Tag: Scientism

Why We Politicise Science

I wrote some time ago about how figures like Anthony Fauci, Michael Mann, Susan Michie, also Boris Johnson, Chris Whitty etc. etc., from 2020 onwards played cups-and-ball with science and politics. Ah, you thought it was politics under this cup, but it was in fact science! If not ‘The Science’.

From The Daily Sceptic

By James Alexander

I wrote some time ago about how figures like Anthony Fauci, Michael Mann, Susan Michie, also Boris Johnson, Chris Whitty etc. etc., from 2020 onwards played cups-and-ball with science and politics. Ah, you thought it was politics under this cup, but it was in fact science! If not ‘The Science’.

Observe how no one has ever referred to such a thing as ‘The Politics’.

No one ever says, “The politics says that climate change is happening.”

No, we always say, “The science says that climate change is happening.”

Why?

Well, politicians are either 1) unitary, our overlords: sovereign, government, the ruling class, or 2) partial, the 24-hour-political-party people. And either way, we don’t like it: either something is being imposed on us from above, or it is being urged on us from one side or the other.

Let me lay this out in textbook manner:

Politics, in modern times, depends on partiality.

Yet partiality is not authoritative.

In those two lines we have the source of all our laments about modern politics. That old bore Habermas always talked about “legitimation crisis”. What does it mean? It means, if I put it in Shakespearian terms (about antique politics), that the king is a usurper. Read Richard II or Henry IV Part I to understand.

But the thought is incomplete. Politics or government has always suffered from that sort of periodic legitimation crisis: usurpation and how to refine it. That is antique politics. But a distinctively modern politics is 24-hour-political-party politics: which means what Machiavelli and John Stuart Mill thought was not a negative thing (as everyone in the entire history of the world had thought – ‘Let’s avoid civil discord at all costs’) but, possibly, a positive thing: antagonism between rival factions being fertile for vitality, as Machiavelli saw, and perhaps fundamentally institutionally necessary, as Mill saw.

So our legitimation crisis is not that of Bolingbroke-cum-Henry-IV: it is permanent. Party political permanent. No Trump or Starmer or anyone will ever be legitimate. Only Charles III is the Lord’s anointed. Touch him not. But you can touch everyone else: touch them in the P.G. Wodehouse sense of ask them for money, and touch them in the sense of jostle them, throw the odd egg or paper cup of warmed milk at them, ask them insolent BBC questions.

(Talking of the BBC, everyone should have known something very bad was going on when the BBC went to interview Evelyn Waugh ‘back in the day’ (as we say when we cannot be bothered to look up the date) and took it as its right to be impertinent. Waugh described it as being addressed as if he were a criminal-in-denial-of-his-crime. Fair enough, previously there had been Orwell, who had written about the Ministry of Truth, based on his experience at the BBC: but no one knew at the time that Orwell had intended 1984 to be a satire of the BBC. As far as I know, Waugh was the first to bring the problem to public consciousness – in his novel, The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold.)

Anyhow, my point is that since our legitimation crisis is permanent – no one has authority – no one in politics has authority – we look for the secular equivalent of religion and find it in that highly remunerated conspiracy of thought known as ‘science’.

Language, language. Science is just the Latin word for knowledge, scientia. What we call science uses to be called natural philosophy or, by the Greeks, ‘physics’, i.e., the study of nature (physis). The word ‘science’ only really took off in the 19th century when William Whewell of Trinity College, Cambridge, coined the word ‘scientist’. It became a term of identification. I identify as a scientist. Ever since, the world has been infested with science and scientists, cocky little entitled and privileged and well-remunerated gate-keeping Overton window-cleaners that they are. Busy little confused oh-so-exact termites.

But they have authority. The authority of science. Science = knowledge. They know. Whereas we don’t know. We have opinions. Politicians have opinions, being partial. So in the land of the one-eyed political partisans, the scientist is a little god. Hence all genuflections to ‘the science’ in 2020.

