A Scientific Realist and Radical View of Marx's Appearance and Essence Conception of the Aim of Science

I here show how Marx's own conception of the aim of science in terms of his distinction between the appearance and essence of things is not only a scientific realist but also a radical one. (This blog post will overlap with some things I’ve already said.)

Scientific realism is, firstly, the view in modern philosophy of science which holds that the aim of science is to discover the hidden causal structures of the observable phenomena of the world in order to then show how they produce their various features. Furthermore, it's the view which holds that science is sometimes successful in this task (eg, Einstein's theory of general relativity, the sub-atomic or quantum mechanics theory of matter, and the neo-Darwinian theory of the origins of organic life have all not only revealed the basic hidden causal structures of the observable phenomena of the world, but also shown how the various observable phenomena of the world are consequently produced.)

Now, in his metaphysics and philosophy of science, Marx draws a basic distinction between the appearance and essence of things, which (without going into it here) has its origins in Hegel's conception of the appearance and essence distinction from his Logic. This Hegelian distinction of Marx's is both an ontological and a causal conception.

Ontologically speaking, it's a distinction between the manifested-surface-level (the appearances) and the causal-depth-level (the essence) of phenomena. That is, it's a distinction between how things immediately appear to us in terms of their manifested features, such as the liquid or gaseous or solid forms of water (a phenomenon of the world), and how they essentially are in terms of their internal causal make-up, such as water being comprised of the atomic-molecular structure of H2O.

It's worth noting here, then, that something can't be what it is and/or have the associated features that it has without also possessing a certain essence. Thus, water can't be what it is, whether it's in the form of a gas, a liquid or a solid, unless it has the atomic-molecular structure of H2O. This is (without going into it) a very Lockean point about what makes something be essentially what it is.

Causally speaking, it's a distinction between how the manifested-surface features of phenomena (their appearances) are directly produced by their causal-depth elements (their essence). So, for example, the various manifested physical states of the substance water (its different appearances), from being either a gas, a liquid or a solid, are each a direct causal result of the kinetic energy levels of its internal H2O atomic-molecular structure (its essence) - that is, if you boil water, it will turn into a gas (steam), or, if you freeze it, it will turn into a solid (ice).

Now, it's in accordance with this Hegelian distinction of Marx's that he conceives the aim of science to be one which seeks to uncover the hidden essence behind the appearances of the observable phenomena of the world, which in turn produce the actual appearances of the observable phenomena of the world. In other words, it's the aim of science to discover the underlying causal structures of the observable phenomenal of the world, which in turn give rise to their observable features.

So, as conceived in terms of the Hegelian distinction between appearance and essence, Marx's conception of the aim of science is in line with the basic aim of scientific realism, as outlined above.

However, we now need to consider Marx's appearance and essence conception of the aim of science, as it applies to his actual critique of political economy in the three volumes of Capital. What we'll see is that Marx has a critical conception of it, which makes it radically different to the standard scientific realist conception of the aim of science in the philosophy of science.

Firstly, in his critique of political economy - which is concerned above all with a critical exposure of the capitalist economic system - Marx draws a distinction between the sphere of exchange and circulation, and the sphere of production, in terms of his appearance and essence distinction: the former constitutes the level of appearances, while the latter constitutes the level of essence. Secondly, given his appearance and essence conception of the aim of science, it is subsequently Marx's view that in the critique of political economy a work of science must go beyond the sphere of exchange and circulation (the level of appearances) to the sphere of production (the level of essence) in order to uncover the hidden causal structure of the capitalist economic system (its essence) which in turn produce its observable features (its appearances). In so doing, according to Marx, a critique of political economy will reveal (as it does in Marx's own case) a discrepancy between how things initially appear on the surface of a capitalist society and how it really or essentially is beneath its surface. Basically, what is revealed is that while it appears on the surface of a capitalist society that everyone is free and equal in the marketplace with respect to, in particular, the selling and buying of the labour-power of wage-workers that occurs between wage-workers and capitalists, it turns out however that beneath this surface-appearance of a capitalist society in what Marx calls the 'hidden abode of production' not everyone is actually free and equal: wage-workers, on the pain of being fired, are forced to do surplus labour for the benefit of their capitalist employers without any compensation. As a result, it is revealed that the capitalist economic system is founded on the basis of what is called the capitalist oppression and exploitation of wage-labour.

This is a critical and radical insight about the essence of the capitalist economic system. It fundamentally reveals that all our ideas about the nature of capitalism - both at the level of ordinary casual observations and at the level of the theories of economics - are all based upon our immediate impressions of how it appears to us, which is a theoretical shortcoming. As a result, we are left with the radical demand that if we want to fully understand the nature of capitalism in a scientific sense, then we need to go beyond our immediate impressions of it (its appearances) to a theoretical account of how it really is and actually works (its essence). And in so doing, according to a Marx, we are left with a theoretical point of departure on which to radically transform society.

