The Philosophy of Inquiry and Global Problems: The Intellectual Revolution Needed to Create a Better World
Palgrave Macmillan, 2024
Universities have long been dominated by a philosophy of inquiry that may be called knowledge-inquiry. This holds that, in order to do justice to the basic humanitarian aim of helping to promote human welfare, academic inquiry must, in the first instance, seek knowledge and technological know-how. First, knowledge is to be acquired; once acquired, it can be applied to help promote human welfare. But this philosophy of knowledge-inquiry is an intellectual and humanitarian disaster. It violates three of the four most elementary rules of rational problem solving conceivable, and as a result fails to give priority to the task of helping humanity resolve those conflicts and problems of living, such as the climate and nature crises, that need to be resolved if we are to make progress to a better world – a world in which there is peace, democracy, justice, liberty, and sustainable prosperity, for all. Very few academics today are aware of this rationality scandal. We urgently need to bring about a revolution in universities around the world, wherever possible, so that academic inquiry puts all four rules of rational problem solving into practice, and becomes rationally devoted to helping humanity learn how to make progress towards a better world. Knowledge-inquiry needs to become wisdom-inquiry, rationally devoted to helping humanity create a wiser world.
The World Crisis — And What to Do About It
A Revolution for Thought and Action
World Scientific, Singapore, 2021
Science and technology have made the modern world possible, but also created all the global problems that threaten our future: the climate crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, mass extinction of species, environmental degradation, overpopulation, lethal modern war, and the menace of nuclear weapons. Nicholas Maxwell, world-renowned philosopher of science and author of 14 books, argues that all these problems have come about because humans have solved only the first of two great problems of learning — how to acquire scientific knowledge and technological know-how — but not the second — how to create a civilized, wise world.
The key disaster of our times is that we have science without wisdom. At present, universities all over the world are devoted to the pursuit of specialized knowledge and technology, or "knowledge-inquiry". Maxwell contends that they need to be radically transformed so that their basic function becomes to help humanity tackle global problems, with a more rigorous and socially beneficial perspective he calls "wisdom-inquiry". The World Crisis — And What to Do About It spells out in detail the changes that need to be made to academic inquiry, why they need to be made, and how they would enable universities to help humanity actively and effectively tackle and solve current global problems.
Our Fundamental Problem: A Revolutionary Approach to Philosophy
McGill-Queen’s University Press, Montreal, June, 2020
How our human world can exist and best flourish even though it is embedded in the physical universe.
How can the world we live in and see, touch, hear, and smell, the world of living things, people, consciousness, free will, meaning, and value - how can all of this exist and flourish embedded as it is in the physical universe, made up of nothing but physical entities such as electrons and quarks? How can anything be of value if everything in the universe is, ultimately, just physics?
In Our Fundamental Problem Nicholas Maxwell argues that this problem of reconciling the human and physical worlds needs to take centre stage in our thinking, so that our best ideas about it interact with our attempts to solve even more important specialized problems of thought and life. When we explore this fundamental problem, Maxwell argues, revolutionary answers emerge for a wide range of questions arising in philosophy, science, social inquiry, academic inquiry as a whole, and - most important of all - our capacity to solve the global problems that threaten our future: climate change, habitat destruction, extinction of species, inequality, war, pollution of earth, sea, and air.
An unorthodox introduction to philosophy, Our Fundamental Problem brings philosophy down to earth and demonstrates its vital importance for science, scholarship, education, life, and the fate of the world.
Agustín Vicente, Ikerbasque, Basque Foundation for Science: Our Fundamental Problem offers an original perspective on several modern philosophical debates, including those on qualia, free will, physicalism, and how to reconcile the scientific and the manifest images of the world. Above all, it is a fresh contribution to the issue of how to think about the roles of academia and education.
The Metaphysics of Science and Aim-Oriented Empiricism: A Revolution for Science and Philosophy
Springer, Cham, Switzerland, 2019
This book gives an account of work that I have done over a period of decades that sets out to solve two fundamental problems of philosophy: the mind-body problem and the problem of induction. Remarkably, these revolutionary contributions to philosophy turn out to have dramatic implications for a wide range of issues outside philosophy itself, most notably for the capacity of humanity to resolve current grave global problems and make progress towards a better, wiser world.
