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REVIEWING MODERN SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE WITHIN THE 

SCOPE OF NIETZSCHE’S IRRATIONALISM 

Oreoluwa Idris ADESINA 

 

Abstract 

Human knowledge has been constrained into two major bifurcations; knowledge 

based on factual experience and those based on value, instincts and intuitions. 

Scientific knowledge is claimed to be based on empirically verifiable data; thereby 

being considered as the most reliable system of inquiry ever developed by human 

civilizations. Scientific knowledge is esteemed to be a systematic inquiry, which 

emphasizes the superiority of human reason over human intuitions, instincts and 

impulses. However, Friedrich Nietzsche expresses strong disgust for the over-

glorification and exaltation of reason over those elements of human nature that 

serve as alternative sources of knowledge such as dark strivings, vitalism, 

intuitions, instincts and impulses. Nietzsche criticizes all forms of system-building 

as expressed in the universalization of fixed scientific methods, universal 

conceptions of truth and knowledge and the very idea of unquestionable religious 

morality and social norms. For Nietzsche, what is needed for the liberation of the 

human soul; and the realization of the “will to power”, is the abandonment of 

reason and the celebration of the dark instincts, creative intuitions and animalistic 

outbursts, which represent the irrational part of human nature. The “will”, which is 

a symbol of irrationality, defines human nature in its crudest form. This work 

proposes two major contentions: the first is that scientific knowledge is exclusive, 

as it denies the authenticity, validity and efficacy of other non-rational and non-

systematic modes of knowing. The second contention of the paper is that there 

exist, non-rational, authentic, valid and efficacious elements of human nature that 

serve as reliable modes of apprehending knowledge, beneath and beyond rational 

and systematic epistemic modes, which are elaborated by Friedrich Nietzsche in 

his philosophical irrationalism.     

Keywords: irrational, rational, science, Nietzsche, system, method, knowledge. 

 

1. Introduction 

The modern civilized man is totally overwhelmed by the dominance of 

rationalism. He embraces reason as the major faculty that is responsible for his 

choices and decisions. He is totally in praise of science and emphasizes the rational 

part of his nature at the expense of a part which is more indebt in his nature (i.e. 

the human will). Modern scientific knowledge is being projected to be based on 

the principles of rationality and objectivity, thereby representing the only form of 

reliable knowledge available to man.  This is exactly the image that the scientific 

community likes to project of itself, which is considered by Wilhelm Newton-

Smith, as that of “rationality per excellence” (Newton-Smith, 2003). p.1. 

According to Newton-Smith, the “scientific community sees itself as the very 



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paradigm of institutionalized rationality. It is taken to be in possession of 

something, the scientific method, which generates a ‘logic of justification’” 

(Newton-Smith, 2003). The assumption that science represents the paradigm of 

institutionalized rationality, as being commonly admitted and accepted by the 

scientific community, implies that there is ‘something special’ about science, 

which distinguishes it from other human intellectual endeavors, such as 

philosophy, theology, history and the rest.  

However, most members of the scientific community are of the opinion that a 

characteristic feature of science, which makes it ‘special’, is the “logic of 

discovery”, which serves as privileged method of formulating and validating 

theories, involving continuous problem-solving activities. The overwhelming 

glorification of science over other human activities derives in large part from the 

successes of recent science and modern physics in particular. The exclusivity of 

scientific knowledge in contemporary times was triggered in large part by the 

emergence of logical positivism in the 20th Century, which was a movement that 

bifurcated knowledge into two, by introducing a criterion of significance: known 

as the verifiability criterion. The verifiability criterion affirms that a piece of 

knowledge or intellectual enterprise is only to be regarded as meaningful when it 

either passes the test of empirical validation or is explainable by definition (Ayer, 

1959). The verifiability criterion proposes that the meaningfulness, truth and 

validity of a statement can only be deduced from the possibility of stating the facts 

that make them possible. A prominent logical positivist, Moritz Schlick, espouses 

this view, by stating in clear terms that: “It is the first step of any philosophizing, 

and the foundation of all reflection, to see that it is simply impossible to give the 

meaning of any statement except by describing the fact which must exist if the 

statement is to be true. If it does not exist then the statement is false” (Schlick, 

1932), p. 88. An implication of the logical positivist’s contention on the place of 

empirical verification for modern science is that science is an intellectual 

enterprise that is based on rationality and the facts of experience. Scientific claims 

must therefore by testable by experience. 

