For many years now a “principle of uncertainty” has played a major role in all discussion of the problem of scientific law as description of nature. That this principle had its origin in the efforts of science to describe nature is entirely appropriate; that it has had so immediate an effect on philosophic thought is inevitable.

It is also inevitable that questions should be raised concerning the meaning of certainty and its reference to descriptive law. Such questions are bound to occur to one who is concerned about the kinds of law in terms of which nature might be described. If these kinds can be considered to be two, one “mechanical,” the other “statistical,” it appears to be an easy step from the assertion of a principle of uncertainty which requires that the description of elemental processes and facts of nature be statistical—in terms of probabilities, that is—to a further assertion that after all a strictly mechanical description of nature is impossible, since the observational data which constitute its material are approximate and probable, and because the laws which provide the formal element of that description can never be more than approximately or probably true. It is concluded, then, that no element of certainty attaches to the so-called mechanical laws, any more than to others that are avowedly statistical. When a prediction is based on either sort of law, it is taken to be a prediction that an event will probablyoccur.

Perhaps the strangest controversy in the history of logic is that over the fourth figure of the syllogism. There was never any argument as to what syllogisms are valid, but merely as to how they should be arranged. Aristotle had divided syllogisms into figures according to whether the middle term was subject of one premiss and predicate of the other, or predicate of both premisses, or subject of both. Theophrastus and Eudemus subdivided the first figure into those moods in which the middle term was subject of the major premiss (and predicate of the minor) and those moods in which the middle was predicate of the major premiss (and subject of the minor). The latter moods were termed indirect. Galen said they constituted a separate figure; and so the controversy started. It has continued to the present with many writers objecting to the fourth figure, generally on grounds that it does not represent a genuine process of thought, and even ascribing this objection to Aristotle. The issue has been joined by writers who believe that it does represent a genuine process of thought.

There is a sense in which a philosophic theory can be confirmed. We may ask what its effects were on the development of scientific theory,—did it clarify ideas and help open up new areas of research, or did it constrain the work of science? In this essay, we shall try to judge the significance of dialectical materialism from this standpoint. We shall be concerned with the bearing of this philosophy on scientific work, especially in the Soviet Union.

Now dialectical materialism is not a “philosophy” in the same sense which the word has when applied to, let us say, logical empiricism. The difference is evident when a writer like Haldane asks, for instance, how far scientific discoveries have verified the principles of dialectical materialism.' We could not ask in a similar way whether scientific discoveries have confirmed the principles of logical empiricism. For the latter affirms no factual propositions concerning the world; it enunciates solely the principle of verifiability, and there is clearly no scientific discovery which could possibly refute the requirement of verification. If it makes sense to ask how far scientific discoveries verify dialectical materialism, then the latter must obviously contain factual propositions concerning nature which should be stated in a way to permit of confirmation of rejection.

Another critical analysis of the intellectual antecedents or the logical structure of Thorstein Veblen's thought is hardly needed. Since his death—iconoclasm's reward is often posthumous—a goodly number of such studies has appeared. I do not intend to add to the pile, but rather to analyze Veblen's work as representative of the response of “intellectuals” to specific ideologies and to ideology in general. This is a subject that has not received the direct attention it deserves, and, to my knowledge, Veblen has never been studied in this connection.

By “ideology” I mean a system of beliefs that presents value-judgments as empirical truths in order to justify, with or without conscious intent, a particular socio-economic group's claim to material and prestigial rewards. The valuejudgments in an ideology fall into two categories: those which have to do with a hero-subject, individual or group, whom the ideologue believes worthy of the rewards, and those which concern a villain-subject, individual or group, whom the ideologue believes unworthy. To win general acceptance of these valuejudgments an ideology also contains a set of reality-statements. These, in purporting to tell the “truth” about the world—about men, nature, God—serve to objectify, and thus justify, the choice of the hero and villain-subjects.

A brief analysis of the processes of measurement common to any science reveal a paradox. This paradox is encountered when one tries to make clear how formal statements are related to experience in such a way that factual statements, such as statements about measurements, result. I believe that this paradox bears an analogy to the “fallacy of the third man” which disturbed Plato. Be that as it may, this paradox has not been satisfactorily solved in modern times, although a full comprehension of the processes of measurement would require its solution. In this paper I wish to do nothing more than present a statement of the difficulty.

An argument opposing the unrestricted use of quantification in modal logic has been put forward by Quine. Central to this argument are the two phrases,

(1) The Morning Star,

(2) The Evening Star.

One form of the argument is obtained by considering the following two statements:

(3) It is necessary that the Morning Star is identical with the Morning Star.

(4) It is not necessary that the Evening Star is identical with the Morning Star.