This was a very tough course for me. I'm glad that I listened to the "Science Wars: What Scientists Know and How They Know It" before I listened to this, or I doubt that I could have understood any of it. Unless you have a real interest in this topic you might want to listen to the other lectures as well.
However, I've listened to this lectures series twice now, and gotten more out of it each time and I'll probably do a little more reading and come back to it again. I got one excellent term out of this series although Dr. Kasser never says it but he almost says it "Science is epistemologically privileged", and it's what he means. As a society we tend to think that if it's scientific the information must be better.
Dr. Kasser's presentation is excellent. If it wasn't I could never have stayed with the lectures. I thought he brought up a lot of good an interesting ideas, and I have to admit that I've always thought Science was a little special, even though I've always been glad to be an engineer and thought that engineering is better than science. I was surprised at many of the points that he brought up.
One thing that drives me crazy about this is how powerful a concept logical positivism is as a philosophy even though it's been mostly shown to be lacking. Most people that I know think that science is only facts that are indisputably proven. I kept hoping that he would bring up A.J. Ayer who said that the only thing wrong with logical positivism was that is was almost all wrong, but he didn't. I actually heard that in another Great Courses Lecture Series, but I forget which one it was.
Good course. I'd recommend it but with reservations.
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