Modern european science as historic anomaly

Abstract

In this paper, we briefly examine the role that religious beliefs have played in the different worldviews that, in each historic period, have induced specific courses in the process of building and implementing scientific and technological knowledge. In particular, we maintain that, without excluding socioeconomic factors, the presence of metaphysical doctrines and of tight traditional religious structures in civilizations other than the European one of 16th and 17th centuries prevented them from conceiving nature as something secular and therefore hindered the emergence of modern science and capitalism. To reach a better understanding of the problem, we think it is essential to resort to sociological approaches, such as those used by Weber and Ben David. We also think it is useful to analyze the problem by means of the concept of "epistemic framework" introduced by Jean Piaget and Rolando García because it would allow us to understand in what way those frameworks have, in different civilizations and in different historic periods, promoted or hindered a certain worldview and thus have orientated the notions about nature and the approaches necessary for its study.