EnSci 1100 - Scientism

C.S. Lewis' views on Science and Scientism 2. claims that someone is anti-science if they are
James Le Fanu and John West sceptical of certain claims made in the name of
science.
This talk was given at the Round Church,
Cambridge, UK to mark the 50th anniversary of 3. claims that public policy should be guided or
the death of C.S. Lewis. David Illman, Christian controlled by an elite class of scientific experts.
Heritage's Director of Apologetics, introduces
Science has many positive aspects. To many,
the two speakers, Dr James Le Fanu and Dr
the abilities of science seems almost magical.
John West. Dr Le Fanu gives a brief, 5 minute
In The Abolition of Man, Lewis claimed that
introduction to the background of scientism
serious magical endeavour and serious scientific
before Dr West presents his 45 minute talk on
endeavour are twins. Although this seems
'Science and Its Proper Boundaries: The Legacy
strange, there are some key similarities (as well
of C.S. Lewis'. This is followed by 10 minutes
as differences).
of Q&A.
Science and magic both have the ability to
Brief notes on the talk function as an alternative to religion. Eg. H.G.
Even before he was a Christian, C.S. Lewis Wells' cosmic evolutionism.
displayed some scepticism concerning the
Science ultimately encourages a lack of
claims made in the name of science. In 1925, he
scepticism. There is a difference in trust
wrote to his father to say that philosophy
between scientific and historical knowledge.
showed "that the scientist and the materialist
Many would say that we can know more about
have not the last word."
pre-historic man, because science provides that
In 1932, after his conversion to Christianity, he information, than we can know from historians
wrote to his brother on publications by the about historic man, such as Julius Caesar or
Rationalist Press claiming that science debunks Napoleon. Scientism fuelled gullibility is
the claims of religion. He wrote that he was illustrated by Freud' materialistic reductionism
reminded him of a comment by another and also by Evolutionism. Lewis did not object
writer: "A priest is a man who disseminates to the evolutionary process in itself, but had
little lies in defence of a great truth and a little patience with the view that it was a blind
scientist is a man who disseminates little truths unguided process. He lamented that "the
in defence of a great lie." modern mind accepts as a formula for the
universe the principle 'almost nothing' may be
Lewis was not anti-science, but was opposed to expected to turn into 'almost everything' without
'Scientism', which may be defined as noticing that the parts of the universe under our
the "wrong-headed belief that modern science direct observation tell quite a different story."
supplies the only reliable method of knowledge
about the world and also … that scientists Lewis noted evolutionism's fatal self-
should be the ones to dictate public policy and contradiction on human mind: "If my own mind
even our moral and religious beliefs simply on is a product of the irrational, if what seem my
the basis of their scientific expertise." clearest reasonings are only the way in which a
creature conditioned as I am is bound to feel,
There was a similar relation between science how shall I trust my mind when it tells me about
and culture when Lewis lived to our own. evolution?" Darwin had similar doubts,
expressed in his Autobiography, which Lewis
Then as now, there were: had read.
1. claims that science provides a view that Lewis also commented on the blind acceptance
refutes the traditional religious view. of eugenics and other later-debunked 'scientific'
views by many scientists. If even scientists
show such credulity, then as the general public
 EnSci 1100 - Scientism

increasingly defer to science, they are even

more susceptible to unquestioning acceptance of
what is presented as 'science'.

Science as power is the most dangerous aspect

of science's similarity to magic, which threatens
the future of civilization itself. The critical
difference between science and magic is that
science 'works'.

In discussing the tendency of science towards

reductionism, Lewis noted that: "As soon as we
take the final step of reducing our own species
to the level of mere nature, the whole process is
stultified. By treating human beings as the
products of blind non-rational forces, scientific
reductionism eliminates man as a rational moral
agent. Man's final conquest has proved to be the
abolition of man." Reductionism opens the door
to the manipulation of human beings, with no
effective limit on such manipulation because
scientism undermines the authority of the
ethical principles needed to justify those limits.
Lewis demonstrates this in his science fiction
trilogy. It is interesting to note that during
World War 2, Lewis wrote not about the
dangers of fascism or communism but about the
danger of scientism.

Lewis' view on the generally held opinion: "I

take a very low of view of climates of opinion.
Every man knows that all discoveries are made
and all errors corrected by those who ignore the
climate of opinion."

