Preserving reason: a rationalist defense of the ‘Western telos’ in social science and the humanities

I discuss some of the current challenges to the social sciences/humanities and contend that their impact, marked by epistemological confusion and ill-founded accusatory discourse against the basics of open scientific debate and empirical methods, is damaging and undermining rational exchange. There is notable variety across disciplines, but contestation is rife. I affirm the existence and value of a historical Western telos, as a scientific-epistemological ‘project’ driven both by basic curiosity and (material) interests. In the face of some justified but also some grossly overstated accusations of science, especially during the past two decades, I plead for renewal and recalibration of such a telos (be it Western or other) based on the intrinsic value of sound, evidence-based science and non-justificationist.