Self, Realities, and the Transcendents 319“9x6” b2726 Self and the Phenomenon of Life: A Biologist Examines Life from Molecules to Humanitydiverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier
shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered
before me.” Zone 4 is reserved for a special type of reality that, because
of its fundamental nature, is forever inaccessible to scientific inquiry.
Such reality provides the axiomatic starting point for science but is itself
outside the reach of science. Questions such as the nature of the subjec-
tive side of mind and “how does anything exist at all?” belong in this cate-
gory. Its presence is simply self-evident, but is beyond proof or disproof.
Scientists deal with knowledge in the first two zones, and attempt
to extend into the third zone. Science aims at demystifying natural phe-
nomena by offering explanations through principles derived from simple
physical events (natural laws). Since scientists engage only in realities
that are observable and testable, and regard all others as technically non-
existent, within this confine, scientists can safely say or hope that there
is no problem that cannot ultimately be solved. It should be recognized,
however, that this attitude is only operationally correct; to extrapolate
this to cover the entire realm of reality is without basis.^4
Whereas scientists dwell most comfortably in the first two zones,
philosophers, on the other hand, cover all and take the fourth category
seriously as a subject of discourse. As scientists are concerned only with tes-
table hypotheses, philosophers raise questions regardless of whether there
will be an answer. Here lies a fundamental difference: science by definition
deals only with positive knowledge; philosophy deals with both positive and
negative — the knowable and the unknowable. For this reason, science,
powerful as it is, cannot totally replace, or engulf, philosophy. The empha-
sis on the unknowable is particularly evident in Eastern philosophical
thought. As Youlan Feng, the eminent Chinese philosopher of the twen-
tieth century, pointed out, Chinese traditional philosophy contrasts with
Western analytic thinking in being intuitive and holistic, and paying much
respect to the unknown. Feng suggested that a balance of the positive and
negative sides of knowledge should be the correct attitude of philosophy.^5
A related issue is the difference between “science of mind” and
“philosophy of mind.” Both have mind as their subject matter, but the