“Every science, insofar as it really is a science, is both positive and normative. Every science, insofar as it is a science, must be ‘normalized’ to some criteria of truth. These truths arise from two sources: an internal and an external source. The internal criteria involve a science’s proper subject matter and methodology. But these criteria are insufficient to found any science as a science. In addition, there must be external criteria of truth, and these truths can only come from one or more higher sciences. In the absence of such an external check, the science will merely be circular, dependent on nothing but itself and disconnected from the hierarchy of truth. Thus, for example, biology is responsible to chemistry, chemistry to physics, physics to metaphysics. No biologist can violate the laws of chemistry, and no chemist can reach a conclusion contrary to physics. Thus every science is responsible to its own methodology (and therefore positive) and to the higher sciences (and therefore normative). Every science has, therefore, both its own proper autonomy, based on its subject matter and methodology, and its own proper connection to the near sciences, based on the hierarchy of truth. In speaking of the autonomy of a science, we should note that it is only a relative autonomy, not an absolute one. A scientist’s obligation to be faithful to his proper method does not relieve him of the obligation to higher truths. No science can provide its own criteria of truth without being circular. When a science attempts to do so, one of two things happens: Either the science breaks up into mutually warring camps whose disputes can never be resolved because there are no accepted criteria of truth by which to resolve them, or it becomes merely dogmatic permitting no rational examination of its premises. In economics, both things have happened: the science is divided into warring factions with no arbiter of truth among them; the principles of the various factions have become dogmatic statements with little connection to reality.
“The hierarchy of science allows us to define what science is, because science is not a mere collection of facts, nor just free-floating knowledge. Rather, it is knowledge integrated into a hierarchy of truth. To know a thing, anything, it is not sufficient to know the thing in itself; one must know also how it fits with everything else, what its relationships are with the rest of the world. Science, then, is not just knowledge, but organized knowledge. It is precisely this organization that makes it science. We have many other kinds of knowledge, such as tacit or intuitive knowledge, but these are not scientific until they can be integrated into the hierarchy of knowledge, and thereby submit themselves to the tests of truth that come from the higher sciences. Until we know the thing in the fullness of its relationships, we don’t really know it at all. Therefore science is not just about describing things in themselves, but about describing things in their full relationships with everything else. Now, everything that exists is related to everything else that exists in one way or another. Nevertheless, we can identify two general hierarchies of knowledge, two great branches of science, the physical and the humane sciences. The first thing to determine about any science, therefore, is not whether it is normative or positive, but whether it is a physical or a humane science.
“The distinction between these two branches of science concerns how the objects of the science are moved to their ends. Physical objects are moved to their ends by laws outside of themselves, such as the law of gravity: They do not exhibit any degrees of freedom. For example, the planets are kept in their orbits by the law of gravity, and no planet can suddenly decide to reverse its course and visit a new region of the heavens. In other words, the motions of physical objects are completely deterministic; they are bound by the laws of nature and cannot deviate from them. We can examine nature and discover its laws, laws that exist independently of will and intention. This examination of nature we may call ‘naturalism,’ and these sciences all terminate in physics, the master science for the study of physical objects.
“Man, of course, is another physical object in the universe of objects, and is bound by the law of gravity no less than any of the planers. He is also something more, however, because while a planet cannot determine its own course, we must determine ours. That is, we are not moved to our ends by a law like gravity; but by the choices we make. Man is that being that can choose his own ends and make judgments about the best means to achieve his ends. This freedom towards ends and means is the essence of what it means to be human. The humane sciences, therefore, have a completely different aim than the physical sciences. The latter aim at discovering the physical laws that must be followed and are always in fact followed; the former aim at discovering laws that ought to be followed and detailing the consequences of not following those laws. Humane sciences have the human person for their object, and specifically the human person in relationship, whether that is the relationship a person has with himself, his family, his community, the natural environment, or God. Now, political economy deals with economic relationships, those relationships necessary for the material provisioning of society. It is therefore a humane science and not a physical science. Like all humane sciences, economics is about right relationships.
“At this point, the positivist is likely to object that no one can tell us what kinds of relationships are ‘right’ or ‘wrong.’ We can only note the facts and predict the consequences. Therefore science, economic or otherwise, should simply stick to the facts and let the moral chips fall where they may. This view is based on a distinction between facts and values. As D. Stephen Long noted in Divine Economy: Theology and the Market, ‘The fact-value distinction has become so determinative in the modern world that we seldom even recognize the many ways our politics, economics, even our theology assume and perpetuate this distinction.’ The fact-value distinction actually has its roots in medieval theology. The medieval theologians insisted that the material world reflected the eternal order of God and operated on God-given laws which could be known without any direct reference to theology. This allowed a measure of autonomy for the physical sciences. The distinction was not a real distinction, however, but a methodological one confined to physical motions; the motions of the human will could not so easily be measured and numbered. With the Enlightenment sages, however, the distinction became a real one — an ontological distinction — that extended even to human motions. All motions, even human ones, would be reduced to number and quantity and divorced from theology and ethics. As David Hume put it,
When we run over libraries, persuaded of these principles, what havoc must we make? If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames: for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.
“This test, known as ‘Hume’s fork,’ is by now so enshrined in our thinking that it has become traditional, with even Christian economists joining in his book burning without a second thought.”
— from John Médaille, Toward a Truly Free Market: A Distributist Perspective on the Role of Government, Taxes, Health Care, Deficits, and More (ISI Books, 2010)
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