Science Studies on Nishida's Philosophy

西田喜太郎的科学哲学是对世纪初“科学危机”争论的一种独创性回应。当时在欧洲，罗素发现了集合论的悖论，把数学的基础逼到了墙角。此外，爱因斯坦的相对论从根本上改变了我们对空间和时间的概念，量子力学的发展使人们对因果关系的概念产生了怀疑。西田试图从“行动直觉”的角度重新审视这些问题。在对数学基础的争论进行调查时，西田拒绝了罗素的“逻辑主义”立场，理由是它缺乏对直觉作用的洞察力。另一方面，西田对布劳威尔的“直觉主义”也有一定的评价。但他建议用他的“行动直觉”概念来代替布劳威尔的“基本直觉”。总的来说，西田并不一定成功地将“行动直觉”应用于数学知识。因为“行动直觉”本来就是一个依赖于我们身体行动的实践概念，相反，“行动直觉”概念在物理学领域中是有其正当功能的。因为，物理学是一门通过实验操作来研究物体结构的学科。基于布里奇曼的“操作主义”，西田坚持认为“没有身体自我的实际行为就没有一个物理世界。他从这个观点阐明了量子力学的认识论意义。按照他的说法，物理学中的因果律只不过是“历史因果性”的一个特殊版本。最后，西田达到了“激进实证主义”的立场，用“现象=现实”来表达。"

Kitaro Nishida's philosophy of science is nothing but an original response to the controversy concerning "the crisis of science" in the early twentieth century. At that time in Europe, Russell discovered the paradox of set theory and it drove the basis of mathematics into a corner. Moreover Einstein's relativity theory radically changed our concept of space and time, and the development of quantum mechanics casted doubt on the concept of causality. Nishida tried to reexamine these problems from the viewpoint of "acting intuition."Surveying the controversy about foundations of mathematics, Nishida rejected Russell's position of "logicism," on the grounds that it was lacking in insights into the role of intuition. On the other hand, Nishida evaluated Brouwer's "intuitionism" to a certain extent. But he suggested to substitute his concept of "acting-intuition" for Brouwer's "basic intuition." Generally speaking, Nishida did not necessarily succeed in applying "acting-intuition" to mathematical knowledge. For "acting-intuition" is originally a practical concept which depends on our bodily acts.On the contrary, the concept of "acting-intuition" properly functions in the field of physics. Because, physics is a discipline which investigates a structure of objects by means of experimental operations. Based upon Bridgman's "operationalism," Nishida insisted that "there is not a physical world without practical acts of bodily selves." He elucidated the epistemological significance of quantum mechanics from this viewpoint. According to him, the law of causality in physics is no more than a special version of "historical causality." Finally, Nishida reached the position of "radical positivism" which was expressed by a term "phenomenon=reality."