this post was submitted on 11 Jun 2026
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Theory must be met with practice, they mutually inform and reinforce each other. The important bit is that we cannot rely on simple empiricism and feel out better or worse policies when the entire system needs to change. This is where theory helps us understand what our systems are naturally leading towards, and what will replace them. The world will not be made better by imperialist countries trying slightly different policies gradually, but instead by the adoption of socialism and the end of imperialism and neocolonialism.
Socialism itself is scientific, the problem is reliance on vulgar empiricism over using empiricism to supplement dialectical materialism. To use a comparison, engineering begins by understanding the laws of physics, then proceeds to apply these laws and create a prototype, before relying on empiricism to refine and improve. Theory in this instance is the study of the laws of social science, and this is tested and affirmed with practice. Your approach denies the theory and overly relies on iterative micro improvements, which can be disastrous while we already have identified root causes of modern ailments as well as solutions.
This is how socialist countries already knew socialism was the answer before implementing it, which they then work on gradually and iteratively improving once it is established.
The problem here is that, by holding to vulgar empiricism, you are taking an anti-scientific approach while claiming to support science. Again, returning to my example, if I say dropping a ball at sea level into a pit will result in an acceleration towards the Earth at roughly 10 meters per second squared, this is because we have studied gravity. We can test it and verify this, but we already know beforehand how it will end up. In the off chance this fails, we have to obviously reevaluate our understanding of gravity.
When engineers design a new prototype, they do so based on already studied laws of physics that have been tested in real life. They do not begin from scratch, rediscovering the world each time, but instead rely on collective knowledge of how the world works, the laws of physics. Social science is also a science.
Philosophy too is scientific. There is anti-scientific philosophy, such as idealist branches of philosophy like Solipsism, as well as mechanical materialist branches of philosophy like physicalism and vulgar empiricism. These world outlooks do not adequately explain the world and how it functions, even if mechanical materialism is superior to vulgar idealism.
No socialist country has ever claimed to be a utopia. Marx denounced and debunked the mechanical materialist and idealist socialists of the past, and turned socialism scientific by advancing the world outlook of dialectical materialism. The theory of evolution is one such example of a development in science that proves the necessity of dialectical materialism over vulgar mechanical materialism and empiricism. If everyone was a vulgar empiricist, then evolution would be unobservable.
Socialism, once established, already relies on experiment and relying on theory and analysis to plan ahead and deal with problems as they arise. Empiricism is a core part of how this works. The problem is exclusively relying on empiricism, which becomes a rejection of science and knowledge in favor of a vulgar, small worldview.
"Vulgar" meaning dogmatic, underdeveloped, and incomplete. I haven't once denied the utility of experimentation and empiricism, just on the reductive use of it. I am aware of the fact that theory comes from experimentation, but it isn't experimentation itself. A dogmatic use of empiricism is saying we cannot know if dropping this specific apple in this specific place will result in the apple falling until we test it, perhaps that's a better explanation of the issue.
Contrary to your assertion, I believe in a more scientific approach than that. We move beyond simple, vulgar, underdeveloped empiricism to dialectical materialism, which itself makes abundant use of empiricism. It is the opposite of anti-scientific, it's the assertion that through practice we form a more and more complete view of the world, and better and better predict what will happen if we do something. Vulgar empiricism removes that predictive element and treats each moment as new and disconnected.
Returning to capitalism and socialism, we can observe definite trends towards centralization and socialization of production, while retaining private distribution. This naturally heightens the gap between the capitalists and workers, despite also killing off competition. The resolution of this is therefore socializing ownership of the means of production, not just the production process itself.
In other words, by analyzing scientific laws through practice, we can better understand how to get what we want without reinventing the wheel every time. Ignoring the laws of science and instead treating everything as disconnected and new, as the vulgar empiricists do, is anti-science.
Of course they are all assertions that can be disproven, in fact the idea that something can be tested one day and be verified for eternity is also an assumption that vulgar empiricists make that in fact is also anti-science. Change and development happens all the time, and it's possible that something true one day could be false the next, as conditions are always changing. The world is not a clockwork machine.
Surely you can see the advantage of prediction based on past experience even in new conditions, and that the more we do this the better we get at predicting, no? If not, you are taking the anti-scientific stance on the matter, one that traps us and prevents correct action to make the world a better place, always behind what must be done.
I'm not arguing against science or experiment, and if you think that's my take then please reread my comments. I am arguing against the vulgar version of empiricism. Vulgar empiricists rejected evolution, for example, as it is something that occurs over an absurd period of time (from a human perspective) and thus is difficult to test. Same as soil erosion and weathering. Empiricism is a method, and as a method it can be used with correct world outlooks and incorrect world outlooks.
Without a proper world outlook, empiricism is ineffective. For example, early experimentation often relied on gods as an explanation for phenomena. They were still experimental, and still observational, but without a correct world outlook they resulted in incorrect conclusions.
I'm not treating political science as religion, I'm treating it scientifically, with the knowledge that how we view and interpret the world colors how we analyze the world. Incorrect means of analysis means the method is blunted, empiricism without dialectical materialism leads to pitfalls like denying evolution or tectonic shifts. It is also entirely possible to come to correct conclusions without the correct world outlook, but this is often sporadic and accidental.
Where do ideas come from? Are they beamed into our heads, or do they come from how we live and the conditions we exist in? If you believe the former, then you are an empirical idealist, which is incorrect and leads to incorrect lines of analysis. What we know is based on how we practice and experiment, which informs how we can predict similar situations occurring. The more we do this, the better and more complete our knowledge. None of this is nonsense like "0=1," but instead is a definite process of knowledge building.
To re-center, my argument is that we learn more about the world as we interact with it, experiment with it, using empiricism. This leads us to connected conclusions, rather than specific and isolated ones. It's how we know human consumption is contributing to climate change. If we take the narrow and specific, isolated and disconnected view, then experiment is not properly used and leads to improper conclusions. That's why I am saying this vulgar empiricist stance is anti-scientific, and that science has advanced beyond it into better science.
You subconsciously agree with me already, you aren't truly a vulgar empiricist as you do generally agree with advancing beyond simple experiment into connected conclusions and theories about the world. This is how science functions, after all. My point of critique, however, is that you retreat from this scientific position towards the vulgar empiricist conclusion when it comes to politics. We cannot simply throw everything at the wall and see what sticks, we need to actually understand what we are trying to do before implementing it.
If I present you data that says areas with a lot of storks have higher birthrates, do you think someone should set up an experiment to disprove how storks bring babies?
An actual scientist will be the first to disregard pure empiricism, because otherwise it would literally impossible for science to be done. An empiricist like Hume would be the first to tell you that causality does not exist, we can't guarantee the Sun will come up tomorrow, no matter how much observation or clever theories we have.
The example doesn't only highlight the difference between correlation and causation, it's just one of the ways naive data fetishism is ineffective science. There is no science without experimentation, and there is no experimentation without theoretical frameworks.
Very well said, much more clear than me!
My point is not that we should not test. My point is that we should, and that we can draw connected conclusions based on test results that enable us to predict outcomes in similar situations and conditions, but that which are fundamentally novel. This is why we have a theory of gravity, we can observe how physics works generally to apply to new particular instances, rather than testing it each and every time.