Scientific faith: social and cognitive aspects

Nikolai Beliakov; Rushana Lukmanova; Svetlana Pozdyaeva; Aleksei Ulanov; Ksenia Khramova

doi:10.34069/AI/2022.50.02.4

Nikolai Beliakov Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3950-7920
Rushana Lukmanova Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7549-9358
Svetlana Pozdyaeva Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9786-7086
Aleksei Ulanov Ufa State Petroleum Technological University, Ufa, Russia. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1795-5896
Ksenia Khramova Bashkir State Medical University, Ufa, Russia. https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8243-4862

DOI: https://doi.org/10.34069/AI/2022.50.02.4

Keywords: existential confidence; scientific faith; scientific worldview; secular faith; epistemological approach.

Abstract

This study analyzes scientific faith through the lenses of its scientific, cognitive, and social potential. The paper aims to study the role of secular non-religious faith in contemporary social processes and individual cognitive formation. The research methodology includes systematic approach to demonstrate the relationship between individual’s cognitive settings and social reality; dialectical approach; analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction. Results: the transformation of traditional social relations leads to the popularization of non-religious secular faith, especially the scientific faith, which motivates to unprovably accept scientific and pseudoscientific positions as true for gaining an existential confidence. In addition to the social aspect, scientific faith has a high scientific and cognitive potential that leads to the irrational acceptance of the scientific understanding of the world, the axiomatic base, and each specific theory, as the closest to the absolute truth, which provides the researcher with a permission to use them. Conclusions: the high role of science and scientific technologies in contemporary society leads to the transfer of faith in science beyond the limits of scientific knowledge into everyday practice. Thus it turns into a powerful social phenomenon, responsible for transforming the image of science in mass perceptions into the undeniable ideal of truth. This confidence not only contributes to the comfortable existence of the individual; without it, an uncorroborated acceptance of the scientific axiomatic base and science as a whole as the closest to the truth is impossible. The lack of this confidence makes further scientific advance difficult.

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Author Biographies

Nikolai Beliakov, Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia.

Candidate of philosophical sciences (PhD), Assistant Researcher of the Department of Philosophy and Political Science, Faculty of Philosophy and Sociology, Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia.

Rushana Lukmanova, Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia.

Doctor of philosophical sciences, Professor, Department of Russian History, Historiography and Source Study, Institute of History and Public Administration, Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia.

Svetlana Pozdyaeva, Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia.

Doctor of philosophical sciences, Professor, Department of Philosophy & Political Science, Faculty of Philosophy & Sociology, Bashkir State University, Ufa, Russia.

Aleksei Ulanov, Ufa State Petroleum Technological University, Ufa, Russia.

Candidate of philosophical sciences (PhD), Assistant Professor, Department of Social & Political Communications, Faculty of Philosophy & Sociology, Ufa State Petroleum Technological University, Ufa, Russia.

Ksenia Khramova, Bashkir State Medical University, Ufa, Russia.

Doctor of philosophical sciences, Assistant Professor, Department of Social & Political Communications, Faculty of Philosophy, Bashkir State Medical University, Ufa, Russia.

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