“Ipsa scientia potestas est.” (“Knowledge itself is power.”)
– Francis Bacon, in his “Meditationes Sacrae” (1597), with the quotation often shortened to “Scientia potestas est” (“Knowledge is power”)
People today are inclined to reject Western culture, absolutely and indiscriminately. But I believe that it is still relevant today. In particular, there is a Western heritage of free inquiry and pursuit of truth. This is the aspect of Western culture that I will most focus on today.
Francis Bacon
Of course, rationality has been found in all cultures, past and present – and one could argue that the earliest science came to us from Mesopotamia. But it made particularly great advances among the Ancient Greeks – famous for their early philosophers like Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. The Ancient Greeks also produced some great mathematicians and scientists, who advanced our understanding of nature. The greatest city-state among the Ancient Greeks was Athens, now famous as the birthplace of democracy. Thus, the name “Athens” has sometimes been used as a metaphor to describe the Western heritage of free inquiry and rational thinking. I recognize that the word “rationality” has sometimes been used to describe reason in contrast with the empirical evidence of one’s senses. But, in this post, I will generally use the term “rationality” to include both logic and empirical evidence, both of which are foundational to doing valid science.
Constantine, the first Roman emperor to embrace Christianity
Athens and Jerusalem: A metaphor for the two great pillars of Western civilization
In the fourth century AD, the Roman emperor Constantine made Christianity into the official religion of the Roman Empire. Before then, Western religion had been pagan, with a pantheon of Greek (and other European) gods like Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon. But the West’s adoption of the Judeo-Christian religion seems to have begun with Constantine in the fourth century AD. This was when this religion became important for the West. Obviously, the Jewish and Christian religions both came from the earlier Hebrews of Ancient Israel, whose culture was centered in and around Jerusalem. Thus, the name “Jerusalem” has sometimes been used as a metaphor to describe the West’s Judeo-Christian heritage. Some have argued that the two great pillars of the Western heritage are thus “Athens” and “Jerusalem.” Therefore, I will here be using these terms as a metaphor for the relationship between faith and reason, a relationship debated inside and outside the West. In the Muslim world, people would naturally associate their faith with places like Mecca. But, for our present subject, the faith side of things will be represented in this post by “Jerusalem.” And, again, “Athens” represents the reason side, as defined here to include both logic and empirical evidence. Sometimes, Western culture has embraced both of these pillars. At other times, Western culture has gravitated towards either pillar at the expense of the other. This is one of the foundational tensions of Western thought, as I will be describing next.
Aristotle
When either of the pillars had problems, the other was sometimes able to compensate
In the fifth century AD, the Western Roman Empire fell, giving rise to Europe’s “Dark Ages” period. The more “secular” kinds of education then declined in the West, and the Greek philosophy of people like Aristotle was largely forgotten. But, during this period, faith was retained, and became even more central to those who held it. This would be the dominant pattern of the Middle Ages. There was some great medieval science, much of which came from the nearby Islamic world. But, as a general rule, Medieval Europe would reject Athens and embrace Jerusalem. As Will Durant once put it, this was the “age of faith.” The tradition of free inquiry was then lost in the West, and so was most of the other Greek learning – although it was still preserved in the Islamic world. This situation would last for several centuries. Then, around the fifteenth century, Greek learning was rediscovered in the West. In particular, the works of Aristotle began again to enjoy popularity. His Greek text had been carefully preserved by the great Muslim philosophers, allowing the West to again embrace the Greek traditions of free inquiry. At that time, the West thus embraced both Athens and Jerusalem, giving it the best of both worlds. This situation continued into the Age of Enlightenment, another major period of European history. Every other age of Western philosophy has produced some great thinkers. But, with apologies to these other periods, I believe that Western philosophy reached its zenith during the Age of Enlightenment. (And I say this as someone who likes classical philosophy!) In particular, the nations of England, Scotland, and France were fertile ground for advancements in philosophy. In the word “philosophy,” I include advances in mathematics like those offered by René Descartes, and advances in the sciences like those offered by Sir Isaac Newton – both of whom were products of this time. This period gave us a steady outpouring of truly great ideas, even though this period is today known more for the expansion of European empires throughout the globe.
René Descartes
Sir Isaac Newton
The positive and negative aspects of past Western colonialism around the world
Obviously, the legacy of Western imperialism is now somewhat controversial, as is the chattel slavery that began to be practiced in the distant provinces of these empires. We are right to be apprehensive about this particular aspect of the “Age of Exploration,” although these kinds of things were hardly unique to the West at this time. And, more to the point, the colonialism also spread the legacy of free inquiry, relatively free trade, and other improvements (economic and otherwise) to their various overseas colonies – including free markets. Thus, along with the bad effects, Western culture actually brought some positive effects to the distant areas that it then colonized. This means that Western imperialism was not quite as “one-dimensional” as it has sometimes been represented to be. It is still good that most former colonies of the West have since become independent of the Western powers that once colonized and controlled them. Nonetheless, the legacy of Western colonialism may have also had some good effects, and these need to be remembered today along with the bad ones. Some today dismiss all of Western culture because of the legacy of these few particular aspects of it – or of certain other aspects, such as racism and sexism. But, again, these things were hardly unique to the West at this time. And, more to the point, throwing out the baby with the bathwater would be a serious mistake. Judging all of Western culture by a few metrics would be silly, given the contributions of Enlightenment rationality and science. During the Enlightenment, the West took science further than it had ever gone before – again embracing both Athens and Jerusalem.