Lewis hoped that the challenge to scientism

could take place on the basis of science itself.
His desire was that from science herself, the
cure might come.
 EnSci 1100 - Scientism

The Magician's Twin: C.S. Lewis and the Case the rational method per se, a subset of the
against Scientism rational method, but that it was very dangerous
and that in the 20th century it had had very
Transcript: malignant consequences to deify it. Scientific
We will restore science to its rightful place and socialism's credibly a scientific version of
wield technology's wonders. politics. The Marxists called their system
We live in an age of science. Technology. scientific socialism. Well, no one in his right
Progress. Modern science has remade our world. mind in 2012 will say that Marxism was
scientific. No one in his right mind, but people
But at what cost? did for 150 years, 170 years. Social Darwinist
racial science in Nazi Germany. Enormous
During the first half of the 20th century, three prestige was given to racialist views by their
prophetic writers warned about the dark side of apparent clothing. People such as Heckel and
scientific and technological progress. G. K. Molschott and Buechner popularizing reductive
Chesterton, George Orwell and C. S. Lewis. scientific ideas with immense success. In many
Best known for his Narnia stories and his books ways more success in Germany than in England.
of Christian theology, C. S. Lewis also had an
intense interest in the growing power of Lewis saw these developments. He saw that two
scientism. world wars, in which one he served and was
badly wounded, has roots in barbaric and
The effort to use the methods of science to hysterical, scientistic ideas, abuses of the
explain and control every part of human life. scientific method, abuses of scientific
terminology and language, abuses of scientific
Lewis was very much a skeptic and a critic of faith.
scientism. He was opposed to an ideology
which in his view had been confused with When warning about the abuse of science,
science. It was a particular materialistic Lewis made an unusual comparison. Although
approach which wanted to reduce everything most people think of science as something
that we could learn scientifically to materialistic modern, Lewis compared it to something
causes, blind, undirected causes. Lewis thought ancient, magic.
that science was what was a perfectly legitimate
enterprise he never denied it. He in fact studied C. S. Lewis thought that science and magic are
it quite a bit. He never so far as I know attacked twins. Now if you think about this, this might
science itself. What he attacked was scientism. seem very strange, but you know I think that
This idea that the method or the methods really Lewis was very perceptive here. In fact he
of natural science should be the bar by which highlighted three different ways that science
every other intellectual discipline must be held. and magic really are quite similar.
Just like in all human disciplines, Lewis thought
that science could be corrupted and that some Science as RELIGION
people could pursue science because they The first way science and magic are similar,
wanted power over the world and power over according to Lewis, is their ability to function as
other people in particular. a religion.

And I think what he saw was that you had to Certainly a magical view of the world can give
avoid those extremes not only in the one a sense that there's something more than
employment of science, but in the just our everyday lives. If you walk through a
popularization of it. You could not afford to forest and think it's enchanted, it gives you a
ignore the finding of science, the importance of sense of a grand vision that there's something
scientific method. You had to see that it's one of out there that we don't ordinarily experience. It
the greatest applications and developments of can give you a sense of meaning. I think there's
 EnSci 1100 - Scientism

