Undo Uus | “Science & Folk Sentiment”

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Undo Uus’ “Science and Folk Sentiment”

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Estonian Astrophysicist and Astronomer Undo Uus has written a number of books and journal articles that express his belief that modern science falls short of true understanding when it attempts to negate the vast world of phenomenal experience. In “Science and Folk Sentiment” he concentrates on the areas of traditional and commonsense knowledge known as folk belief. As a scientist, Uus does not seek to undermine his own discipline, but to show that the whole body of the truth of human existence must include the growing corpus of knowledge from common “folk,” and that this knowledge and its morphology lead to the probability that humanity, contrary to the modern scientific worldview, is something more than merely “material” without a soul.

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In “The Glory and Misery of Modern Science” he writes:

“Contemporary science, holding to the fallacious world concept, totally ignores the extremely valuable information that the subjective phenomenal experiences contain. It is necessary to analyze the qualitative content of the constituents of reality and the qualitative character of their interrelations…Modern science disparages qualitative intuiting by degrading its conclusions to the status of deceptive feelings, harmful for the scientific purpose” (121).

His argument describes the fallacy of a one-sided approach to understanding human existence. Phenomenal experience is inherently human and a necessary component of human intellectual life (Vihalemm, 179). Folk knowledge originates in the intellectual and emotional activities that proceed from human interactions in community and with nature.

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Uus describes the expression of folk sentiment as a free-will choice that occurs outside of the laws that govern natural processes. The human capacity for choice is crucial to Uus’s argument because its existence indicates that we are something more than the scientific definition of humanity: natural phenomenon that behave predictably within the laws that govern natural processes. Modern science chooses this human limitation because it fits neatly within the realm of empirical knowledge built on observational and experimental data; however, Uus suggests that both science and folk knowledge are each incomplete without the other (10). Individually, they are narrow and address only the microcosms of life.

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For example, take a look at the seemingly expansive nature of quantum physics. For some time it was hailed as the brilliant, all-encompassing new discipline that explained the nature of the universe – until quantum mechanics arrived and delivered conflicting information about extremely small phenomenon (Smith). In like fashion, quantum mechanics makes inaccurate predictions for phenomenon at the cosmic scale. Apart from each other these two disciplines fail to predict a true picture of the nature of the universe; yet together, they demonstrate valid descriptions of both the macro and microcosmic events in physics. Likewise, acknowledgement of the inadequacies of both modern science and folk knowledge to individually express a clear and true picture of human existence presents an opportunity for a partnership, or mutual professional respect, of disciplines that can work together to produce a more holistic set of explanations.

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Some of the areas in which science fails to operate efficiently are in the systems of belief, psychology, and introspective observations (also known as mental awareness). These areas require a tolerance of diversity, or an ability to look at and accept more than just the “best” data (10). Human experience entertains a vast scope of qualitative data, which Uus calls “qualia.” Feelings such as physical pain or a sense of freedom involve levels of qualia that do not fit well on the scales of scientific empirical fact. Where science rests on provable relationships between cause and effect, folk psychology offers a more realist explanation of sensations. Uus writes, “we have the least possible reason to doubt having experiences: they are empirical data we are directly aware of […] We can say that one of the advantages of folk thinking over scientific reasoning is its lesser regard for theoretical speculations and greater respect for that which is empirically given” (11).

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It is arrogant to assume that we can relate the complexities of our physical world to a microcosmic understanding founded solely on the laws that describe the physical processes alone. Every individual alive can say that the physical experience by itself is not the extent of human existence. Free will, recognition of intrinsic values, the phenomenal experiences all attest to another level of human awareness, one that cannot be described by scientific fact.

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Uus suggests that the modern scientific worldview is intolerant of the introduction of any modifications because these would “mar its elegance” (13). In other words, modern science is built upon descriptions of definite systems that can be ordered and understood through specific laws. Anything that cannot be understood through an explanation of the physical would introduce an inconsistency into the scientific equation, thus confusing and undermining the concrete certainty upon which modern science rests. For the common folk, however, commonsense brings understanding to that which cannot be described by science. It is the presence of free will in human existence that lends weight to Uus’s argument for human soul, a greatly debated element of existence that is neither scientific fact nor “directly comprehensible intuitive fact” (15). Uus writes that the very activity of investigating a notion of immaterial soul is an act of free will, the source of which activity cannot rest in material systems (15).

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Uus’s conclusion is elegant: “If conscious beings have free will and immaterial souls, then the world is not thoroughly natural” (16). This simple statement proves the need for reconciliation between modern science and folk sentiment, two disciplines that Uus believes are not, in fact, adversaries: “both seek truth” (7). To reduce the world and human experience to that which can be explained by “law-governed material processes” reduces phenomenal experiences to the most primitive and simplistic of forms. Clearly, this is an inappropriate construction for a world that demonstrates an undeniably deeper, more elegant sophistication, both materially and intellectually.

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Uus’s essay brings clarification and intuition to the need for greater attention to a scholarly study of folk sentiment, including folkloric genres. Particularly in the areas of religion, psychology, and mental observations, folklore expresses a wealth of human knowledge and tradition, including archetypes, motifs, and cultural histories. Uus’s essay points to the validity of archetypal criticism and the use of archetypes in folklore and myth to communicate certain phenomenal principles and concepts in a society or culture. These are the ideas, unorthodox and unscientific in the world of modern science, that flesh out the intellectual and emotional life of humanity; and these same ideas, so necessary to existence, are those which modern science will not acknowledge because the ideas do not subject themselves to the laws that govern physical processes. Uus asserts the profound wisdom that “if we are aware of such [unintelligible] phenomena, we must not deny their existence merely on the ground that it is difficult to comprehend their essence clearly” (14). His words are a worthy challenge to the status quo attitudes toward folk knowledge.

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