A key element of the proposed solution to the first problem is that physics is about only a highly specialized aspect of all that there is – the causally efficacious aspect. Once this is understood, it ceases to be a mystery that natural science says nothing about the experiential aspect of reality, the colours we perceive, the inner experiences we are aware of. That natural science is silent about the experiential aspect of reality is no reason whatsoever to holdthat the experiential does not objectively exist.
A key element of the proposed solution to the second problem is that physics, in persistently accepting unified theories only, thereby makes a substantial metaphysical assumption about the universe: it is such that a unified pattern of physical law runs through all phenomena. We need a new conception, and kind, of physics that acknowledges, and actively seeks to improve, metaphysical presuppositions inherent in the methods of physics. The problematic aims and methods of physics need to be improved as physics proceeds.
These are the ideas that have fruitful implications, I set out to show, for a wide range of issues: for philosophy itself, for physics, for natural science more generally, for the social sciences, for education, for the academic enterprise as a whole and, most important of all, for the capacity of humanity to learn how to solve the grave global problems that menace our future, and thus make progress to a better, wiser world. It is not just science that has problematic aims; in life too our aims, whether personal, social or institutional, are all too often profoundly problematic, and in urgent need of improvement. We need a new kind of academic enterprise which helps humanity put aims-and-methods improving meta-methods into practice in personal and social life, so that we may come to do better at achieving what is of value in life, and make progress towards a saner, wiser world.
This body of work of mine has met with critical acclaim. Despite that, astonishingly, it has been ignored by mainstream philosophy. In the book I discuss the recent work of over 100 philosophers on the mind-body problem and the metaphysics of science, and show that my earlier, highly relevant work on these issues is universally ignored, the quality of subsequent work suffering as a result. My hope, in publishing this book, is that my fellow philosophers will come to appreciate the intellectual value of my proposed solutions to the mind-body problem and the problem of induction, and will, as a result, join with me in attempting to convince our fellow academics that we need to bring about an intellectual/institutional revolution in academic inquiry so that it takes up its proper task of helping humanity learn how to solve problems of living, including global problems, and make progress towards as good, as wise and enlightened a world as possible.
Damian Beanato: The Metaphysics of Science and Aim-Oriented Empiricism ... is a solid and persuasive exposition of the main elements that have marked this author's career: an original, remarkable philosophical doctrine, and a wide-encompassing proposal for academic reform. The main strength of this book, from a philosophical point of view, is its cogency in presenting a well-developed, appealing, and rigorous philosophical system pertaining to the metaphysics and epistemology of science, something that not many philosophers even attempt to do these days. Principia, 23(9), 2019, pp. 529-533.
Understanding Scientific Progress: Aim-Oriented Empiricism
Paragon House, 2017
Science makes astonishing progress in improving our knowledge and understanding of the world but philosophers, by contrast, have made no progress at all in explaining how this progress is possible, despite centuries of effort. Some of the world's greatest thinkers, from Hume, Kant and Mill to Russell and Popper, have struggled to solve philosophical problems about scientific progress, and have failed. Even Einstein confessed he was baffled by the problem of what it means to say of a physical theory that it is "unified", "explanatory", or in possession of what he called "inner perfection". This book sets out to solve the eight most fundamental philosophical problems about scientific progress. These include the problem of induction, the problem of what it means to say of a physical theory that it is "unified", and the problem of specifying precisely what the progress-achieving methods of science are. The enhanced understanding of scientific progress that this provides has important implications both for science, and for our attempts to achieve progress in other areas of human life where progress is urgently needed and much less assured-above all, in the effort to achieve social progress towards a better, wiser world.