Notice how language drifts.

I said no one ever talks about ‘The Politics’. But we do talk about ‘The Science’.

Why?

It is authoritative. Politics needs authority. So politicians, lacking religion, or, nowadays, even tradition, and troubled by Machiavelli and Mill-type antagonisms, fall back on science: unitary, authoritative science. That speaks as one.

Consider:

1. “The scientists say that climate change is happening.”

Hum. This still sounds a bit wobbly: what if one or two scientists disagree? Oh dear, I’ve checked, and they do disagree. Right, then. Let’s rephrase:

2. “The scientific consensus is that climate change is happening.”

Good, good. No point allowing mere scientists any agency. If they disagree, then let’s point to the ‘consensus’: which has the advantage of being a unity, of speaking with one voice. Yes, the consensus, I like it. But, a second thought, isn’t it the case that a consensus sounds a bit as if it is based not on knowledge but on opinion? You know, ‘We have come to agree on something.’ Sounds a bit pragmatic, as if everyone has been paid, or is engaging in groupthink.

Hum. What about this?

3. “The science says that climate change is happening.”

That’s it. The full reification. Very good.

The science.

With a definite article.

(Silence.)

Well, of course, it is not good.

It is in our time that some of us have begun to doubt whether science is actually just a sort of conspiracy of universities, military planning and bright idea merchants. We had a recent piece in the Daily Sceptic which took a good look at ARIA, the farcically named entity, apparently one of Dominic Cummings’s legacies to the nation: the UK equivalent of DARPA, which one reads about in books about the history of the computer. America had military-industrial-complex levels of spending, and IBM. We had Clive Sinclair and Alan Sugar. Geniuses like Dominic Cummings observed the difference, and thought we should have a small disbursement of funds for the actually not very eccentric eccentrics, to turn snake-oil-sellers into professional pharmacutes.

It’s just politicisation.

An enterprising Finnish political thinker, Kari Palonen, has written some good books on politics and parliamentarism. In one of his old articles he drew attention to the word ‘politicisation’. He defined politicisation as the phenomenon whereby something hitherto not considered political is now brought into the category of the political. Politicisation is the opposite of depoliticisation. Hence, COVID-19 was the politicisation of a virus, and Climate Crisis the politicisation of the occasional heatwave. The Supreme Court, Quangos, Devolution, the Stupidity of Politicians, EU-Logic and Globalism are all contributions to the depoliticisation of England.

I want to suggest, and this is just to see things a bit more clearly, that things may be made political, or politicised, in three ways, or three stages. I shall use visual analogies to help the argument along.

The first is frame.

The second is cancer or empire.

The third is colour adjustment.

First, we may have something like Christ Crucified, or Chinese Fireworks, or the Big Bang, or Tree Rings, things which are amusing and interesting: beliefs, entertainments, hypotheses, observations. But then we may put them in a political frame. They are framed, and they become political. Because they are framed by political imperatives: someone is paying, there are institutions, and the belief/entertainment/hypothesis/observation is put to use. At least here, though the original thing is twisted, it is not corrupted. It is put to political use, but is not itself political. The science is still science.

Second, we have cancer. This is where politics extends itself imperially, by means framing, so that its funding and institutional support start to corrupt the original thing. Its nature becomes politicised. People explode gunpowder, now, not out of interest or amusement, but with the purpose of blowing things up more effectively. This is the purpose. The purpose is political: the use is no longer a consequence. The use is a cause. Useless things are unfunded.

But third is worse than cancer. This is where, within the frame, the colour slowly changes, as it is used to do when old cathode ray tube televisions failed and went pink or some other colour. This is the sort of politicisation that is creeping and total: where everything is politicised in the sense of being inflected by the purposes of the state. This is where we are now. Centralisation, aided by technology, has run apace: and we have a fully saturated political order: framed, cancered, pinked. It was so effective that before 2020 many of us were still unaware: tricked by the slow colour adjustment, not noticing that our complexions were getting pinker and pinker.