However, Friedrich Nietzsche, being a proponent of philosophical irrationalism, 

discredits the scientific and positivist claim that reason and experience alone 

determines reliable knowledge, while affirming the irrational elements of human 

cognition, such as “the will”, instinct, intuition, emotion, dark strivings and the 

rest, as bases for reliable knowledge (Nietzsche, 2010). In this paper, we attempt 

an exposition of the movement of irrationalism, synthesizing and contrasting it 

with its counterpart; rationalism. The scope of the paper is to project Nietzsche as a 

prominent figure in the dethronement of reason, and the embracement of the non-

rational part of human nature, as the initiator of postmodernism, and as well 

discuss the implications of Nietzsche’s irrationalism for the enterprise of modern 

science. This paper shall also attempt a review of the major contentions of modern 

science within the scope of the irrationalist pretensions of Nietzsche’s philosophy.    

 



Adesina                                                              Reviewing Modern Scientific Knowledge … 

22 

 

 

2. The Rational Image of Science 

Modern science is being widely conceived as the paradigm of rationality and the 

sole model of truth, which possesses the exclusive methods of arriving at reliable 

knowledge and problem-solving. Science is generally considered as “any 

“systematized”, “organized” or “classified” body of knowledge which has been 

critically tested and is beyond reasonable doubt” (Nagel, 1961), p. 3. Therefore, for 

any piece of knowledge to be tagged ‘scientific’, it must result from a 

systematized, organized and classified procedure, which is guided by an 

underlying logic of discovery, mostly described as a method. Jack Aigbodioh 

identifies four characteristic features of science, which include the fact that science 

is said to be specific, public, impersonal and objective (1997), p. 3. The specificity 

of natural science is evident in the fact that science solely enquires into particular 

and identifiable objects which are observable in the physical world of experience, 

rather than merely abstract or metaphysical ideas which are beyond the realm of 

observable reality. Science is being considered as being able to provide us with 

exact explanations of the nature of phenomena around us as they actually are. The 

enterprise of science is regarded as being public in character, owing to the fact that 

the methods, techniques and procedures of science are exoteric, rather than being 

esoteric. This implies that scientific knowledge can be taught to the generality of 

persons, and can be interpersonally or inter-subjectively verifiable, rather than 

being known by a select few who hold an exclusive right to such knowledge. 

Similar to the public character of science is the claim that the enterprise of natural 

science is impersonal. Science is often considered as being devoid of idiosyncratic, 

sentimental, and imaginative beliefs or ideas, but is rather “dispassionate and 

unprejudiced” (Aigbodioh, 1997), p. 4. Science bases its explanations on factual 

judgments rather than value judgments.  

 

The objective character of scientific claims, theories, principles and laws lies in the 

fact that they are all drawn from the concrete or material facts of the physical 

world of everyday perceptual experience. Science is said to be objective because it 

is entirely based on facts. The factual nature of scientific propositions is given a 

clearer picture by Alan Chalmers, when he writes that: “When it is claimed that 

science is special because it is based on the facts, the facts are presumed to be 

claims about the world that can be directly established by a careful, unprejudiced 

use of the senses. Science is to be based on what we can see, hear and touch rather 

than on personal opinions or speculative imaginings” (1999), p. 1. Moreover, the 

specific, public, impersonal and objective characters of the sciences are said to 

confer on them “the amazing power to uncover the truth about the world as it 

actually is, constituting them into knowledge par excellence” (Aigbodioh, 1997), 

p. 5.  

However, the received view of science that scientific knowledge is derived from 

the facts of the physical world of perception is often attributed to two schools of 

thought, namely: empiricism and logical positivism (Chalmers, 1999), p. 3. The 



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British empiricists, notably, John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume share 

the common view that all knowledge are derived from ideas in the mind which are 

implanted by sensory perception. These ideas are regarded by David Hume as 

sense impressions which are products of perceptions of external physical objects 

(Hume, 1975). The external physical objects thereby serve as the facts, which 

every scientific theory should attempt to fit. The logical positivists, such as Alfred 

Jules Ayer, Carl G. Hempel, Rudolf Carnap, Moritz Schlick, and the rest, also 

subscribe to the empiricist view that scientific knowledge, and knowledge 

generally is primarily derived from the facts of experience (Ayer, 1959). The 

logical positivists were more interested in the form of the logical relationship 

between scientific knowledge and the facts. The positions of the British empiricists 

and the logical positivists imply that modern scientific thinking is firmly based on 

the principles of rationality, which include: objectivity, impersonality, precision, 

soundness, validity, deduction, and induction.             