Lloyd Eby: Understanding Scientific Progress constitutes a potentially enormous and revolutionary advancement in philosophy of science. It deserves to be read and studied by everyone with any interest in or connection with physics or the theory of science. Maxwell cites the work of Hume, Kant, J.S. Mill, Ludwig Bolzmann, Pierre Duhem, Einstein, Henri Poincaré, C.S. Peirce, Whitehead, Russell, Carnap, A.J. Ayer, Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn, Imre Lakatos, Paul Feyerabend, Nelson Goodman, Bas van Fraassen, and numerous others. He lauds Popper for advancing beyond verificationism and Hume's problem of induction, but faults both Kuhn and Popper for being unable to show that and how their work could lead nearer to the truth. Dr. Lloyd Eby teaches philosophy at The George Washington University and The Catholic University of America, in Washington, DC
In Praise of Natural Philosophy: A Revolution for Thought and Life
McGill-Queen's University Press, Spring 2017
Paperback, ebook, and can be downloaded free from UCL website.
In Praise of Natural Philosophy argues for a transformation of both science and philosophy, so that these two distinct domains of thought become one: natural philosophy. This in turn has far-reaching consequences for the whole academic enterprise. It transpires that universities need to be reorganized so that they become devoted to seeking and promoting wisdom by rational means – as opposed to just acquiring knowledge. Modern science began as natural philosophy. What today we call science and philosophy, in Newton's time formed one integrated enterprise: to improve our knowledge and understanding of the universe. Profound discoveries were made. And then natural philosophy died. It split into science and philosophy. But the two fragments are defective shadows of the glorious unified endeavour of natural philosophy. Rigour, sheer intellectual good sense, and decisive argument demand that we put the two together again, and rediscover the immense merits of the integrated enterprise of natural philosophy. This requires an intellectual revolution, with profound consequences for how we understand the universe, do both science and philosophy, and tackle global problems. A comprehensive addition to discussions about the purposes of academia, In Praise of Natural Philosophy has dramatic implications for the fate of our world.
Michael Krausz, Bryn Mawr College:This is an ambitious, wide-ranging, and visionary book.
CHOICE: In Praise of Natural Philosophy is well researched and systematically demonstrates the historical mistakes scholars made over time that artificially divided knowledge into two entities-science and philosophy. Maxwell's solution is a fully developed model called "aim-oriented empiricism," which offers a complex range of assumptions that help improve both the methods of science and the academic enterprise. Recommended.
Karl Popper, Science and Enlightenment, UCL Press, September 2017: The central thesis of this book is that we need to reform philosophy and join it to science to recreate a modern version of natural philosophy; we need to do this in the interests of rigour, intellectual honesty, and so that science may serve the best interests of humanity. Modern science began as natural philosophy. In the time of Newton, what we call science and philosophy today - the disparate endeavours - formed one mutually interacting, integrated endeavour of natural philosophy: to improve our knowledge and understanding of the universe, and to improve our understanding of ourselves as a part of it. Profound discoveries were made, indeed one should say unprecedented discoveries. It was a time of quite astonishing intellectual excitement and achievement. And then natural philosophy died. It split into science on the one hand, and philosophy on the other. This happened during the 18th and 19th centuries, and the split is now built into our intellectual landscape. But the two fragments, science and philosophy, are defective shadows of the glorious unified endeavour of natural philosophy. Rigour, sheer intellectual good sense and decisive argument demand that we put the two together again, and rediscover the immense merits of the integrated enterprise of natural philosophy. This requires an intellectual revolution, with dramatic implications for how we understand our world, how we understand and do science, and how we understand and do philosophy. There are dramatic implications, too, for education. And it does not stop there. For, as I show in the final chapter, resurrected natural philosophy has dramatic, indeed revolutionary methodological implications for social science and the humanities, indeed for the whole academic enterprise. It means academic inquiry needs to be reorganized so that it comes to take, as its basic task, to seek and promote wisdom by rational means, wisdom being the capacity to realize what is of value in life, for oneself and others, thus including knowledge, technological know-how and understanding, but much else besides. The outcome is institutions of learning rationally designed and devoted to helping us tackle our immense global problems in increasingly cooperatively rational ways, thus helping us make progress towards a good world - or at least as good a world as possible.
