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"Just as science can play havoc with metaphysics, metaphysics can play havoc with science." Gilson

There is a natural antipathy between the two. Gilson goes on to point out that metaphysics stifled science for centuries, just as science today stifles metaphysics. Empiricism is the belief that only those things that are scientifically verifiable exist . . . or are worth studying or have meaning.

So, science is arguably returning to metaphysics the suppressive abuse that metaphysics dished out to science for such a long time. Thing is, metaphysics never denied science altogether, but merely claimed its (rightful) primacy and often asserted its primacy indelicately, whereas science's suppression rises to the level of wholesale denial of metaphysics' existence.

It's also worth pointing out that two wrongs don't make a right. Both metaphysics and science--and mankind in general--are best served when both are recognized and respected. Metaphysics' earlier suppression of science doesn't justify science's suppression of metaphysics today.

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