a real reason why fantasy stories are so beloved, cakes, they have special concerts even, with
whether it be Lewis's own Chronicles of Narnia hymns towards Darwin. It really takes on the
or J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings or Harry trappings of a religion.
Potter. It really strikes a deep chord in people,
whether they're religious or not, about a sense Science as CREDULITY
of grandeur in the universe, something higher “With the knowledge of the first atomic
than ourselves. And in fact, for some people explosions to guide us, our chances for survival
who aren't religious, this magical view of the will be far better than those of the people of
world can actually be even more attractive Hiroshima and Nagasaki, if we act on our
because it substitutes for that. Well, in the same knowledge and are prepared.”
way, science can be an alternative religion. And
during Lewis's own time, there were people like A second way science and magic are similar,
H.G. Wells who turned, say, Darwin's cosmic according to Lewis, is their encouragement of a
theory of life developing in this blind struggle lack of skepticism. Now, again, this may seem
in the universe, and then human life develops, just completely outlandish, because science,
so this heroic character fighting against nature, how does that promote gullibility? Science is
and then eventually man evolves and evolves supposed to be just the hard facts. Now of
himself through eugenics into a race of course magic, you can think of in the tribes, has
demigods. “But for man, no rest and no ending. a witch doctor and they believe whatever the
He must go on, conquest beyond conquest. First witch doctor says. And so being, you know,
this little planet and its winds and waves, and magical thinking can promote a type of
then all the laws of mind and matter that restrain credulous thinking where you just trust what the
him. Then the planets about him and at last out authority figure says. But how does science
across immensity to the stars. And when he has promote that type of credulous or gullible
conquered all the deeps of space and all the thinking? Lewis pointed out that in the modern
mysteries of time, still he will be beginning.” world, people will believe almost anything if it's
dressed up in the name of science.
And this epic struggle, this cosmic struggle of
evolution, was really an alternate religion for For Lewis, one of the leading examples of
H.G. Wells. And you see that same thing today. science-fueled gullibility was Freudianism.
Whether it be Oxford biologist Richard Lewis had an interest in Sigmund Freud since
Dawkins, who says that Darwin helps us his days as an Oxford undergraduate. Lewis was
become an intellectually fulfilled atheist, or in intrigued by some of the claims of
2012, we had 10,000 to 20,000 people converge psychoanalysis, but he ultimately rejected the
on Washington, DC in the United States for this effort by Freud's followers to explain everything
Reason Rally, where a lot of the people from religion to stealing cars as a result of our
testifying, they really offer science as a religion. subconscious urges.
“If you look at the Royal Society of London, the
equivalent for the British Commonwealth, again Who are Guilty by Freudian Psychiatrist
about 90% of them are atheists.” (1952)
Before the police finally caught up with him,
And so today I think you see a lot of people Peter took about 30 cars. A car had meaning to
speaking in the name of science who offer him. In a symbolic way, it represented his
science as a quasi-religion. It's what gives their mother. Since he could not get her, he had to
lives meaning. Another area that we see this have a substitute. And a car was that substitute.
today is in the whole celebration of Darwin's Hence his thrill every time he drove a car.
birthday. Hundreds of colleges, Community Hence his continuous stealing. To the average
organizations, if not thousands around the world, reader, such an explanation may seem far-
on February 12th every year, hold Darwin Day fetched. Yet clinical experience shows that a car
celebrations. Sometimes they have birthday often stands for a woman. In daily language we
 EnSci 1100 - Scientism

often call a car she. When we have the tank conscious living things through a blind and
filled with gasoline, we say, fill her up. -end- unguided process. Lewis's doubts about
unguided evolution went back to his days as a
Well, Lewis pointed out that if you actually take soldier in World War I. While recovering from
Freud's view to its eventual conclusion, that shrapnel wounds, a young Lewis read the book
actually undermines even the belief in Creative Evolution by French natural
Freudianism. Suppose you had a Freud, philosopher Henri Bergson. Bergson questioned
somebody kind of like Freud, and this person the ability of Darwin's theory to account for
who is kind of like Freud said, no one ever complex structures like the human eye through
believes anything for a reason because there's a blind process like natural selection.
always some other explanation for why they
believe it, other than their reason for believing it. Lewis believed that evolutionism, like
Well, that would be true of religious people, but Freudianism, contained a fatal self-contradiction
it would also be true of Freud, right? Freud regarding the human mind. According to the
himself. Darwinian view, reason was simply the
unforeseen and unintended byproduct of a
Lewis's point is where does this end? If you mindless process, based on survival of the fittest.
really think that all reasoning fundamentally is Lewis pointed out the key difficulty with the
based on sub rational urges and that we can't Darwinian account of reason. If my own mind is
analyze those urges and there isn't real reason a product of the irrational, he asked, how shall I
that we can judge based on evidence and that trust my mind when it tells me about evolution?
we can't be self-critical, then that destroys
Freudianism just like it destroys everything else. In his personal copy of Charles Darwin's
autobiography, Lewis underlined passages
Shortly after Louis accepted Christianity, he where Darwin had asked himself the same
satirized Freud in his allegory, The Pilgrim's question.
Regress. In Louis' story, the main character
John ends up being thrown in jail by a character “ But then with me the horrid doubt always
named Sigismund Enlightenment. Sigismund arises whether the convictions of a man's mind,
was actually Sigmund Freud's real first name. which has been developed from the mind of the
He ended up shortening it later. And so this was lower animals, are of any value or at all
very much a parody of Freud. But what is this trustworthy. Would anyone trust in the
jail that he's thrown into? Well, it's a jail convictions of a monkey's mind, if there are any
governed by this giant. And this giant has a convictions in such a mind?”
particular propensity that anything that he looks
at becomes transparent. And so when this What this means is that if natural selection and
pilgrim character is thrown into this dungeon, random genetic mutations gave rise to our
into this jail, it's a jail of horrors because intellectual capacities, we should assume that
whenever he looks at someone, he doesn't see our intellectual capacities are consistent with
them. He sees their insides, their intestines. He survival enhancing behavior, but we should
sees through them. And it's horrible. It's like a have no especially good reason to believe that
house of horrors. And that was Lewis's pictures we actually know truth, or that our intellectual
really of where Freudianism leads you. If you faculty even have that capacity of connecting
try to deconstruct everything, you're left with with truth as one of its natural outcomes,
nothing. because that's not always designed for. If
anything, our reason is just sort of along for the
Another example of science-inspired gullibility, ride with our survival enhancing behaviors,
according to Lewis, was what he called which natural selection over millions of years
evolutionism, the popular idea that matter could has selected. So the implication of Lewis's
magically transform itself into complex and argument here is that if naturalism is true, and
 EnSci 1100 - Scientism

