Agora Journal Volume 11, 2020

Implications of Idealism on Science
Brayden Bull

Introduction
Persisting for over two centuries, a preoccupation with the implications that idealism
poses for science and philosophy started in the late 18th-century with Immanuel Kant. Nicholas
Boyle, principal investigator of a project concerned with unearthing the various impacts of
idealism, states that “questions and issues revolving around the rise of the German idealist
movement have had a lasting impact on the way we think”. Kant espoused the idea of

“transcendental idealism”, suggesting that the “mind was the keyway in which we perceive the
world, and that the world was filtered by perception” (Boyle, 2012). In attempts at establishing
an objective account of reality, Kant argued that we can only understand the world by
“experiencing it through our senses then applying a framework of concepts to those experiences”
(Boyle, 2012). Idealism can be described as an understanding of external reality that is
indistinguishable from the internal subjective experience of human perception. This constitutes
the external world with mental qualities. In layman’s terms, understanding the real world is

dependent on human perception. Giving birth to a new theory of mind and pointing out the limits
of cognition, idealism claims that what we see is a “world of appearances processed by our
minds, and that it is impossible to understand it independently of ourselves” (Boyle, 2012).
Our current paradigm is indeed effective – whereby it is useful and successful at certain
things – but to stand out and continue in our evolution embracing idealist implications could
become prioritized. The position taken in this paper is that despite the implications of idealism
on science discussed herein, building a new scientific paradigm is not only possible, but that
idealism itself forms the basis of salient paradigm-building.

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Analysis
Upon analyzing the implications set forth by idealism I am faced with striking
realizations; one of the insights gleaned from idealism can be found in asking the question: what
happens prior to the moment of witnessing? Stemming from that question one can reasonably
assert that all we can know is that nothing was happening prior to the moment it was observed.
The implication of the question posed directly affects how exactly science is done such that the
researchers’ state of mind is inextricably nested within their observation of what is going on in
the outside world.
How exactly is this a problem? The implications of idealism pose a problem for science
in describing how the world really is, especially in terms of there being external physical objects
outside of - and prior to - the realm of internal subjective experience. If a researcher is locked
into the subjective experience of their reality, then how exactly can science extrapolate any

research done past the confines of when and where something was studied? That is to say, the
findings can never really be applied outside of when and where they took place. Despite the
inescapable nature of this problem, there can however be solutions recovered about reality and
human nature from idealism that accounts for the problems it raises in addition to addressing
criticisms against it.

Psychological Organs
Coinciding with biological evolution is a marked and parallel psychological evolution.
An example would be the evolution of the human eye deemed as a psychological adaptation
representing a “metaphysical tube” (V. Smith, personal communication, January 23, 2020)
bridging physical stimuli into the metaphysical framework of the mind. As such, would it not be
reasonable to suppose that the mind is also an exquisitely crafted structure? And should not our
psychological architecture also contain mental organs? Furthermore, what would lead us to

assume that psychological mechanisms are less well-engineered than physiological organs?
The German idealist Johann Gottlieb Fichte described the mind as a psychological
structure whereby the “organ of positing [the mind] is reason itself” (Lachs & Shade, 2014, p.
73). The translation of “positing” from the German verb “setzen” - which Fichte used - does not
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capture his intended meaning. “Setzen” translates as a word that may be used to express
agreement and opposition (conjecture and refutation) or roughly: the act of establishing a
reasoned claim. The richness of “setzen” is described as being due “precisely to this amphibious
character: it is equally at home in the realms of theory and practice”. From this Fichte takes
advantage of the ambiguity by using “setzen” to “denote an activity that is both cognitive and
creative [convergent and divergent] and represents the unity of reason and will, the theoretical

and the practical” (Lachs & Shade, 2014, p. 73). Supports of idealism are able to wield an
intellectual object that is evident in the language, accounting for its ability to posit a stance as
well as refute its opposite, based on the principles of idealism itself.
Evolution as a process of change never fails to cease. The evolution of the human triune
brain evolved over time from reptilian to paleo-mammalian to neo-mammalian (Sagan, 1977, p.
57). As such it can reasonably be inferred that due to most of our biological evolution being
homeostatic, the dynamic evolution occurring on the mental level (psychological structures) is
still underway. The embodiment of reason as a developed mental organ could be considered the
main driving force at edging out the old scientific paradigm. Opposed to operating solely on
historically primal instincts, humanity has made the evolutionary step of self-affirmation via
creative and intelligent endeavours in the modern context and out of the historical context of the
Pleistocene. The latter can be affirmed by stating “reason in its primordial unity is thus
conceived as the infinite and intelligent source of all, totally absorbed in its creative, allencompassing act” (Lachs & Shade, 2014, p. 73). The continued evolution that establishes a self
within its own environment is itself a psychological adaptation in response to external stimuli; it
is advantageous to survive in the world if an organism has a theory of mind, a sense of self, or
ego, to strive for the continuation of itself. In the case that “external stimuli” is refuted against
the underpinnings of idealism, I would retort that the world that we experience is only via mental
states. Upon analyzing what the external and internal denote, a realization that the only existing
boundary between internal and external is only established by the self, or the ego, for the sake of
its individual existence. Breaking down mental categories releases the constraints of the ego, or
self, whereby rendering the distinction created between internal and external as mere thought
form.

