Montaigne
rejects the theoretical or speculative way of philosophizing that prevailed
under the Scholastics ever since the Middle Ages. According to him, science
does not exist, but only a general belief in science. Petrarch had already criticized
the Scholastics for worshiping Aristotle as their God. Siding with the
humanists, Montaigne develops a sharp criticism of science “à la mode des
Geométriens the mos geometricus deemed to be the most rigorous. It is
merely ‘a practice and business of science’, he says, which is restricted to
the University and essentially carried out between masters and their disciples.
The main problem of this kind of science is that it makes us spend our time
justifying as rational the beliefs we inherit, instead of calling into question
their foundations; it makes us label fashionable opinions as truth, instead of
gauging their strength.
No comments:
Post a Comment