Science is intelligence in action with no holds barred.
( P. W. Bridgman )
科學就是「格物致知」,從研究「形而下的器」開始,
所以科學重視實際 pragmatic,
因為「格物」必然是一個從錯誤中學習的過程。
但科學不只是一堆事實和實驗結果,
因為一堆事實和實驗結果沒有任何解釋的能力,
不能夠產生概念,從而引發新的思考。
科學要求的,是事實和現象背後一個合理的解釋。
換言之,科學假設了「形而下的器」的背後,
一定有「形而上的道」,
而所謂「致知」,就是找出背後「形而上的道」!
What is the message behind the data?
科學家們相信一堆相關的事實和現象的背後,
必然具備一些信息,給予我們一個合理的解釋,
我們希望能夠找出這些信息。
Science is built with facts
just as a house is built with bricks,
but a collection of facts cannot be called a science
any more than a pile of bricks can be called a house.
( Henri Poincare )
換言之,西方和東方文化都相信「有諸內,形諸外」。
For every inside there is an outside,
and for every outside there is an inside;
though they are different, they go together.
( Alan Watts, Man, Nature, and the Nature of Man, 1991 )
☆ 「假說」是暫時存在、暫且接受的解釋。
同一個現象或實驗結果,最初的時候可以提出很多不同的解釋,
科學界稱之為「假說」hypothesis。
「假說」不一定是或能夠從由事實中「推論」出來,
但是「假說」必須能夠解釋事實和現象。
「假說」的來源並不重要,但敘述一定要清晰,
而且一定要用可以證實的敘述來表達;
「假說」亦不能夠有內部邏輯上的矛盾。
然而「假說」只不過是暫時存在、暫且接受的解釋,
只不過是一種過渡的工具。
A hypothesis is a tentative explanation of
certain observed phenomena.
It is either invented or born
in a sudden illumination or inspiration,
and so remains very much speculative and idiosyncratic.
Hypotheses are scaffolds
which are erected in front of a building
and removed when the building is completed.
They are indispensable to the worker;
but he must not mistake the scaffolding for the building.
( Johann Wofgang von Goethe )
懂得提出「假說」,不但在科學上非常重要,
事實上對研究任何學問,對整個人生,對宗教修行。都同樣重要。
可惜很多人雖然懂得提出「假說」,卻欠缺了嚴謹的思考訓練,
結果得物無所用。