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Scientific Paradigm Evolution
Coupled with the biological-psychological evolution runs another parallel evolution - that
of the scientific paradigm itself. As stated in Theory and Reality, “a lineage of organisms in
evolutionary time will usually exhibit long periods of relative stasis”; “these periods of
equilibrium are punctuated by periods of rapid change in which new fundamental structures
arise”; “the periods of stasis also feature a kind of homeostasis in which the genetic system tends
to resist substantial change”; “the analogy between Kuhn’s theory and the biological theory of
punctuated equilibrium shows the same kind of convergence on a story about the processes of
change” (Godfrey-Smith, 2008, p. 100). On an evolutionary timeline, successfully reproduced
biological and psychological adaptations parallel the evolution of the current scientific paradigm.
Furthermore, it is the parallel in the mechanism of selecting against what does not work
evolutionarily, with the principle of Popper’s falsification model of science (Godfrey-Smith,
2008) that more accurately describes how similar a scientific paradigm is to the biological and
psychological selection process of evolution.

Cultural/Sociological Evolution
The cultural unit of selection - the meme - as coined by Richard Dawkins (2016), furthers
the propensity for psychological organs to evolve. The rapidly changing nature of our present
cultural memes conform to the idea of the period of rapid change following the punctuated
equilibrium found in biological evolution. Conforming to the parallel nature found in the
evolution of biology - as well as with scientific paradigms - rests the underlying rapid change
occurring within the psyche and framed by culture. The ability with which we conduct science in
society is not necessarily hampered by the radical subjective implications set forth by idealism, it
in fact bolsters its efficacy. Contrarily, rather than science being impacted negatively the
consequences of idealism could be foundational in paradigm-building on an entirely
unprecedented level. Going almost without refutation is the notion that the current epoch of
humanity is undergoing the beginnings of a vast psychological and sociological paradigm shift in addition to an imminent scientific paradigm shift.

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Criticism
An immediate objection against idealism would be in taking a position within the realist
camp. The realist, as noted by Kant, regards “space and time as independent of our sensibility”
and “the realist therefore interprets outer appearances as things in themselves, which would exist
independently of us and of our sensibility and thus would also be outside us according to pure
concepts of the understanding” (Allison, 2004, p. 21).
An idealist could in all actuality pit realist descriptions of reality against the accuser. For
instance, a realist might posit that if they were to throw a rock at your head, without your prior
knowledge of the rock’s trajectory it would still hit and hurt you. Which is to say that without
observing the rock existing, it still exists; combating the notion that nothing occurs prior to
witnessing - implying the existence of an external reality - refuting the radical notion of idealist
subjectivity. In refutation, I would say that it is only through mental states that we identify what

that rock is, how it felt, and that it happened to me. Therefore applying the knowledge with the
phenomena of “rock” and “hitting” and “my head”, all categorized by mental structures. Without
having prior knowledge of language by applying meaning to sounds as established by the
subjects’ mind, we could never experience and know the phenomena of any scenario experienced
in the subjective mind.
Does the external world still exist even if we do not know about it? If it did, we can never
know it; the mental faculty is not present within our experiencing structure to know. In searching
for an external world, drawing a comparison between it and searching for the failed idea of
“phlogiston” (D. Haas, personal communication, January 23, 2020) could be made.
Understanding the previous example - coupled with the scientific method - may deem the very
assertion of a physical reality to be nothing more than a case of limited perception; a failed
hypothesis, although one that has still lead science closer to what reality really is.

Conclusion
Considering that idealism has seemingly sat on the ‘back-burner’ of philosophy due to
the radically subjective implications on science, it has provided an open backdrop for a spacious
realm of thought. By considering idealist implications, science can further the evolution of the
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new paradigm by radically embracing what we do have access to, rather than failed attempts at
what we can never access and continuing the scientific method further. The object of this paper
is in demonstrating the biopsychosocial model of evolution that converges with the evolution of
our scientific paradigm with biology, psychology, and society as a singular process, that unfurls
itself via parallel processes - which appear to be, perhaps, contingent to one another.
With science acting as the embodiment of reason, it represents a great evolutionary ally
that may find utility in amplifying the implications set forth by idealism - especially in finding
equilibrium within our current scientific paradigm - as well as building a salient new paradigm.
When observing the implications of scientific experimentation, nothing can be known that exists
outside of, prior to, or even after, the level of human conscious awareness - and therefore value is
found in radically embracing our subjective experience.

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References
Allison, H. E. (2004). Kant’s transcendental idealism. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Boyle, N. (2012). The Impact of Idealism. Retrieved from
https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/the-impact-of-idealism
Dawkins, R. (2016). The selfish gene: 40th anniversary ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Godfrey-Smith, P. (2008). Theory and reality: an introduction to the philosophy of science.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lachs, J. & Shade, P. (2014). Freedom and limits. New York: Fordham University Press.
Sagan, C. (1977). The dragons of Eden. New York: Random House.

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