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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Philosophical Instructions Lesson Five: Philosophy and The Sciences The Philosophy of the Sciences In the previous lesson we mentioned that sometimes the term “philosophy” is used in genitive constructions such as “philosophy of morals”, “philosophy of law”, etc.. We shall now explain this sort of usage.

This sort of expression is sometimes used by those who restrict the term “science” to the empirical sciences, and who use the term “philosophy” for fields of the human sciences which are not susceptible to proof by sensory experience. Instead of saying, “the science of theology”, for example, such people say “the philosophy of theology”, that is, the use of “philosophy” in the genetic construction is merely for the sake of indicating the kind of matter under discussion and its topics.

Likewise, those who consider problems which are both scientific and evaluative to be “unscientific”, and who hold that there is no objective basis in reality for them but consider them to be merely governed by the desires and inclinations of people, sometimes consider these sorts of problems to belong to the realm of philosophy.

So, for example, instead of speaking of the “science of morals” they say, “the philosophy of morals”, and instead of speaking of “the science of politics” they say, “the philosophy of politics”. Sometimes this sort of expression is used in another sense, and that is to explain the principles of other sciences. In addition, matters such as the history, founders, goals, methods of research, and the course of development of a science are also discussed under this rubric.

This sort of expression is not peculiar to the positivists and those of like mind to them, but those who consider philosophical and evaluative knowledge to be “science” and who consider their methods of research and inquiry to be “scientific”, also use this sort of expression. Sometimes, in order to avoid confusion with the previous usage, they add the word “science” to the genetic construction.

For example, they say, “the philosophy of the science of history” in contrast to “the philosophy of history”, or they say, “the philosophy of the science of morals” in contrast to “the philosophy of morals” in the previous sense. Metaphysics One of the terms which is used in contrast to “science” is the term “metaphysics”. Hence, it is necessary to explain something about this word.