Raphael’s 16th-century fresco “The School of Athens”
Today, postmodernism rejects all rationality, particularly that of the Enlightenment
But today, there is a school of thought that rejects all rationality – particularly that of the “Age of Enlightenment.” This is the school known today as “postmodernism.” The Age of Enlightenment is now identified with the aptly-named “modern” period – that is, anything within the last 500 years or so. Thus, those who reject it have since come to call themselves “postmodernists” – a strange name, if ever there was one. Some of them are educated enough to know about this period of Western intellectual history, but (for reasons that are unclear to me) nonetheless seem to reject it. Postmodernists often reject all rationality (or empiricism) from any source. Some of them even overtly reject science, but especially reject the science of the Age of Enlightenment. They see science and reason as just another piece of problematic Enlightenment baggage, which they claim to have been “forced” upon the helpless nations of the non-Western world (see source). If I were from a non-Western culture, I’m not sure how I would feel about this claim that the West forced reason and science upon everyone else (their idea, not mine), and that “no other culture” had these things before the West came along (again, their silly idea). The West may have given us some advances in these areas – but, as acknowledged earlier, these things were also found to a significant degree in other cultures. Some of these people even object that logic and science are “racist,” and need to be rejected by all sane and fashionable persons. Academia is filled with postmodern nonsense such as this, and it is starting to become far more common to claim these things today. In contrast to British empiricists who rejected rationality in favor of empirical evidence, postmodernists reject rationality in favor of unrestrained emotion – unhampered, that is, by anything smacking of “logic” or objective truth. They seem to reject both Athens and Jerusalem, something that seems to have no post-Socratic precedents in the West. I’m not sure how our society would function if it collectively rejected both Athens and Jerusalem, and threw them both onto the junk pile. But, to me, the conscious rejection of both logic and evidence is inexcusable and self-defeating. To the extent that we abandon our Enlightenment heritage, we’re shooting ourselves in the foot, and setting ourselves up for a new (and possibly even worse) Dark Age.
Jean-François Lyotard, sometimes called the Father of Postmodernism
A few of the problems with postmodernism, particularly in its rejection of objective truth
I can understand the apprehensions about Western history based on slavery and imperialism, even though I believe that certain other aspects of Western culture may help to compensate somewhat for these things. But rejecting science as “just another way of looking at the world” (as some postmodernists have actually said) is to embrace the fallacies of Protagoras, that all truth is in the “eye of the beholder.” (Or, as Protagoras himself put it, that “man is the measure of all things.”) These arguments were debunked more than 2,000 years ago by Socrates, with arguments that are still relevant today. There is such a thing as objective truth, and it needs to be accepted today if we are to achieve true happiness. As some wise critics have said, postmodernism is a cancer of the human spirit, which discourages happiness and promotes nihilistic misery. The antidote for this is to accept the evidence for objective truth, and to embrace logic and science as a means of finding such truth. I should acknowledge that this does not require us to hold all truths as “certain,” although I do believe that some claims should indeed be regarded as such. (More about that here.) Rather, it requires us to acknowledge the fact that some truths just exist independently of whether we believe them or not, and that they will stubbornly refuse to bend to anyone’s will. This is what I mean by objective truth. This is one of the greatest cultural legacies of Western intellectual history, and that of the Age of Enlightenment in particular. It would be a grave mistake to reject it today because of “political correctness,” when Enlightenment rationality has done so much for us – and will continue to do much for us, if we allow it to do so.
François-Marie Arouet, better known as “Voltaire”
Rather than rejecting our Western heritage, we need to be embracing it even more today
Anytime you use technology to do anything, you accept the scientific principles upon which that technology is based, and the culture of free inquiry that produced the discoveries which have enabled this technology. Science is thus more than just another “way of looking at the world,” and Western science has left a truly positive legacy for both Western and non-Western cultures. This legacy is still relevant today, and so is the Western culture that produced this Enlightenment rationality. Rather than rejecting this Western heritage, we need to be embracing it today, and pursuing truth with ever more dogged devotion and determination. Perhaps then, we will be able to return to the foundational principles of our culture’s noble birthright, and embrace both Athens and Jerusalem – or, at the very least, the one or the other.
“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”
– Isaac Newton, in a letter to Robert Hooke (February 1676)
If you liked this post, you might also like:
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment