Philosophy Quote by Larry Laudan
““I did not write this work merely with the aim of setting the exegetical record straight. My larger target is those contemporaries who -- in repeated acts of wish-fulfillment -- have appropriated conclusions from the philosophy of science and put them to work in aid of a variety of social cum political causes for which those conclusions are ill adapted. Feminists, religious apologists (including "creation scientists"), counterculturalists, neoconservatives, and a host of other curious fellow-travelers have claimed to find crucial grist for their mills in, for instance, the avowed incommensurability and underdetermination of scientific theories. The displacement of the idea that facts and evidence matter by the idea that everything boils down to subjective interests and perspectives is -- second only to American political campaigns -- the most prominent and pernicious manifestation of anti-intellectualism in our time.””
About This Quote
Source Book: Philosophy of Science, 1995
Critiques misuse of scientific philosophy for political agendas, warning against anti‑intellectualism.
In simple terms: Science should guide facts, not personal agendas.
Key Takeaway
Promote evidence‑based discourse.
Themes
science
politics
anti‑intellectualism
Mood
critical
concerned
Type
philosophical
political
When to use this quote
- policy debates
- education reform
- media analysis
Key Concepts
underdetermination
misappropriation
ideology
Questions to Reflect On
- How can we safeguard scientific integrity?
- What role should educators play?
A Different Perspective
Complex scientific concepts can be oversimplified for persuasion.
![“[...] intellectualism (as understood by Fascists) divocers thought from action, science from life, the brain from the heart, and theory from practice. It is the posture of the talker and the skeptic, of the person who entrenches himself behind the maxim that it is one thing to say something and…” quote by Giovanni Gentile](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/692/giovanni-gentile-182419_intelligence_intellectualism-as-understood-by-fascist_722633.jpg)
![“I never knew any man who had once tasted the sweetness of experimental knowledge, that ever afterward fasted after ye Vapour garlick and onions of phantasmatical seeming philosophy." [William Petty]” quote by Carl Zimmer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/e5a/carl-zimmer-16331_knowledge_i-never-knew-any-man-who-had-once-tasted_1770.jpg)