the Darwinian mechanism more or less accounts “What gets under your skin about research is
for our faculties, we probably shouldn't trust our the attitude of the man in the lab. They work on
reason. the principle that nothing is impossible.”

The idea that a blind and purposeless process “You hear that, bud?”
without a mind can produce things like human
beings that have minds and produce moral “Oh, sure, but I don't believe it.”
beliefs and things that sometimes go against our
need for physical survival. The idea that a “Open your eyes, but the proof's all around
mindless process of survival in the fittest could you.”
create such things really was an outlandish one
according to Lewis. How could a mindless And of course, that can be good. Modern
process produce minds and to think that it could science brings us good things, many things from
really just shows how gullible people can be in the microwave oven to the computers to life-
the name of science. saving treatments of modern medicine, which
we certainly appreciated. But on the other hand,
Science as POWER that
The third similarity between science and magic, tendency to want to control things can bring us
according to Lewis, is the quest for power. the Orwellian state of George Orwell's 1984.
Magic was about the quest for power. And so Lewis thought that modern science, in
Magicians wanted to have power over the world fact, was far more dangerous than magic
and over the universe. They wanted to harness because magic failed. Magic doesn't work at the
the powers of nature and the deeper powers of end of the day. And so it wasn't so dangerous
nature in order to control it. And Lewis said that because people actually couldn't use it to
much of modern science, not all, but much of control the world. Modern science has the
modern science was actually devoted towards potential that you really can control people. If
power over the world. you find the right drugs or find the right
treatments, you can manipulate them. And so if
For many people in the 20th century, the power you don't have some other way of protecting
of modern science was its greatest virtue. and limiting what you do in the name of science,
They hoped science would usher in a new age some ethical basis that isn't dictated by science
of peace and prosperity, a scientific utopia. itself, that can control it, then you are facing a
really bleak future.
“All curves and plastic. Monsanto's House of
the Future is open to the public at Disneyland. Lewis's critique of scientific utopianism was at
The four-wing plastic shell makes a snug and the heart of his novel, That Hideous Strength,
solid five-room dwelling designed for a family which tells the story of a conspiracy to
of four. And coincidentally, it's a fairly typical transform England into a scientific dictatorship.
family of four that gets first look. A family food The conspiracy is led by a government
center to store atomically irradiated food. A bureaucracy with the deceptively innocuous
work surface that includes a combination name of the National Institute of Coordinated
supersonic dishwasher and storage unit. A look Experiments, or NICE.
at the future. Looks good, eh?”
I think that that hideous strength and Huxley's
For the scientific utopians of Lewis's era, Brave New World are the two greatest dystopias
science was the savior that would allow us to in our language in the 20th century. The agenda
remake our world of NICE in That Hideous Strength reads like a
wish list drawn up by the eras leading scientific
social reformers. It included sterilization of the
unfit, selective breeding, biochemical
 EnSci 1100 - Scientism

conditioning, experimentation on both animals based on their scientific knowledge and