 

3. Philosophical Irrationalism 

The age of Enlightenment brought with it, an appraisal of reason as the 

determinant factor for human personality and guide to all human endeavors. 

During this age, reason was regarded as sovereign. Philosophers therefore, defined 

human beings by their capacity to think critically. This thought system was 

challenged by some thinkers in the late nineteenth century. The Enlightenment 

conception of human rationality was questioned, while the irrational aspects of 

human nature were emphasized. These thinkers now saw existential elements of 

human life such as blind strivings, animal instincts as the primary fact of human 

existence. For them, reason exercised a very limited influence over human conduct 

and that much more than logical consciousness, all forces below the surfaces, such 

as: impulses, drives, instincts, feeling, and will determine human behavior 

(Russell, 1945).  Irrationalism is a nineteenth century and early twentieth century 

philosophical movement which advocated the non-rational aspects of human 

behavior as being necessary for apprehending human life. That human life could 

be better explained and understood by expanding it beyond the rational to it fuller 

dimensions. Although, in philosophical history, irrationalists could be found before 

the nineteenth century, especially in the predominantly rationalistic Ancient Greek 

culture in the works of a poets like Pinder, dramatists, and even in such 

philosophers as Pythagoras, Empedocles and Plato, who all share a Dionysian 

(instinctive) influence (Perry, 1992).    

Irrationalism is a multi-faceted reaction against the dominance of reason in 

philosophical history, with various strands, and orientations on the role played by 

reason in human behavior. Some thinkers recognize the weakness of reason, 

continued to value it and sought to preserve it as an essential ingredient of civilized 

life, while for others, the creative potential of the irrational aspect of human 

behavior is to be emphasized. They urged the embracing of the feelings which they 

considered vital to artistic creativity and a richer existence. There are still others 

who strongly oppose the claim of scientists and the positivists that only 



Adesina                                                              Reviewing Modern Scientific Knowledge … 

24 

 

mathematical truths or principles and analytical reason was the supreme arbiter of 

knowledge and the only part to certainty. They argued otherwise that the truths 

discovered by the intellect were less profound than those grasped by our interior 

sentiments. “Like the romantics, proponents of the non-rational placed more 

reliance on feeling, spontaneity, instinct, intuition, and other non-rational sources 

of knowledge than on reason. They belittled the intellect’s attempts to comprehend 

reality, scorned the liberal-rational tradition, praised outbursts of the irrational, and 

in some instances lauded violence” (Perry, 1992). In fact, new insights were gained 

into the irrational side of human nature which along with the growing assault on 

reason influenced political life hugely. In later decades, the various currents of 

irrationalism mentioned above became ideologized and politicized by 

“unscrupulous demagogues” who sought to mobilize and manipulate the masses, 

with their emphasis on a chiefly Aristotelian society (Perry, 1992). A typical 

example of such ideological orientation was the fascist movements, which openly 

denigrated reason and exalted race, blood, action, and will. This runs against the 

position of nineteenth century liberals who held that reason had triumphed in all of 

human affairs. 

In early modern philosophy, even when Cartesian rationalism was developing, 

Blaise Pascal turned from reason to an Augustinian faith, claiming that the “heart 

has its reasons” unknown to reason itself. Irrationalism emphasized things about 

the life of the spirit and human history that could not be dealt with or handled by 

rational methods of science (Frankfurt, 1982), p. 92. The likes of Charles Darwin 

and later Sigmund Freud made irrationalism a movement interested in the 

exploration of biological and subconscious roots of human experience. 

Philosophical theories and movements like pragmatism, existentialism, and 

vitalism (or “life philosophy”) all arose as expressions of this expanded view of 

human life and thought (Stumpf, 2003). Arthur Schopenhauer, a typical nineteenth 

century irrationalist, exposited the idea of voluntarism, which expressed the 

essence of human life - meaning a blind purposeless will permeating all existence 

(Russell, 1945). Among the pragmatists, Charles Sanders Peirce and William 

James, the mind evolved as an instrument for practical adjustment and not as an 

organ for the rational plumbing of metaphysics. For them, ideas are not to be 

assessed in terms of logic but in terms of their practical results when put to the test 

of action. 

