Brief Answer:
The belief that science is the sole path to knowledge is known as “scientism,” a concept that has been debunked in scholarly literature for over a century.
Detailed Answer:
As much as I enjoy and make a living through science, there are a number of ways to refute scientism.
Scientism refutes itself
There is no scientific test or experiment able to prove the belief in scientism. If someone claims, “Science is the only way to know truth,” ask them, “How do you know that scientifically?” Scientism cannot be validated by science, which makes it self-defeating.
Science is excellent, but limited
Science is an excellent source of information, when viewing what it is capable of viewing. Like any camera, science has a limited viewpoint. There is so much in life science is incapable of providing answers to, beyond its viewing area.
What science is capable of viewing depends on how you define “science”. Some think science can only provide knowledge about what is observable and can be repeated in experiments. I think this is too restrictive as science can definitely study things unable to be observed or repeated in experiments, but most recognize the central feature of science is using the scientific method and exclusively explaining natural world, with scientific explanations being in the form of models using the initial conditions and natural laws found in nature. However, even with this broad view of science, all of nature was brought into existence by a cause beyond, entirely distinct from nature, meaning we already have scientific evidence of existence beyond the natural world science is capable of studying.
Further, for science to be the only way to knowledge, then the following three things below must be true, and none of those three are true.
Science misses entire areas of knowledge
Science must be able to cover all aspects of reality, yet, science cannot cover many essential swaths of knowledge:
- philosophical: metaphysical, ethical, logic,
- mathematical knowledge,
- theological,
- aesthetic,
- anything from the past; for those who believe in only empirical science (that which must be verified by observation and repeatable experiments), then specific occurrences from the past are not verifiable.
If any other source of knowledge provides unique and accurate knowledge about the world, which is simple to demonstrate, then science is not the only, or even the best source of knowledge in every situation.
Science must not depend upon assumptions or upon other sources of knowledge
Yet, there are assumptions made by those doing science, which cannot be proven by science:
- the real existence of the phenomenal world, objective reality of the cosmos; there is a real world out there, which is independent of your mind
- reliability of cognitive and sensory faculties; the power of the human intellect and senses to accurately reflect reality, humans have all the abilities built in to do this correctly; we think other animals don’t have this capability, for example, a wolf can navigate a forest better than humans, but the existence of the universe is unintelligible to them
- the perfect lawfulness of nature; there is a regularity and uniformity you can count on, no matter where you are in the universe; some may argue you can experimentally show effect B always follows cause A, yet the principle of induction cannot be scientifically justified. Just because some event “A” has always been succeeded by another event “B” in the past, provides no warrant for inferring that the next “A” will be followed by “B”
- validity of math and logic and philosophy, which science also relies upon, for example, proper interpretation and presentation of the data collected requires the science being founded upon proper philosophical logic and ethics
There cannot be other sources of truth
Science cannot be the only way, or even always the best way to gain knowledge if there are other ways to gain accurate and unique knowledge about reality, but there are other sources. In fact, some of the most interesting answers we seek are forever beyond the grasp of science, for example: What is the cause of the Universe? Is there true or objective morality? What is beautiful?
Prominent philosopher of science Karl Popper, philosopher of science: “it is important to realize that science doesn’t make assertions about ultimate questions, about the riddles of existence.”[1]
[1] Karl R. Popper, “Natural Selection and the Emergence of Mind,” in Evolutionary Epistemology, Rationality, and the Sociology of Knowledge, ed. Gerard Radnitzky and W. W. Bartley, III (La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1987), 141.
Conclusion
Science has provided massive value in knowing and operating in our world, and we should not downplay this significance, but we should also not overstate science’s capability.
