The Search for the Truth

This article by Frank Furedi was originally published in Italian in La Republica

At first sight it appears that science has the last word on all the important questions of our time. Science is no longer confined to the laboratory. Parents are advised to adopt this or that child-rearing technique on the grounds that ‘research’ has discovered some new beneficial outcomes. The authority of science is frequently used to instruct people how to conduct their relationships, family life, what food to eat, how much alcohol they can drink, how frequently they can expose their skin to the sun and even how to have sex. Virtually every dimension of the human experience is publicly validated through pointing to the finding of a piece of research or through appealing to the judgment of an expert.

Of course as in the past so today, science invites criticism and scepticism. Indeed its authority is continually scrutinised and subjected to a powerful moral anti-scientific critique. Scientific experimentation and innovation – e.g. stem cell research, cloning, genetically modified food – are continually problematised and stigmatised as immoral. Moreover claims appealing to the authority of science invite moral denunciation about the competence, hidden agenda and the interests represented by the claim. Many people understand that frequently last year’s scientific advice is contradicted a few month’s later by a different research finding. Others are anxious about the rapid pace of scientific advance and worry about the potential power for destruction unleashed by the new applications of science through genetic manipulation or nanotechnology.

Many greens blame science and technology for contributing to environmental degradation and global warming. Indeed one of the puzzling features of our time is that the relentless expansion of the authority of science is paralleled by a powerful mood of distrust towards it. Anyone old enough to recall the public’s enthusiasm for the achievements of science in the 1950s and 1960s will be struck by its more grudging and even fearful acceptance of it today. The response of western society to science is intensely contradictory. It continually seeks its authority but it does not quite believe that it has the answers and frequently worries about the fruits of its discoveries.

Yet whatever misgivings people have about science its authority is unrivalled. The formidable influence of this authority is demonstrated by the growing tendency of environmentalists to rely on science to back up their arguments. Not so long ago many leading environmentalists insisted that science was undemocratic and responsible for many of the problems facing the planet. Bit at least in public the hostility towards science displayed by the environmental movements in the 1980s has given way to its positive endorsement. Today the greens depend on the legitimation provided by scientific evidence and scientific expertise. In their public performance the use of science by environmentalists sometimes even acquires a dogmatic form. ‘This is what the science says’ they state before adding that debate about global warming is ‘now finished’.

Belief in religion and political ideologies fail to inspire significant sections of the public. Politicians find it difficult to justify their existence through the vocabulary of morality. In the Anglo-American world officials promote policies on the grounds that they are ‘evidence based’ not that they are ‘right’ or ‘good’. In policy making the language of ‘right and ‘wrong’ has been displaced by the idiom of ‘research shows….’. Moral judgments are often edged out from even the most sensitive dimensions of human conduct. Thus experts use the language of medicine and not of morality when they tell children that having sex is not so much ‘bad’ but bad for their emotional health. The loss of confidence in belief is so pervasive that even religious institutions are affected by it. Fundamentalist religious groups do not simply rely on biblical texts to affirm their belief in the Creation. The invention of creation science by American fundamentalist religious groups is symptomatic the trend to supplement traditional belief with the authority of science. The anti-abortionist movement no longer relies on the moral denunciation of a practice they deem to be evil. They increasingly rely on scientific and technical expertise to advance their cause. They argue that an abortion is bad for a women’s health and likely to cause post-abortion trauma. A question like ‘when does life begin’ which until recently invited a morally informed response is increasingly answered through appealing to a body of medical research.

Despite its formidable intellectual powers science can only provide a provisional solution to the contemporary crisis of belief. Science emerged through a struggle with religious dogma. And belief in its power to discover the way the world works should not be interpreted to mean that science itself is a belief. On the contrary science depends on an open ended orientation towards experimentation and the testing out of ideas. Indeed science is an inherently sceptical enterprise because it respects no authority other than evidence. As Thomas Henry Huxley once declared: ‘the improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority as such’ and added that ‘for him scepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the unpardonable sin’. That is why the scientific institution, the UK’s Royal Society was founded on the motto ‘On the word of no one’! The message conveyed by this statement is very clear: knowledge about the material world should be based on evidence rather than authority.

The critical spirit embodied in the motto ‘On the word of no one’ is increasingly violated by growing tendency to treat science as a belief that provides an account of the Truth. Many religious leaders, politicians and environmentalists have little interest in engaging in the voyage of discovery through scientific experimentation. They often appear to be in the business of politicising science, or more accurately, moralising it. For example Al Gore has claimed that scientific evidence offers scientific (inconvenient) truths. Such science has more in common with the art of divination than of experimentation. That is why these days science is often offered up as possessing a fixed and unyielding, and thus unquestionable quality. Frequently, Gore and others will prefix the term science with the definite article ‘the’. So Sir David Read, vice-president of the Royal Society, recently said that ‘the science very clearly points towards the need for us all – nations, businesses and individuals – to do as much as possible, as soon as possible, to avoid the worst consequences of climate change’. Unlike ‘science’, this new term – ‘The Science’ – is a deeply moralised and politicised category. Today, those who claim to wield the authority of The Science are really demanding unquestioning submission.

The slippage between a scientific fact and moral exhortation is accomplished with remarkable ease in a world where people lack the confidence to speak the language of right and wrong, But turning science into an arbiter of policy and behaviour only serves to confuse matters. Science can provide facts about the way the world works but can not say very much about what it all means and what we should do about it. The search for truth requires scientific experimentation and the discovery of new facts but it also demands answers about the meaning of those facts – and those answers can only be clarified through moral, philosophical clarity. If science is turned into a moralising project its ability to develop human knowledge will be compromised. It will also distract people from developing a morally educated understanding of the problems facing humanity in the 21st century. Those who insist on treating science as new form of revealed truth should remember Pascal’s words: ‘we know the truth, not only by reason, but also by the heart.’