Irrationalism is also expressed in the historicism and relativism of Wilhelm 

Dilthey, who saw all knowledge as conditioned by one’s private historical 

perspective and who thus urged the importance of the “Geisteswussenschaften” 

(the humanities) (2002). Another irrationalist, Johann Georg Hamann, claims that 

truth could be found in feeling, faith, experience and personal conviction, above 

mere speculation. Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi exalted the certitude and clarity of 

faith to the detriment of intellectual knowledge and sensation (Perry, 1992). The 

likes of Friedrich Schelling and Henri Bergson who were also preoccupied with 

the uniqueness of human experience, relied on the idea of intuitionism, “which 



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sees things invisible to science.” In fact, they did not attack reason itself, the belief 

was that it had lost its commanding role in as much as personal insights are not to 

be tested. Bergson’s philosophy and as well as that of Nietzsche, was a form of 

vitalism and as well irrationalistic in holding that instinctive, or Dionysian drive 

lies at the heart of existence (Russell, 1945). 

Friedrich Nietzsche saw moral codes as mere myths, lies and frauds created to 

mask forces operating beneath the surface to influence thought and behavior. 

Nietzsche professed that humans are free to formulate new values by claiming that 

God is dead (Nietzsche, 2002).  Another thinker, Ludwig Klages extended life 

philosophy in Germany by urging that the irrational springs of human life are 

“natural” and should be followed in a deliberate effort to root out the adventitious 

reason; while Oswald Spengler extended it to history, which he viewed intuitively 

as an irrational process of organic growth and decay (Stumpf, 2003). 

In existentialism, Soren Kierkegaard, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Albert Camus all 

frowned at making sense out of an incoherent world; and each chose his own 

alternative to reason- the leap of faith, radical freedom, and heroic revolt, 

respectively (Barret, 1962). Generally, irrationalism implies either that the world is 

devoid of rational structure, meaning, and purpose; or that reason is inherently 

defective and incapable of knowing the universe without distortion; or that 

recourse to objective standards is futile; or that in human nature itself the dominant 

dimensions are irrational. 

 

4. Nietzsche and the Irrationalist Movement 

Friedrich Nietzsche was the principal figure in the “dethronement of reason” and 

the glorification of the irrational. For him, life abounds in cruelty, injustice, 

uncertainty, and absurdity and this is a fact man must understand in order to enjoy 

full existence. Nietzsche holds firmly that life is not governed by rational 

principles, there is no absolute standard of good and evil, no timeless principles, 

whose truth can be demonstrated or proven by the activity of reflective reason. The 

idea of a transcendental world or what could be called the higher world of 

metaphysics and even the Christian heaven is for him, a myth. Nietzsche claims 

that nothing is true, all what is available to man is his naked self (naked man) 

living in a godless, chaotic, meaningless, and absurd world. This is the reality, 

which no one but the strong must face, for the weak have no will to face it, and 

thus invent fables about a higher reality and a future life, such as is provided by the 

Christian faith (Nietzsche, 1924).   

In fact, Nietzsche claims that modern civilized, mechanized or bourgeois society 

was decadent and enfeebled, it is a victim of excessive development of the rational 

faculties at the detriment or expense of will and instinct. Against the liberal-

rationalist stress on the intellect, Nietzsche urged the recognition of the dark 

mysterious world of instinctual desires, which for him, are the true forces behind 

human life. He affirms that what the modern bourgeois society has succeeded in 



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achieving was to smother the will with excessive intellectualizing, the result of 

which is the destruction of the freedom or spontaneity that sparks cultural 

creativity and ignites a zest for living. The critical and theoretical outlook of the 

modern time has for too long stifled the creative instincts that are the real forces 

behind human life. Therefore, for man to realize his manifold potential, he must 

stop relying on the intellect and begin to nurture the instinctual roots of human 

existence. This, he expresses as follows: “I have kept a close eye on the 

philosophers and read between their lines for long enough to say to myself: the 

greatest part of conscious thought must still be attributed to instinctive activity, and 

this is even the case for philosophical thought”(Nietzsche, 2002). 

Traditionally, the Ancient Greek culture has been lauded for its rationality, for 

originating scientific and philosophical thought and for endeavoring to achieve 

balance, harmony, and moderation both in the arts and in ethics. This Ancient 

Greek culture with its overwhelming rationalistic thought system was given an 

unconventional interpretation by Nietzsche. Nietzsche chose to emphasize the 

emotional roots of Greek culture with recourse to the Ancient Dionysian spirit 

“that springs from the soil of myth and ritual, passion and frenzy, instinct and 

intuition, heroism and suffering.” For him, this Dionysian spirit, rooted in the non-

rational, was the source of and the force behind Greek creativity in art and drama. 

