Is Metaphysics considered pseudoscience?

Question

To be honest I know nothing about it except that it's, i guess, the study of reality.(?) I just happened to glance at my friend's Metaphysics book, and some of the things in there seemed kind of strange, and I recall someone telling me something a while back ago that telepathy was involved in metaphysics. I was wondering if it's actually considered a science.

I apologize if I'm coming off as dumb, I just really don't understand it.

Answer 1

OK. Everybody just shut up and listen here. There are two different definitions of metaphysics. Actually this word was invented by Aristotles's editor (or smth like that). U know Aristotle wrote a lot of different things and he did it in an order. He wrote the metaphysics book after he wrote the physics book. And he didnt have a chance to give it a name. He was talking in the book about a new science about beeings (the beeing in this case is everything that exists). So he didnt give it a name (I dont know what happened). SO the editor had to give it a name... and as it came after physics he called it metaphysics (meta means after).

So in Aristotle's case metaphysics is the science about the things that exist. I dont wanna go into details.

The second definition of metaphysics is everything that is beyond physics, like God for e.g. This definition is more often used in the modern era, and nowadays...

Answer 2

It's a  delicate issue.The answer varies man to man.But i find metaphysics to be interesting.There may be some dispute but

it shouldn't be considered pseudoscience.Becuase u can't deny

anything what u don't know    

Answer 3

The word Metaphysics means in ancient Greek practically beyond the things of the material world. So, from this very first definition we may understand that the issues which the Metaphysics are occupied with are initially more or less, in contemporary terms, the issues that Idealism, meaning the approach that is interested in ideas rather than maters of e.g economy, market, labor, syndicalism etc but from its own perspective issues like ethics e.g abortion, family, relations, love, friendship, social relations etc. Now, you may ask me, aren't the latter issues of the material world? Yes of course they are, nevertheless the method that Metaphysics are using to give answers to issues like the above mentioned, is that of the abstract notions. The Ideas like Plato said that exist beyond our own will. So, as long as ancient times are considered, Ideas gave meaning to every day life because Ideas set standards for peoples' lives as prototypes. Moreover, Aristotle, another Philosopher developed his own theory of Metaphysics seeking to find a logical relation of the context of the universal structure. This is why he initiated the teleology system which practically combined the forms and the substances which unity is the essence and the result of the chain of these essences, following the inferior the superior is methexis, meaning the perfect essence. Maybe this is how they gave answer to the question of the existence of God. This is an exemple of abstract thinking of ancient philosophy.

In Middle Ages, Christianity and Philosophy were combined. Religion is kind of competitive to Metaphysics because it gives answers to the same questions in a different way some times. But, Christianity preserved ancient Metaphysics which interpreted many questions of moral issues.

When Enlightment took place, another incident took place in Metaphysics and that was called Practical Philosophy. That was the turn that Philosophers like Descartes, and I. Kant gave to Metaphysics. The Method they used may be different than this of the ancient times and of the middle ages but the demand for answers on issues on moral matters using the method of abstract thinking, meaning, universal truths derived by universal notions, which means notions exeptable by all the human kind, was alarming. Histroric events taking place during the work of Metaphysics Philosophers prove that people who read Metaphysics, that from now and on are written not only in latin but also in the native language of its country, gives to Metaphysics Philosophy a shift that will make it stay alive untill now days.  

Answer 4

The tools that are used to measure changes may not be as developed as they need to be-thus, some scientist consider metaphysics to be a 'second rate" science.

Answer 5

yes, metaphysics is all junk

Answer 6

Metaphysics rests somewhere between philosophy & fairy tales. If it cannot be scientifically tested, I would not call it a science. However, if it enables one to gain a better understanding of any given concept then I would not call it pseudo either.

Answer 7

Metaphysics is a form of philosophy. It is not so much a science because it does not involve much measurement and empirical experimentation. I do not consider it rubbish or fairy tales though.

Answer 8

Meta physics is the subject placed after physics.  It is the examination of reality beyond the scope of physics, involving intellectual experiment.  It is actually closer to theoretical physics.

Pseudo science is science malpractice.

Answer 9

No, that would be too good for it by having any reference to science.

Metaphysics is considered fantasy, it is all just made up junk someone uses to escape from reality.  

Answer 10

I think the answer to this question may depend upon the philosopher answering.

But there is an article on the internet available entitled "recent advances in metaphysics", google it.

Bertrand Russell has pointed out that there has been a lot of bad metaphysics put out there on the book shelves.

But philosophy is much about the nature of reality and that I call metaphysics.  I think Kant dealt with the subject in Critique of Pure Reason.

When I think of metaphysics I think of such quotes from Solomon as:

"cast your bread upon the water, for thou shalt find it after many days"; it is a statement of a physical principle but it  has some kind of parabolic meaning within the larger context of trying to prove his perspective of his thesis statement.

Advancements have also been made in the philosophy of science, and there are many recent books on the subject (which I haven't gotten to yet myself).

My categorical treatment defines metaphysics as that part of philosophy which is not mainly ethical, theological, or semantic.  If it is not largely those then it is metaphysical, but these areas all overlap.  Philosophical reasoning is used to discover scientific laws.

So as metaphisics consists of the first steps towards discoveries, it leads to scientific work; but not if it is concerned with speculating about things that are unknown making assumptions which have no basis.

Determining the validity of reasons for the basis of assumptions, may be an important consideration in this subject.

Answer 11

Actually, no. Metaphysics, since the time of the pre-Socratics who discovered philosophy, have called it the First Science, or the Science of Sciences, and any rational philosopher today will agree. Metaphysics is the conceptual identity of "existents." Epistemology is the science of discovering these identities.

What bothers so many modern philosophers is that they believe, as did Kant and so many others after him, that defining these identities is impossible because we cannot know the "true nature of nature." Kant went so far as to invent "noumena," which he said were the essences of thing; then proceeded to claim we can never know anything about noumena because they are the "unknowlable" things about empirical existents.

However, Aristotle, Occam, the Atomists, the Stoics, Ayn Rand, and many others, disagree with the definition of metaphysics as something that cannot be identified.

One example is the identity of Man as "the rational animal." There are many animals, and philosophers don't say man is not one of them. But they say that what makes him unique is that Reason is "predicated" of only Man.

That is what an (ultimate) identity is; the thing about that subject which cannot be predicated of any other subject. Emotional can be predicated of many animals, so that's not it. Speech is supposed of many animals; we believe the "songs of the whales" are the whales talking to each other, and Chimps are soon to be moved into the genus Homo with Man because, among other things, they have a rudimentary language. So language is not the one thing that can be predicated of Man.

Metaphysics is the science of identifying that "one thing" that is predicated of each existent. To do so, all existents must be classified. This is called Taxonomy. Removing Chimps from the genus Pan and putting them in Homo is taxonomy, because we have identified enough about them to identify them as being of our genus.

But the one thing that cannot be predicated of Chimps that can be predicated of Man is "Reason," not in any lenght of time longer than what naturalist Loren Eiseley called "the eternal present," and Ayn Rand called "range of the moment consciousness."

ADDED

BTW, every professor of philosophy is going to have at least a BA in Metaphysics. It may not be his/her specialty, but the point is, if it was not a "real" science, universities would not make you study for them in order to get a degree in them.