Science and Enlightenment: Two Great Problems
of Learning
Springer, Cham, Switzerland, 2019
Two great problems of learning confront humanity: learning about the nature of the universe and about ourselves and other living things as a part of the universe, and learning how to become civilized. The first problem was solved, in essence, in the 17th century, with the creation of modern science. But the second problem has not yet been solved. Solving the first problem without also solving the second puts us in a situation of great danger. All our current global problems have arisen as a result. What we need to do, in response to this unprecedented crisis, is learn from our solution to the first problem how to solve the second. This was the basic idea of the 18th century Enlightenment. Unfortunately, in carrying out this programme, the Enlightenment made three blunders, and it is this defective version of the Enlightenment programme, inherited from the past, that is still built into the institutional/intellectual structure of academic inquiry in the 21st century. In order to solve the second great problem of learning we need to correct the three blunders of the traditional Enlightenment. This involves changing the nature of social inquiry, so that social science becomes social methodology or social philosophy, concerned to help us build into social life the progress-achieving methods of aim-oriented rationality, arrived at by generalizing the progress-achieving methods of science. It also involves, more generally, bringing about a revolution in the nature of academic inquiry as a whole, so that it takes up its proper task of helping humanity learn how to become wiser by increasingly cooperatively rational means. The scientific task of improving knowledge and understanding of nature becomes a part of the broader task of improving global wisdom. The outcome would be what we so urgently need: a kind of inquiry rationally designed and devoted to helping us make progress towards a genuinely civilized world. We would succeed in doing what the Enlightenment tried but failed to do: learn from scientific progress how to go about making social progress towards as good a world as possible.
Global Philosophy: What Philosophy Ought to Be
Imprint Academic, October 2014
This book is about education, learning, rational inquiry, philosophy, science studies, problem solving, academic inquiry, global problems, wisdom and, above all, the urgent need for an academic revolution. Despite this range and diversity of topics, there is a common underlying theme. Education ought to be devoted, much more than it is, to the exploration real-life, open problems; it ought not to be restricted to learning up solutions to already solved problems - especially if nothing is said about the problems that provoked the solutions in the first place. A central task of philosophy ought to be to keep alive awareness of our unsolved fundamental problems - especially our most fundamental problem of all, encompassing all others: How can our human world - and the world of sentient life more generally - imbued with the experiential, consciousness, free will, meaning and value, exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the physical universe? This is both our fundamental intellectual problem and our fundamental problem of living. The essays in this volume seek to provoke a concerted effort to transform our institutions of learning so that they become rationally and effectively devoted to helping us learn how to create a wiser world.
How Universities Can Help Create a Wiser World: The Urgent Need for an Academic Revolution
Imprint Academic, January 2014
In this book I argue that, in order to create a wiser world, it is essential that we bring about a revolution in universities around the world so that they become rationally devoted to helping us solve problems of living, above all our grave global problems.
Julian Baggini, editor-in-chief The Philosophers' Magazine: Thirty years ago, Nicholas Maxwell first argued that our universities must be rationally designed and devoted to helping us learn how to solve our problems of living. In the intervening years it has become more, not less, urgent that we take up his challenge.
Professor Lord Robert May, Oxford University: This book begins by acknowledging that today most people lead longer and healthier lives than previous generations, primarily as a result of "knowledge-inquiry", mainly in universities. Perversely, the result is ever-expanding populations, pressing against the limits to growth on a finite planet. Maxwell gives a good case for addressing these problems by universities putting much greater emphasis on "wisdom-inquiry". It is a timely and interesting idea. I think the book deserves a wide readership.
Mary Midgley, Philosopher: Which ideal matters more to us, knowledge or wisdom? Nicholas Maxwell has long fought staunchly for wisdom in this debate, and in this book he once more points out shrewdly how much our universities need to learn this lesson. It's to be hoped that this time they are listening!
David Price, Vice-Provost of Research, University College London: Nicholas Maxwell argues that in order to address the problems of global society, we must transform our universities. At UCL we fully agree and we have already made such changes central to our 2011 Research Strategy "Delivering a Culture of Wisdom". Our UCL Grand Challenges programme, which has so far involved more than 250 academics, is putting these ideas into practice.
