REVISTA ELECTRÓNICA DE INVESTIGACIÓN EN EDUCACIÓN EN CIENCIAS Mario Bunge: Physicist, philosopher and defender of science1 Mario Bunge: Físico, filósofo y defensor de la ciencia Michael R. Matthews School of Education, University of New South Wales, Sydney 2052, Australia Resumen Mario Bunge nació en Argentina el último año de la Primera Guerra Mundial. Aprendió física atómica y mecánica cuántica de un refugiado austriaco que había sido estudiante de Heisenberg. Adicionalmente, aprendió en forma autodidacta filosofía moderna en un entorno que era hostil. Fue el primer filósofo de la ciencia sudamericano con formación inicial en ciencias. Sus publicaciones en física, filosofía, psicología, sociología y fundamentos de la biología son sorprendentemente numerosas, e incluyen en extenso Tratado de Filosofía en ocho volúmenes. La línea unificadora de su producción es la constante y vigorosa defensa del Iluminismo, y la crítica a los movimientos culturales y académicos que niegan o devalúan sus fundamentos: su naturalismo, la búsqueda de la verdad, la universalidad de la ciencia, la racionalidad y el respeto por los individuos. En un tiempo en que se alaba ampliamente la especialización y son reconocidos sus efectos sobre la ciencia, la filosofía de la ciencia, la investigación educativa y la enseñanza de las ciencias, es saludable ver los frutos del empeño de una persona por construir una ‘gran’ imagen científica y filosófica. Abstract Mario Bunge was born in Argentina in the final year of the First World War. He learnt atomic physics and quantum mechanics from an Austrian refugee who had been a student of Heisenberg. Additionally he taught himself modern philosophy in an environment that was a philosophical backwater. He was the first South American philosopher of science to be trained in science. His publications in physics, philosophy, psychology, sociology and the foundations of biology, are staggering in number, and include a massive 8-volume Treatise on Philosophy. The unifying thread of his scholarship is the constant and vigorous advancement of the Enlightenment Project, and criticism of cultural and academic movements that deny or devalue the core planks of the project: namely its naturalism, the search for truth, the universality of science, rationality, and respect for individuals. At a time when specialisation is widely decried, and its deleterious effects on science, philosophy of science, educational research and science teaching are recognised – it is salutary to see the fruits of one person’s pursuit of the ‘Big’ scientific and philosophical picture. *Este artículo es una versión aumentada y mejorada de trabajo que apareció originalmente en la revista Science & Education, 12(5-6), 2003. REIEC Año 4 Nro. Especial 1 1 1. INTRODUCTION 3. PUBLICATIONS Willard Van Orman Quine, in his autobiography, mentions Bunge is the author or editor of more than 50 books – attending the 1956 South American Philosophical including four major books in the past five years; and 500 Congress in Santiago, Chile. The only thing about the scientific and philosophical papers – including a number of meeting that he thought worth recording was his philosophy, physics and social science papers in the past observation that: two years. His papers have appeared in major journals in the disciplines of philosophy, philosophy of science, The star of the philosophical congress was Mario theoretical physics, chemistry, neuroscience, cognitive Bunge, an energetic and articulate young science, mathematics, psychology and sociology. Argentinian of broad background and broad, if headlong, intellectual concerns. He seemed to In 1944 Bunge was instrumental in establishing the journal feel that the burden of bringing South America up Minerva which was devoted to the defense of rationalism to a northern scientific and intellectual level rested against current, Fascist-inspired, irrationalisms, and on his shoulders. He intervened eloquently in the various obscurantisms prevalent in Latin American discussion of almost every paper. (Quine 1985, philosophical and intellectual circles. He published a p.266) number of essays and reviews in the journal during its twelve months of existence. One of which was ‘Auge y The congress was held nearly fifty years ago when Bunge fracaso de las filosofía de la naturaleza’ (Bunge 1944) was in his mid-30s; he is now approaching his mid-80s which argued against the then common Naturphilosophie with his intellectual energy in no way diminished. movements that emerged out of both Catholic scholasticism and Continental idealisms; the paper was The core of Bunge’s scholarly life is his commitment to critical of Bergson and of Husserl. studying and understanding the interaction of science and philosophy; to defending the best of both; and to applying Bunge’s first English article was titled ‘What is Chance?’ what is learnt to significant social and cultural issues. (Bunge 1951). Here he proposed an objectivist or Unlike many philosophers of science, Bunge seeks a holist ‘propensity’ interpretation of the probability calculus. He and coherent intellectual position whereby ontology, argued that chance was a feature of the world, not just a metaphysics, epistemology, semantics, psychology and name for our ignorance. What was randomness at one sociology are all advanced together and are made to level of the organisation of material was causality at account to each other. He abhors epistemology that is another level, and conversely. The article attracted the divorced from ontology; psychology that is divorced from attention of David Bohm who invited him to visit the theories of mind; and metaphysics that is conducted Institute of Physics of the Universidade de São Paulo; and without regard to science. He is both a scientific Bohm utilised the linked categories of randomness and philosopher and a philosophical scientist. causality in his Causality and Chance in Modern Physics (Bohm 1957). Among Bunge’s English-language books are: Causality: 2. ACADEMIC CAREER The Place of the Causal Principle in Modern Science Bunge’s enrolled in 1938 as a student of physics at the (1959), Intuition and Science (1962), The Myth of University of La Plata. He says that he ‘went into physics Simplicity (1963), Scientific Research (1967), Foundations for the love of philosophy’ (Bunge 2003b, p.245). His of Physics (1967), Philosophy of Physics (1973), The doctoral thesis was in the field of theoretical atomic and Mind-Body Problem (1980), Scientific Materialism (1981), nuclear physics. His first academic position came in 1941 Philosophy of Psychology (1987, with R. Ardila), the as a teaching assistant in experimental physics at the Treatise on Basic Philosophy (eight volumes, 1974-1989), University of La Plata. A few years later (1947-52) he Finding Philosophy in Social Science (1996), Foundations became a teaching assistant in mathematical physics at the of Biophilosophy (with Martin Mahner, 1997), Social University of Buenos Aires. In 1956 he was appointed a Science Under Debate: A Philosophical Perspective professor of theoretical physics at the universities of (1998), The Sociology-Philosophy Connection (1999), Buenos Aires and La Plata. In 1957 he won the chair of Crisis and Reconstruction in Philosophy (2000) and philosophy of science at the University of Buenos Aires, Emergence and Convergence (2004). Many of these books and a year later he resigned his physics chairs to have appeared in Spanish, Portuguese, German, Italian, concentrate on philosophy. However, he went back to French, Polish, Russian and Hungarian editions. Other teaching both physics and philosophy during short-term books have been published just in Spanish. appointments in the USA (University of Pennsylvania 1960-61, University of Texas 1963, Temple University As well as writing books, Bunge has edited a number of 1963-64, University of Delaware 1964-65). In 1966 he important anthologies. These include: The Critical became a professor of philosophy at McGill University in Approach: Essays in Honor of Karl Popper(1964), Montreal, and in 1969 became Head of the university’s Quantum Theory and Reality(1967), Delaware Seminar in Foundations and Philosophy of Science Unit. At McGill the Foundations of Physics (1967), Exact Philosophy he has taught a dozen different philosophy courses, and is (1973), Problems in the Foundations of Physics (1971), the Frothingham Professor of Logic and Metaphysics. He and The Methodological Unity of Science (1973). has also held visiting professorships in Uruguay, México, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, and Italy, and has He is the founder of the Society for Exact Philosophy; co- lectured in a dozen different countries. founder of three other learned societies; a fellow of the REIEC Año 4 Nro. Especial 1 2 Royal Society of Canada and the American Association for Marxism. Bunge set himself against all of these positions. the Advancement of Science; the recipient of Guggenheim As Quine observed, South American philosophy even up to and Killam fellowships; the Prince of Asturias prize; and the mid-1950s was a long way removed from its American five honorary doctoral degrees. and British counterpart. Bunge studied ‘modern’ philosophy on his own, and at age 20 gave his first public 4. EARLY EDUCATION lectures on the subject. Mario Bunge was born in Buenos Aires in 1919, the only child of Marie, who had been a nurse in Germany, and While in high school, Bunge became interested in physics, Augusto Bunge, a physician, sociologist, writer, and philosophy and psychoanalysis, and wrote a book-length politician. Bunge’s grandfather had been Chief Justice of criticism of the latter. In 1938 he was admitted to the Argentina. Augusto Bunge was the first socialist senator in Universidad Nacional de La Plata, where he studied Argentina; he was imprisoned for supporting trade union physics and mathematics. Shortly thereafter he founded a activism, and died some years later as a consequence of Worker’s School, which was closed down by the prison-induced illness. The father desired that his son government five years later, when it had 1,000 students should be ‘a citizen of the world’. From an early age enrolled.