At the beginning of the new century, Chinese scholars first explored the systematic: On the Spirit of Science

Author: / Country: Mainland China
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-04-01
Features: Exploring the meaning and value of life, establishing a life philosophy that pursues truth, goodness, and beauty, but it cannot rely solely on science. Literature and art, philosophy and history, ethics and morality, politics and society, greatly influence life philosophy, but all of these must be infused with the spirit of science and cannot violate the spirit of science. Moreover, the spirit of science itself also has profound humanistic significance. The birth of modern science liberated people from the bondage of theocracy—wasn't that full of humanistic spirit? The development of automation and informatization technology freed people from heavy, monotonous labor. The works of the founder of cybernetics, Norbert Wiener, were titled "Use People as People," hoping to change the situation where people were treated as machines—wasn't that also full of humanistic spirit? The moral concepts in the fine traditions of the scientific community are not only a valuable scientific spirit but also a valuable humanistic spirit. Throughout history, outstanding figures in the scientific community have fought for truth, science, and human progress, filled with a spirit of dedication, even at the cost of their lives. They tirelessly pursued their research, persistent and selfless, indifferent to fame and fortune, devoting their energy to their careers rather than to pleasure. They were aware of their responsibility for society and humanity in their scientific work, actively participating in struggles against aggression, upholding peace and humanity, and protecting the ecological and environment. All of this reflects the high integration of the spirit of science and humanistic spirit. Insufficient emphasis on and inadequate promotion of the humanistic spirit within the spirit of science are also weaknesses in our science education and science promotion. In summary, the humanistic spirit we advocate should be one with a modern scientific (natural and social sciences) consciousness, and the scientific spirit we advocate should be one full of profound humanistic care.
The value of modern science and technology is recognized by historians that few isolated political events can have a lasting and decisive impact on the course of human history. However, if certain scientific discoveries or technological inventions were missing, human history might have been completely different. For centuries, people have tried to define science, and this effort continues today. However, no definition has been entirely satisfactory. Gradually, people have come to realize that many things in the world cannot be defined, and often it is better not to define them at all. People tend to understand science in other ways: not by directly defining what science is, but by saying what essential characteristics science should contain. Of course, these listed essential characteristics have entered and exited this list in different periods, constantly changing. It is estimated that the 21st century will continue this activity of describing the characteristics of science. The characteristics we currently recognize will also change. This difficulty in defining science perfectly illustrates its vastness and infinite vitality.
At least ten essential characteristics can be summarized as the essence of science. Science should be systematic; it is a description of the generality, commonality, and regularity of individual phenomena. People can describe things in the world from different angles, in different ways, and with different concepts, but science has its own specific perspective, concepts, and methods. Second, science must explain unity and predictability. It strives to provide unified, quantitative, and causal explanations for things. This is the aspiration of scientists, but it is often unattainable. Due to the interactions between multiple factors, the systems studied by scientists do not always follow simple laws. Nevertheless, scientists continue to explore and seek, and they philosophically believe that it can be resolved. Third, science is extremely rigorous and is based on experiments. Experiments exist in many cultures, but scientific experiments have their own strict definitions. Scientific experiments are repeatable and have many features that distinguish them from other cultural experiments. Fourth, from a sociological perspective, it is astonishing to find that many past knowledge systems have remained virtually unchanged or changed very little over thousands of years. However, science continuously enriches its knowledge, and people constantly use past knowledge to create new knowledge. Science is a self-replenishing and self-expanding knowledge system. The expansion of scientific knowledge follows a series of its own laws. Fifth, in a sense, the exploration of science is a playful activity. It transcends conventions, is unexpected, and sometimes yields results that people did not anticipate. When people engage in scientific exploration, many important scientific achievements are not initially derived from direct, predetermined plans or utilitarian purposes but from a persistent curiosity about nature. Scientists dedicate their relentless efforts to embody and satisfy this curiosity. Sixth, science and technology exhibit an extremely complex interactive relationship, with different characteristics in different historical periods. In the process of human knowledge creation, what humans created first was not science but technology. What humans created first were three arts: survival technology, art, and sorcery. These were the earliest spiritual products of humanity. Technology and experience accumulated to a certain extent before they could support human survival, reproduction, and development. When social wealth accumulated to a certain level, the demand for science arose, and material conditions were provided for the emergence of science. For a long time, science in many countries depended on the tradition of philosophy. Technology, on the other hand, long depended on the tradition of craftsmen. The mutual influence between these two traditions was very small. This stage of separation continued for thousands of years. After the birth of modern science in the 17th century, this situation underwent a qualitative change. In the 17th century, Galileo, with the unique way of thinking of a scientist, transformed the philosophical concepts proposed by philosophers of the time, including Roger Bacon and Francis Bacon, who proposed that "experiment is the foundation of natural science," into operable scientific methods. From then on, true natural science was established, and many crucial natural phenomena and laws were discovered, laying a solid foundation for the emergence of new technologies and creating a new group of technologies that transcended experience and common sense. The development of new technologies then pushed science into new fields. This interactive process continues to this day. Seventh, scientists treat experiments differently from ordinary people. When pursuing expected results, scientists pay special attention to the by-products or side results of these experiments—those things that differ from their original intentions. If the results of an experiment deviate from the original hypothesis and expected outcomes, it indicates a new discovery, and scientists will be delighted. In other fields, when this happens, it is often frustrating. In November 1999, during the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Ding Zhongzhi discussed the four experiments he had conducted in fundamental science in recent years. He listed a table, with the left side indicating the original experimental objectives and the right side showing the results. Almost none of the originally expected outcomes were found, and each time, something unexpected was discovered, but he was very happy. As long as scientific exploration is serious and rigorous, and the results of scientific exploration are objective and correct, they are important to science.