An account of the UCL launch of the book, including comments by Alan Sokal and Philip Ball
Jonathan Coope: It is ... heartening to see [Maxwell's] work being taken more seriously in recent years... The message of Maxwell's How Universities can Help Create a Wiser World is both urgent and wise ... Maxwell is to be praised for putting the task of seeking 'wisdom' on the agenda of universities again. As an introduction to Maxwell's project, and as an inspiring vision of a higher education worth fighting for in our era increasingly beset by marketization, Maxwell's book is a breath of fresh air. While the book is aimed at university staff and policy-makers ... [it] could usefully be read by anyone interested in the future of higher education. Metapsychology, 17 June, vol. 18, issue 25, 2014
Peeter Müürsepp: [Maxwell] is an interesting, metaphysically minded, serious thinker in philosophy of science whose analysis of this wonderful achievement of the human mind is masterful ... It is high time to start taking Nicholas Maxwell seriously, not just as a regular philosopher of science developing the ideas of Karl Popper but first and foremost as an academic revolutionary in the best sense of the word who cares deeply about the future of the whole mankind. Rationality, constantly aimed at acknowledging and solving problems is the most important capacity our species possesses. We have to make proper use of it. Nicholas Maxwell is able to tell us how to get started. Dialogue and Universalism, 2014, no. 2, p. 247
Cutting God in Half - And Putting the Pieces Together Again: A New Approach to Philosophy
Pentire Press, March 2010
Tackles our fundamental problem: How can our human world, imbued with perceptual qualities, inner experiences, consciousness, free will, meaning and value, exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the physical universe?
Here is a book that will enthral anyone concerned about ultimate questions - the nature of the universe, the meaning of life, the fate of humanity. It is written in a lively, accessible style, and has original things to say about a number of fundamental issues. The author argues that we need to sever the God-of-Power from the God-of-Value. The first is Einstein's God, the underlying unity in the physical universe that determines how events occur. The second is what is of most value associated with human life - and sentient life more generally. Having cut God in half in this way, the problem then becomes to see how the two halves can be put together again. This is our basic problem: to see how our human world, imbued with meaning and value, can exist and flourish embedded in the physical universe. It is our fundamental philosophical problem, our fundamental problem of knowledge and understanding, and our fundamental practical problem of living - personal, social and global. This book tackles outstanding aspects of this problem, and in doing so throws out startlingly original ideas about science, education, religion, evolutionary theory, free will, quantum theory, and how we should go about tackling impending global crises such as population growth and global warming. It transpires that bringing our basic problem into sharp focus has revolutionary implications. Many aspects of our social and cultural world urgently need to be transformed. The book would make an excellent text for an introductory course in philosophy, as well as being of interest to the general reader.
What's Wrong With Science? Towards a People's Rational Science of Delight and Compassion
Pentire Press, 2nd ed., September 2009
What ought to be the aims of science? How can science best serve humanity? What would an ideal science be like, a science that is sensitively and humanely responsive to the needs, problems and aspirations of people? How ought the institutional enterprise of science to be related to the rest of society? What ought to be the relationship between science and art, thought and feeling, reason and desire, mind and heart? Should the social sciences model themselves on the natural sciences: or ought they to take a different form if they are to serve the interests of humanity objectively, sensitively and rigorously?
Might it be possible to get into human life, into art, education, politics, industry, international affairs, and other domains of human activity, the same kind of progressive success that is found so strikingly, on the intellectual level, within science? These are some of the questions tackled by What's Wrong With Science?
The author argues that a range of intellectual, technological, social, moral, educational and cultural problems associated with modern science are by-products of the widespread attempt to make science conform to a seriously inadequate ideal for science, an inadequate, widely upheld philosophy of science. The author puts forward and defends a new ideal for science, one which puts people, human life, at the centre of intellectual concern. Such a "person centred" science would be both more humanly desirable, and more rigorous and objective, than science as we have it today. The book is, however, no abstruse treatise on the philosophy of science. Most of it takes the form of a passionate debate between a Scientist and a Philosopher, a debate that is by turns humorous, ironical, bitter, dramatically explosive. Even as the argument explores the relationship between thought and feeling, reason and desire, the two main protagonists find it necessary to examine their own feelings and motivations.
The book is a delight to read and can be understood by anyone. It should have a wide appeal. It will be of interest to any scientist concerned about the intellectual and moral integrity of modern science - whether working in a physical, biological or social science. It will be of interest to educationalists, science teachers, students, 6th form pupils, historians, sociologists and philosophers of science, and indeed to anyone concerned about the place and role of science and technology in the modern world.