This is what Nietzsche means by the Greek tragedy, which declined when serenity, 

clarity, order, structure, form, and cold calculation – the Apollonian spirit- 

predominated over noble ecstasy and creative intuition. Greek tragedy, for 

Nietzsche was killed by rationalism which is life-undermining. 

The rise of modern theoretical outlook of scientific thought which seeks to 

separate truth from myth, illusion, and error, Nietzsche attributes to Socrates. For 

him, this scientific outlook which began with Socrates and attained its height in the 

Hellenistic age during the time of Alexandria, had the basis and set the foundation 

for modern culture. Nietzsche claims that the modern westerner values the 

theoretical man and not the man of instinct and action! As such, they do not 

appreciate the creative potential and non-rational (irrational) side of human nature.  

Nietzsche then claims that we are beginning to recognize and discover the 

limitations of science and the cognitive faculty itself or rationality. Nietzsche talks 

about Immanuel Kant who has already giving reasons for us to doubt the capacity 

of the cognitive and rational apparatus to apprehend reality in itself, and then 

science’s claim to the attainment of certainty. For Kant, the senses or the human 

rational and perceptual apparatus are incapable of apprehending things as they are 

in themselves.  

 

5. Nietzsche as the Initiator of Post-modern Thought-system 

Postmodernism represents a united force of diverse intellectual currents with a 

unanimous desire to undermine all categories of thought and assumptions that are 

typical of the historical epoch of Modernism. All attempts to seek universal 

standards of truth, beauty and goodness are seen as not only futile but also 



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restricting and tyrannizing. In place of the quest of certainty and validity common 

with modernism, postmodernist thinkers advocate the recognition of infinite 

differences and acceptance of uncertainty with regards to all knowledge. Friedrich 

Nietzsche is the philosopher who can be said to have ushered-in postmodernist 

orientation in philosophical history. Nietzsche objects to all forms of system-

building, universal standards of truth and morality. According to him:  

There are still harmless self-observers who believe in 

the existence of “immediate certainties,” such as “I 

think,” or the “I will” that was Schopenhauer’s 

superstition: just as if knowledge had been given an 

object here to seize, stark naked, as a “thing-in-itself,” 

and no falsification took place from either the side of 

the object. But I will say this a hundred times: 

“immediate certainty,” like “absolute certainty” and the 

“thing in itself” contains a contradictio in adjecto 

(contradiction in terms). For once and for all, we should 

free ourselves from the seduction of words!(Nietzsche, 

2002).  

Nietzsche criticizes Descartes’ idea of the thinking self (ego) as being the basis for 

all human knowledge, while also repudiating the Kantian idea of the “thing in 

itself”, which expresses some sort of objective knowledge that is to be sought after 

(Nietzsche, 2002). For him, there is no immediate certainty that requires only the 

aid of reason to be grasped (just as we have it in Descartes). Any form of system-

building presupposes lack of integrity. The rejection of absolute truth, objective 

knowledge, universal morality, and all forms of formalisms, brings us to the 

concept of nihilism in Nietzsche’s philosophy.        

 

6. Nihilism and Irrationalism in Nietzsche’s Philosophy: A Challenge to 

Modern Science 

As being hinted earlier in this paper, modern scientific thinking emphasizes the 

rational faculty of human cognition as being essential to the production of 

scientific knowledge, while disregarding other elements of human cognition, such 

as the “will”, instincts and impulses, as being unable to produce reliable and 

genuine knowledge. Modern science is often projected to possess a rational image, 

which places emphasis on a fixed, universalisable and objective method of inquiry, 

devoid of uncritical presuppositions which are considered as products of irrational 

cognitive apparatuses of man, such as the “will”. However, Friedrich Nietzsche 

proposes an opposing view which contrasts the rational outlook of science, as 

being evident in his nihilistic and irrational reflections.    

