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THE PHILOSOPHICAL REVOLUTION
be a mystery. Empirically established laws of nature are never suspended to make manifest supernatural powers. In short, scientific outlook does not admit of the possibility of something coming out of nothing. Thcre is a causal connection in the interminable chain of events. The scientific mind rejects the theological maxim : “Ex nihili ominium " in favour of the thesis of the ancient Grecks: “Ex nihili nihil”. Scientific outlook is based on positive knowledge, not on belief, speculation or fantasy. As such, it is hostile to the religious, metaphysical, teleological view of the Universe, life, history and society. This view is opposed to all free enquiry. Its pivot is authority which defies or eludes test. It declares human knowledge not only imperfect, but unreliable, placing it within insurmountable bounds.
Scientific method is inductive-to reach the general from the particular, the abstract from the concrete, the unknown from the known. The spiritual view of life follows in contrast the deductive method to start from an assumption, a hypothesis, which can never be verified, to explain phenomena in the light (?) of an unknown and unknowable noumenon.
The religious, metaphysical, teleological view of life-a view that arrogates the pious distinction of spiritualism and starts from an assumption or unverifiable hypothesis, a Divine Providence, Cosmic Will, First Principle or Final Cause-- is not a
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