Abstract

Through discussing scientific whaling, the paper brings the necessity of retrieving natural philosophy. The paper’s arguments favor an expanded vision of human encounter with nature, through the lens of natural philosophy, with a priority focus of expanding our imaginations to embrace the vast natural world. There is no doubt that both the philosophy and science, two of the three significant areas of cultural and intellectual engagement (the other one is religion), have gone through changes over time. It is also conspicuous that the modern natural science marginalized and suppressed specific concerns which were previously an indefeasible part of natural philosophy. Bringing both historical and critical discussion of natural philosophy, the paper explores prospective retrieval of natural philosophy in contemporary modern science. Emphasizing the significance of natural philosophy’s imperatives both in the intellectual and field application of modern science, the paper reiterates commentary of Nicholas Maxwell, who advocates to correct three loopholes (Maxwell 2017): change the nature of social inquiry; opt aim-oriented rationality methods; and generalize the progress achieving methods of science.