Nihilism is the extreme view that there is no justification for values. Nietzsche was 

an ardent critic of commonplace ways of thinking about truth and knowledge, for 

him, all thinking is perspectival, there are no facts, all what we have are mere 



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28 

 

interpretations (Nietzsche, 2002). This explains why he was interpreted as 

rejecting the idea of truth and knowledge altogether, and was considered as a 

radical epistemological and moral nihilist. Yet, it can be said of Nietzsche, that he 

manifested a passionate commitment to truthfulness, and made philosophical 

postulations which he himself supposed to have something like knowledge as their 

aim. “Zarathustra” speaks thus:    

 

I appeal to you, my brothers, remain true to the earth, 

and do not believe those who speak to you of 

otherworldly hopes! Poisoners are they, whether they 

know it or not. Despisers of life are they, decaying and 

poisoned themselves, of whom the earth is weary: so let 

them pass away! Once sin against God was the greatest 

sin; but God died, and with him these sinners. To sin 

against the earth is now the most terrible sin, and to 

revere the entrails of the unknowable higher than the 

meaning of the earth!(Nietzsche, 2010), p. 13-14. 

Nietzsche considers those things which are beneath the human nature, such as 

intuition, blind strivings, emotions, feelings, impulses, as providing the most 

reliable source of understanding and knowledge that is required to achieve a fuller 

existence. In proclaiming the death of God, he expresses the demise of universal 

morality, while proposing something radical, like self-acclaimed values. Nietzsche 

conceives human thoughts and actions as being constrained by values and at the 

same time clears the way for a new set of values which are constituent with human 

needs. Systems of values, as well as all knowledge, are for him, a set of illusions.  

However, the implications of Nietzsche’s irrationalist views for the enterprise of 

modern science is that the underlying assumptions that are often devised in support 

the rational image of science are mostly misguided. The assumptions often used in 

support of the rational image of science include the views that scientific 

knowledge is the only form of reliable knowledge available to man, that science is 

the paradigm of rationality, that science is the sole model of truth, that science is 

entirely based on facts, that only reason can guide man to the apprehension of 

reliable knowledge and a plethora of others. All these underlying assumptions of 

modern scientific rationality are being faulted and ‘mocked’ by Friedrich 

Nietzsche, who upholds the contention that genuine knowledge can only be 

derived from the more creative elements of human nature which are more indebt in 

man, such as the will, creative instincts, impulses, animalistic outbursts, and dark 

strivings (Nietzsche, 2010). As fallout of Nietzsche’s irrationalist doctrines is the 

contention that the enterprise of science can be more comprehensive in terms of 

approach and method by acknowledging and adopting the irrational sources of 

human knowledge.     



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It is therefore on the basis of the above analysis of the challenge posed by 

Nietzsche’s irrationalism to the enterprise of modern science that it is proposed in 

this paper that the assumption that science is based on fact and objective 

knowledge presupposes that the enterprise of science is methodologically 

handicapped, as it can only come to terms with the rational aspects of human 

cognition, while disregarding the efficacy of the irrational elements of man in the 

production of reliable knowledge. It will be of immense benefit to the enterprise of 

science if other non-rational sources of knowledge can be investigated and adopted 

veritable sources of reliable and scientific knowledge. Moreover, the very idea of 

fact, which science claims to explain is under contention, due to the several 

numerous interpretations given to the idea in different cultural and methodological 

contexts (Chalmers, 1999).      

 

7. Conclusion 

The basic assumptions that underlie scientific rationalism and the philosophical 

irrationalism of Friedrich Nietzsche have been extensively discussed in this paper, 

while also delving into a general analysis of the idea of philosophical irrationalism 

as a doctrine that upholds the irrational elements and sources of knowledge and 

human cognition, such as will, instincts, impulses and emotions. The scientific 

enterprise has been portrayed in this research work as a rational and objective 

enterprise, which bases its approach and methods on the principles of rationality. 

However, having given thorough considerations to Nietzsche’s contentions about 

the misguided assumptions underlying the rational image of science, which include 

the views that science is not the paradigm of rationality, that reason alone cannot 

serve as the only reliable source of knowledge, and that the irrational elements of 

human cognition are more efficacious in the apprehension of reliable knowledge; 

the paper thereby submits that the enterprise of modern science can be more 

comprehensive in terms of approach and method by incorporating the irrational 

sources of knowledge in its research programs. Moreover, Friedrich Nietzsche has 

been discussed in this paper as being the harbinger of the post-modernist thought 

system, owing to his critique of all forms of system-building, universal standards 

and principles of rationality, and grand-theorizing.   

 

 

 

 

 

 



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30 

 

 

 

 

 

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