To help us grasp Marx's particular appearance and essence conception of the aim of science as it applies to a critique of political economy, we need only compare it with Marx's own paradigm of science - the Copernican-Newtonian account of our solar system and universe.

For Marx, whenever we look up at the sky, we see the ‘heavenly bodies' (the Sun, the Moon, the planets and the stars) all revolving above us from east to west on an apparently stationary Earth, which is also seemingly at the centre of the universe. Although, for Marx, this is how our solar system and universe actually appears to us from the position of a seemingly stationary Earth (and hence, it's not an illusion), it is not an accurate or true picture of it either. For, as revealed by the scientific work of, in particular, Copernicus himself through to Galileo, Kepler and, lastly, Newton, the Earth is not at the centre of our solar system, as the Sun is instead; and as a consequence, it is the planets themselves, which includes the Earth itself (plus its moon), which all actually orbit about the Sun - and do so, in ellipses, due to Newton's first two laws of motion and his universal theory of gravity. Thus, the real picture of how solar system is structured and works is very different to the way it all appears to us from the position of a seemingly stationary Earth.

Now, this scientific account of our solar system and universe is a paradigm for Marx in two fundamental ways. Firstly, it illustrates Marx's distinction between appearance and essence, as represented by, respectively, the way our solar system and universe initially appears to us from the the position of a seemingly stationary Earth (the appearances of things) and how it really and/or essentially is (its essence), according to science. Secondly, and most importantly, it's a paradigm of how science goes about uncovering the essence of the phenomena of the world by going beyond our immediate impressions of how things initially appear to us.

So, on the basis of this paradigm of science, it is Marx's view that whenever there is a discrepancy between the way things appear and how they are in essence, then it's the task of science to reveal how the essence of things give rise to the way things appear. That its raison ďêtre.

It is notable that this paradigm of science is also quite theoretically revolutionary in that it completely transformed our Judeo-Christian view of our solar system and the universe (as Darwin's theory of evolution would also do with respect to the origins of species). This view, which had put 'God's creation of life' at the centre of the universe, could no longer be sustained, and had to consequently, at a very minimum, accommodate itself to this radically new and different but basically accurate picture of our solar system and the universe.

Thus, for Marx, this paradigm of science also demonstrates to him the potential radical and revolutionary aspects of science. That is, science has the capacity to help people transform not only how they see things, but also transform how they might do things differently.

With this all said, I can now spell out in what way Marx's type of scientific realism is different to the standard conception of scientific realism in the philosophy of science. While both Marx's appearance and essence conception of the aim of science and the scientific realist conception of the aim of science each hold that it is the aim of science to uncover the hidden causal structures of the observable phenomena of the world in order to then show how the various features of the observable phenomena of the world are produced, they differ in this one crucial respect. Whereas for Marx the ultimate goal is to provide a critical perspective on what type of society we all live in under capitalism so we may consequently think about how and why it needs to be transformed into a different type of society in which, say, there's no oppression and exploitation of people based upon class differences, the basic goal of standard scientific realism in the philosophy of science is to simply understand, without any socio-political objectives behind it, how science goes about the task of uncovering the hidden causal structure of the observable phenomena of the world, which in turn give rise to their various observable features. In short, standard scientific realism is concerned with nothing more than the philosophical nature of science itself, whereas for Marx science is a critical theoretical tool to help people better understand the world they actually live in under capitalism - with an eye on how it might be and/or ought to be radically transformed.

I hope what has been said here not only clarifies how Marx's appearance and essence conception of the aim of science is a scientific realist one, but also what is its underlying rationale which distinguishes it from the standard conception of scientific realism in the philosophy of science.

Addendum

When scientists say that they are engaged in the project of developing a theory about reality, this is just another way of stating the scientific realist thesis.

The concept of a theory simply stands for all the ideas that scientists have about the hidden causal structures of the observable phenomena of the world which in turn produce their various features, while the concept of reality simply stands for all the things that actually exist in the world, such as its observable phenomena.

So, to have a theory about reality amounts to basically saying that science/or scientists has/have a theory about the hidden causal structure of some particular thing which exists in reality (ie, the real world itself), which in turn accounts for its various observable features.

My overall point here, then, is that despite whatever way it is formulated, one is a scientific realist if they are in fact attempting to uncover the hidden causal structures of the observable phenomena of the world, which in turn account for their various observable features. Marx is a scientific realist for this reason, so are those scientists who think in terms of theory and reality.