Professor Schaff has another well-written and thought-provoking post on the perils of scientific culture. I agree with a lot of what he says, in this and in another related post. I am not quite so hostile to laptops in schools as he is, but I have to concede that evidence is mostly with him on this one. There is no good evidence I have heard of that suggests that providing students with computers improves their education. Quite the contrary, it seems to lead to less homework and less reading. The reason is probably very simple: the internet, for all its genuine wealth, offers a lot more distractions. But while this is a very good argument against pushing computers in schools, it is also true that all of our students will be surfing the web soon enough. We might ought to give thought to what to do about that.
Professor Schaff gives us A Clockwork Orange as a warning of the dangers inherent in a scientific conception of man. I read the book when I was about thirteen, and have only recently seen the movie. I still remember the stunning words "I was cured alright," at the very end, when Alex has had anti-violence, anti-sex conditioning removed.
There is, of course, the danger that technology will allow managers to transform workers into mere cogs in an industrial machine. I suspect that this danger will become more serious as biotechnology advances. We aren't that far away from happy worker pills. But I think that Professor Schaff is guilty of one confusion.
This past weekend in Minnesota I was paging through a book at Barnes and Noble that was worried about the potential loss of America's "scientific soul."... I seriously doubt American ever had a "scientific soul," and if it did it is a good thing to remove. When we view humanity simply through the eyes of science it is all too easy to start seeing man as a clockwork machine, a thing to be manipulated for good and for ill. Man, of course, is a machine of sorts, but not only a machine.
Science is not the same thing as technology. The latter means a kind of know-how, understanding the underlying principles of some field just well enough to achieve some desired product or outcome. A consultant, hired by a factory manager, may indeed view the workers as mere cogs in the machine. What he is paid for is increasing output while lowering costs. But even here the dangers are easily overstated. Free human beings are much more efficient than slaves have ever been, and a technological shrewd consultant will realize this.
Science is the pursuit of the underlying truths about the world, all of them, out of a simple desire to know. If it is true that man "is a machine of sorts, but not only a machine," and I think that this is true, then the scientist will want to know that. A machine is a mere reflection of the purposes of it's designer and users. Living organisms, by contrast, have their own agenda and respond to our attempts at manipulation in more or less unpredictable ways. I think that modern science is rediscovering the soul, after a long period of inattention. But then I think the soul is what Aristotle thought it was: the actuality of a body, with the potential for life.
So I cannot agree with Jon that "when we view humanity simply through the eyes of science it is all too easy to start seeing man as a clockwork machine." One of the best popular science writers, Johnathan Weiner, wrote a book called Time, Love, and Memory. This book is about the search for the genetic foundations of three of the most important biological powers among a wide range of species, including our own. The title alone suggest the poetry in this search. What it shows, I think, is not that mechanical forces determine life and thought; rather, life manipulates mechanical forces. In so far as Jon and I agree, human beings are what we think they are: more than machines. Honest science is illuminating this rather than obscuring it.
Professor Schaff also offers Sherlock Holmes as an example of the dangers of science.
In a Sherlock Holmes story I listened to during my recent road trip, Holmes laments while in a posh London neighborhood that while his friend Watson can appreciate the beautiful architecture of the homes, Holmes himself can only see places where crimes might take place. His dedication to his science has made him immune to beauty. What a pity if that is how we start to see humanity and nature, unable to appreciate their beauty, only able to see a machine.
But Holmes is presented by A.C. Doyle as very dysfunctional person, however brilliant and fascinating to Watson. One interest alone motivates him: solving crimes. When he doesn't have a case to chew on, he is so painfully bored that he spends his time in an opium stupor. Holmes is an artist at best. He is interested in science only for its devices. Charles Darwin, by contrast, was never bored. Nor, if you read his Voyage of the Beagle, can you imagine for a moment that science leaves one immune to beauty.
Some of those who fear science (and I do not accuse Jon of this) do so because they sense that it threatens magic. They are right. All magic implies that the real world can be manipulated merely by manipulating the human imagination. Make a doll that looks like Todd Epp, put a pin in the forehead, and Epp will say something irrational. Wait, how could one tell? Science attempts to correct the imagination until it can seize on and be nurtured by the nature of things.
The best presentation of a world with effective magic in it is of course J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter novels. I am a big fan. In those novels, the world of science and technology (the real one) coexists with a world of magic. But what does the latter look like? It's Victorian in its architecture and clothing. Everything in it except its magic is borrowed from the world of muggles (non-magical people), but with a significant time lag. The magical world of Harry Potter is retarded. I don't think that Rowling intended this lesson, but she teaches it. It's fun to play with magic in movies and novels. Outside that venue, it stunts one's growth.
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