and criminals, and above all, truly scientific expertise.
planning. Lewis's concern about authoritarian science
seems eerily prophetic.
A scientific planning that is pretending to
provide a new humanity that is doing away with In a world driven by science and technology,
traditional ethics, that is doing away with all those who question the new order, like C.S.
traditional restraints.(US 1927: Forced Lewis did, increasingly find themselves labeled
Sterilization Upheld [Three generations of anti-science. C.S. Lewis would have rejected
imbeciles are enough], Nuremberg 1947: the charge.
Doctors Sentenced to Death [for Nazi
experiments on prisoners and other war crimes]) Lewis did not accept the idea that science was a
special form of knowledge that was somehow
This depicts a world in that hideous strength in immune to inspection, that was somehow
which nothing is sacred. Daniel Bell has told us cordoned off from the non-specialist assessing
that the essence of modernity is that nothing is the deliverances of the sciences. Lewis was well
sacred. (Alabama 1947: Blacks Denied aware that first of all that there's no such thing
Penicillin [As parts of US public health studies as science as such. There are sciences and each
effects of Syphilis]) science has its particular methods and its
particular areas of study. And also that the
In the abolition of man and also in that hideous science says to be good, need to interact with
strength, we see the consequences of a world in one another, but they do so by means of the
which nothing is sacred, which includes the larger tools of good, rational, critical thinking.
human person. The human person is not sacred. And so that the things that the scientists say are
And when that happens, there are no subject to review by everyone who is able to
distinctions between individuals or humans and think well, to think critically, to think rationally.
animals or humans and vegetables or humans
and minerals. And we have the kind of thing Lewis did not deny that scientific expertise
we've had in the 20th century. might be necessary for good public policy in
many areas, but he insisted that science alone
In the two decades before his death, Lewis was not sufficient. Knowing say how things
became increasingly alarmed by the rise of work, knowing how cells work, or knowing
scientific authoritarianism. Lewis was very how ecosystems work doesn't tell you what you
concerned by the dogmatic use of science, and ought to do for your society, because public
that is why he wrote his novel That Hideous policy is not just about the technical expertise of
Strength. That is why he wrote his book The how things work. It's about what good is worth
Abolition of Man, where he actually worries having at what price. And as C.S. Lewis pointed
and somewhat sort of predicts the rise of a new out, on these questions, a scientific training
class of people, of experts speaking in the name gives you no added value. Scientists are not
of science who would dictate to everyone else. moral philosophers, yet political and social
In fact, by the end of his life, Lewis was judgments involve not just how do things work
worrying about the rise of what he called and how can we make them work better, but
Scientocracy. how should we act and what's worth spending
money on and what's worth doing and what
Government and society that claims to be based freedoms are worth giving up or not.
on the claims of modern science, but in reality
really is based on a scientific clique of a few And on these sorts of moral and ethical
people who are speaking in the name of science. questions, someone's science training doesn't
And maybe they are adopting the majority view give them the right to dictate to the rest of
of science, but they're claiming the right to rule society.
 EnSci 1100 - Scientism

C.S. Lewis hoped that scientists themselves

“I dread government in the name of science. would find a way to rescue science from
That is how tyrannies come in.” - C.S. Lewis scientism, creating a regenerate science that
respected human rights and honored human
C.S. Lewis thought that science was a good dignity, a science that would no longer be the
thing, but he also thought that it held some magician's twin.
really strong dangers. The biggest danger really
was the penchant to control. In a scientific view,
if you think that is the only way that we have -end of video-
knowledge of the world, and so if you think that
if I have the scientific truth about something,
that's the end of story. I know everything.

That really tends to feed a power trip. Whether

you're a scientist or you're a politician who's
trying to latch onto the prestige of science, you
really have people who are going to abuse their
power. Because they think, look, we're the only
ones who know what should happen. Because
we know how the universe really works.
Therefore, we should be able to dictate what our
cultural beliefs are. We should dictate what our
government should do.

How we should design governmental programs,

we should dictate all manner of public policy,
and that anyone who doesn't have a scientific
training or isn't part of the consensus view of
science is basically stupid or against progress or
against science. And so it should be really swept
by the wayside and shouldn't be listened to. And
I think Lewis thought that that almost
totalitarian impulse was really a dangerous
thing.

Lewis, I think, was properly so frightened by

that potential within science. And that's why he
stressed why we really need a way to
understand the limits of science and that there is
something behind science, a larger transcendent
ethical sphere behind science, and that we aren't
just blind matter in motion, that we're part of a
designed universe that actually sets limits on
what we should and shouldn't do.

It's an age-old problem. How do we prevent

something good from being twisted for evil
ends?