Let me start by describing how the nervous system is structured in strata, with lower, "thalamic" nerve centres which are closer to the outside world, giving us

Let me start by describing how the nervous system is structured in strata, with lower, "thalamic" nerve centres which are closer to the outside world, giving us sense impressions; and higher, "cortical" nerve centres which are further away from the outside world, and process the nerve currents coming from the lower nerve centres. It's a well known fact that it is the cortical nerve centres that are engaged when operating with languages (including scientific languages – physics, mathematics, etc.; and probably coding, too); however, because of this structuring of the nervous system, cortical products of abstraction are abstractions from the abstractions of the lower nerve centres – in other words, it is natural to begin with sense impressions (observations, facts, etc.) and proceed by producing generalisations, models, formulations, ideas. If, contrary to that, we assign primary importance to words and ideas, then, structurally, we are behaving similarly to people suffering from hallucinations, illusions and delusions, word salad, fanaticism, etc. I hope not to be opposed by anyone if I suggest defining science as the investigation of empirical structures, with the purpose of formulating structurally-similar semantic representations using words and other symbols (laws, theories, generalizations, formulae, etc). We readily see how science is nothing else than the mature, appropriate behaviour of a healthy human nervous system. Fundamentally, scientists are preoccupied with sanity, really: day in, and day out, they spend their time co-ordinating ideas with facts. Their job, their contribution to society is adjustment to facts. Now, if, for example, we would repeatedly find ourselves stumbling, we would turn to professional athletes for inspiration; it follows similarly that, for the sake of sanity and adjustment, the methods, conduct and results of scientists are of interest to us all. The Wikipedia article doesn't really provide any clear, explicit, concise argument against the so-called "scientism". In my opinion, the article reflects the struggle of a curious group of people: people with an inflated sense of self-worth, fuelled by a gratuitous use of words ("logolatry" is the name for it, and it's always nice, btw, to discover that an ancestor summarised personal observations of mine with a single word!). In any case, I trust that one can only retard the natural functioning of his, and others' nervous systems – never abolish it.