This second edition has a new Preface explaining how the book both exploits and develops Karl Popper's philosophy.
From Knowledge to Wisdom: A Revolution for Science and the Humanities
Pentire Press, 2nd edition, 2007
New material, a new introduction and three new chapters. From Knowledge to Wisdom argues that there is an urgent need, for both intellectual and humanitarian reasons, to bring about a revolution in science and the humanities. The outcome would be a kind of academic inquiry rationally devoted to helping humanity learn how to create a better world. The basic intellectual aim of inquiry would be to seek and promote wisdom - wisdom being the capacity to realize what is of value in life for oneself and others, thus including knowledge and technological know-how, but much else besides.
Professor Christopher Longuet-Higgins, Nature: There are altogether too many symptoms of malaise in our science-based society for Nicholas Maxwell's diagnosis to be ignored.
Dr. Mary Midgley, University Quarterly: A strong effort is needed if one is to stand back and clearly state the objections to the whole enormous tangle of misconceptions which surround the notion of science to-day. Maxwell has made that effort in this powerful, profound and important book.
Dr. Stewart Richards, Annals of Science: The essential idea is really so simple, so transparently right ... It is a profound book, refreshingly unpretentious, and deserves to be read, refined and implemented.
Is Science Neurotic?
Imperial College Press, London, December 2004
Is Science Neurotic? sets out to show that science suffers from a damaging but rarely noticed methodological disease - ''rationalistic neurosis.'' Assumptions concerning metaphysics, human value and politics, implicit in the aims of science, are repressed, and the malaise has spread to affect the whole academic enterprise, with the potential for extraordinarily damaging long-term consequences. The book begins with a discussion of the aims and methods of natural science, and moves on to discuss social science, philosophy, education, psychoanalytic theory and academic inquiry as a whole. It makes an original and compelling contribution to the current debate between those for and those against science, arguing that science would be of greater human value if it were more rigorous - we suffer not from too much scientific rationality, but too little. The author discusses the need for a revolution in the aims of science and academic inquiry in general and, in a lively and accessible style, spells out a thesis with profound importance for the long-term future of humanity.
The Human World in the Physical Universe: Consciousness, Free Will and Evolution
Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham, Maryland, 2001
This book tackles the problem of how we can understand our human world embedded in the physical universe in such a way that justice is done both to the richness, meaning and value of human life on the one hand, and what modern science tells us about the physical universe on the other hand. It includes discussion of consciousness, free will and evolution.
The Comprehensibility of the Universe: A New Conception of Science
Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998, pp i-xv + 316, paperback edition, 2003.
Available online: click here.
The Comprehensibility of the Universe puts forward a radically new conception of science. According to the orthodox conception, scientific theories are accepted and rejected impartially with respect to evidence, no permanent assumption being made about the world independently of the evidence. Nicholas Maxwell argues that this orthodox view is untenable. He urges that in its place a new orthodoxy is needed, which sees science as making a hierarchy of metaphysical assumptions about the comprehensibility and knowability of the universe, these assumptions asserting less and less as one ascends the hierarchy.
This view has significant implications: that it is part of scientific knowledge that the universe is physically comprehensible; that metaphysics and philosophy are central to scientific knowledge; that science possesses a rational, if fallible, method of discovery; that a new understanding of scientific method and rationality is required. Maxwell argues that this new conception makes possible a natural resolution of long-standing philosophical problems about science, regarding simplicity, induction, and progress. His goal is the reform not just of the philosophy of science but of science itself, and the healing of the rift between the two.
From Knowledge to Wisdom: A Revolution in the Aims and Methods of Science
Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1984, pp. viii + 299, paperback editions, 1987, 1988
What's Wrong With Science? Towards a People's Rational Science of Delight and Compassion
Bran's Head Books, Frome, England, 1976, pp. xi + 260. R. Barnett and N. Maxwell, eds., Wisdom in the University, Routledge, 2008, pbk. 2009. Includes my "From Knowledge to Wisdom: The Need for an Academic Revolution"