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Comment by 317070 | Hacker News Reader

> Increasing knowledge is the only legitimate goal of science.

According to some, not according to others. There is no consensus on what science is. Prominent philosophers like Foucault say science is a power-confirming tool first, and therefore definitely political.

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That is how I feel about economics. It is just there to justify what is already happening, this actually has the counterproductive side effect that people think being wealthy is a reward for good and moral behaviour which is of course ridiculous. There are many ways to become rich and there is nothing about it that requires it to be morally good or fair.

It's like that Debt book from David Graeber where in the beginning he talks about how it is odd that paying debts is supposed to be good moral behaviour as if taking on business risk and failing is a decision that people make voluntarily. It is especially strange because lenders slap on a risk premium on top of their loans because they are fully aware that some are going to default.

> Foucault say science is a power-confirming tool first

Can you summarize why Foucault thought the application of the scientific method to empirical questions is “power-confirming first?” If that’s not what he meant by science then what was he specifically referring to?

I've read some of Foucault's work, and this is my honest take:

He was an actual communist who thought of everything in terms of "the struggle." Scientists (etc.) are respectable? They must be oppressing people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Foucault

A large portion of philosophers are “actual communists”, since they actually read Marx

EDIT replying to sub comment (I am once again rate limited)

Indeed he literally wrote an essay called “On the ruthless criticism of everything existing” which argued against the French socialists who came up with prescriptions rather than solid critiques. Marxism isn’t about communism, it’s about criticising capitalism. That’s why he spent so little time talking about communism. That would be like a slave or a serf wondering what might come next. A strong scientific (in the German sense) critique was his project

Marx is good when it comes to explaining things. Less so when it comes to prescriptions on how to fix them.

Foucault lived when the actual Nazis were in power and saw the rise of eugenics, so I'd bet that has more to do with his relating power and the course of science than "scientists are respectable ergo oppressive". Iirc he was also fairly clear about how his analyses were rooted in observation of actual occurrence, and not an attempt to divine the essence of the idea of science and power.

context, man. it matters.

> rooted in observation of actual occurrence

So by observation of actual occurrence Foucault means ignoring the entire history of science radically improving living conditions and extending lifespans for the previous centuries and instead conflating it with Nazis? That explains a lot.

Orwell was a generation ahead of Foucault, but he lived through many of the same events. Unlike Foucault, he drew the correct conclusions about them. His work will still be read when Foucault is just a footnote.

You can find someone to disagree on anything. There are people who think we never landed on the moon. There were undoubtedly those who thought Copernicus was full of it. They were wrong.

And Foucault is only "prominent" for people who can't do science, or really anything else useful.

Foucault is prominent for me as a physicist

Exactly, anyone that would bring him up in this discussion, and expect it to actually contribute to the topic at hand, can go Foucault themselves with a rusty hammer and sickle.

So linguistics, history, archeology to only speak of the social sciences I'm interested in aren't science, and aren't useful.

Ok, thanks for your opinion i guess.

Makes sense, but isn't this bad? Shouldn't we aspire to have science not be what Foucalt says it is?

Foucault would say yes, but I'm not so sure. I follow more Graeber's point of view that scientists are essentially shamans, and that you probably want to be a good or useful shaman.

Whether that means political or apolitical is hard to assess. I would say that the aspiration either way might be good for your own work, but shouldn't be used to judge the scientific work of others.

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