to Chemistry and Biology, and to all their practical applications.

As its applied counterpart, Physics has Engineering, with all its branches and aspects, such as Architecture.

Biology has important sub-branches, each with application correlatives, giving rise to considerable chance of overlap:
BotanyAgriculture (Forestry is both theoretical and practical), Food production, Landscaping etc.
ZoologyVeterinary Science, Fisheries
Human biologyMedicine

Human biology is related not only to Medicine, but also to the Social Sciences, since they all assume certain postulates about the nature of man, his capabilities, requirements and destiny. Human biology can and should go as far as demonstrating the existence of spiritual powers in man, but what they are and how they operate belong to Metaphysics.

The Philosophy of Man, in his rationality, therefore, belongs in the Philosophy Department. It should consider the questions Aristotle raises in his De anima, and correlate these with modern discoveries. It is the key link between Biology and the Social Sciences.

The Social Sciences, as said above, are concerned with human behavior. The term "social" is somewhat a misnomer, since it includes individual behavior. Ethics, therefore, should accompany Psychology, in one Department. Social Sciences should also have a Department of Family Studies.

The chieftain of Social Sciences, however, is Political Science, which has to do with society as a whole. Law, though usually in a separate Faculty, is subservient to the goals set by Political Science. So also is Economics, while Sociology and Geography serve Political Science as their dialectical arm, providing facts and data for Politics to work with. History, too, belongs in Social Science, not Arts, because it provides data for Political Science.

Philosophy of Politics is really part of Political Science, but, as we have seen elsewhere, it tends to neglect the theoretical foundations on which it is based, and we find Philosophy Department stepping into the gap.

Classics and European studies, in so far as they stray from languages into culture and history, really belong in Social Science. If they want to retain their status in Arts, they should confine themselves to language and literature.

Arts, then, having to do with tools of Science, finds its strength in Language, Linguistics, and Literature. It should also take up all the branches of Logic, as it does with Theatre Arts and Communications. Communications includes Journalism, the use of Radio, Television, the Press and Internet. Theatre Arts embraces drama, film, music, dance, and beautiful scenery, in a word, all the fine arts, apart from their technological aspects.

Likewise, the art of teaching, i.e. the whole of Education, belongs in Arts, as a form of Communications.

University Organogram

Conclusion

Universities are notorious for their politics. Before making compromises, accommodations, swaps and deals, let us have a clear vision of the rational connection of all the parts.

In discussing 60/40, let us keep a vision of man in mind, as provided by Philosophy and Theology. Science and Technology are vital, but are at the service of human life. Human life requires social order and harmony —hence the importance of the Social Sciences. Above all, it requires a life of the spirit. Arts provides tools not only for all the other faculties, but above all, for the contemplation of truth, for reaching, through philosophy and religion, to the supernatural. —"Man does not live by bread alone."

NOTES

1. Thomas Aquinas comments: "According to the ancients, who knew no other substance except the corporeal and mobile, it was necessary that the philosophy of nature be First Philosophy" (Commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics, I, lectio 1, #78). Later he says: "However, among substances there is also a hierarchy, for the first substances are immaterial ones. Hence the study of them belongs properly to first- philosophy, just as the philosophy of nature would be first philosophy if there were no other substances prior to mobile corporeal substances, as is stated below in Book VI (1170)" (ibid., III, lectio 6, #398). And again: "[Aristotle] says that if there is no substance other than those which exist in the way that natural substances do, with which the philosophy of nature deals, the philosophy of nature will be the first science. But if there is some immobile substance, this will be prior to natural substance, and therefore the philosophy which considers this kind of substance, will be first philosophy. And since it is first, it will be universal; and it will be its function to study being as being, both what being is and what the attributes are which belong to being as being. For the science of the primary kind of being and that of being in general are the same, as has been stated at the beginning of Book IV (533)" (ibid., VI, lectio 1, #1170).

2. Commentary on the Nichomachean Ethics, Book 6, lect. 7.

3. See my "The scope of logic, according to Aristotle, Ibn-Sīnā, and Benedict Ashley," presented at the World Day of Philosophy, Tehran, November 2010, for now available at www.josephkenny.joyeurs.com.