By Gammon!

This is the world we live in. The system has an extremely awkward relation to genuine freedom of thought or eccentricity. Almost everyone repeats mantras they hear. I do, too, but I read books.

My advice. Read books. Not Douglas Murray’s book. But proper old books, with leather bindings, or in Penguin orange and blue, something from a second-hand-bookshop, the sort of thing you’ll find in Oxfam for a quid. I am reading, at the moment, Kermode’s Shakespeare’s Language which I see I bought for a fiver, second hand. Incidentally, Shakespeare is actually quite instructive about the imperatives of politics, even though he knew nothing of the distinctive antagonisms of modern politics, or of science.

Shakespeare? The first thing he would have done is write some blank verse about how, if be science be powerful, then it be not science, for power is not science, and – but I am not Shakespeare: however, you know how it would go… 

I have been studying how I may compare

This prison where I live unto the world;

And for because the world is populous,

And here is not a creature but myself,

I cannot do it; yet I’ll hammer it out.Richard II, Act V, scene 5 quoted in Kermode, p. 44.

James Alexander is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at Bilkent University in Turkey.

Six Ideologies Threatening Civilization: The Unified Assault on Progress and Freedom

In the essay posted at Human Progess, “What Unifies the Enemies of Civilization?” the authors, Arjun Khemani and Loga Chipkin, present a sweeping critique of various modern ideologies, arguing that they share a common trait: an opposition to the very foundations of Western civilization. The text asserts that movements ranging from radical environmentalism to social justice activism are rooted in a shared disdain for progress, prosperity, and reason—the key pillars upon which modern society rests.

From Watts Up With That?

By Charles Rotter

What Unifies the Enemies of Civilization?

In the essay posted at Human Progess, “What Unifies the Enemies of Civilization?” the authors, Arjun Khemani and Loga Chipkin, present a sweeping critique of various modern ideologies, arguing that they share a common trait: an opposition to the very foundations of Western civilization. The text asserts that movements ranging from radical environmentalism to social justice activism are rooted in a shared disdain for progress, prosperity, and reason—the key pillars upon which modern society rests.

Summary: Anti-merit, authoritarian, collectivist ideas like socialism, environmental extremism, and doomerism are enemies of human progress because they impede innovation, limit personal freedom, and prevent societal growth. Fostering decentralized creativity, by contrast, improves the continued ability of human civilization to advance.

What Unifies the Enemies of Civilization?

A significant portion of the argument revolves around the rise of what the author terms the “degrowth movement” and its broader ideological allies, such as climate change alarmists and radical egalitarians. These groups are depicted as not merely misguided but as actively working to dismantle the structures that enable human flourishing. The essay paints a picture of these movements as anti-technological, anti-capitalist, and even anti-human in their outlook.

But there is nothing moral about slowing down growth for the planet’s sake or of rebalancing our relationship with nature. Growth is not some abstract thing that greedy capitalists have made a deity of. Growth means more wealth for people in the form of lifesaving and life-enhancing technologies, from shelter to protect us from the violent forces of the Earth to mass food production to bring starvation to an all-time low.

Climate Change Alarmism as an Enemy of Civilization

One of the central villains in this narrative is the environmentalist movement, especially those advocating for extreme measures to combat climate change. The essay suggests that the underlying motivation of climate activists is not merely environmental protection, but rather a more insidious desire to deconstruct the very fabric of modern life. The call for “Net Zero” emissions, for example, is portrayed as a utopian fantasy that disregards the real-world consequences for energy production, economic growth, and human well-being.

And if something like climate change is judged by its effects on people, things have never been better thanks to growth. The Earth doesn’t care about us—but we care about each other. As philosopher Alex Epstein notes, “If you review the world’s leading source of climate disaster data, you will find that it totally contradicts the moral case for eliminating fossil fuels. Climate-related disaster deaths have plummeted by 98 percent over the last century, as CO2 levels have risen from 280 ppm (parts per million) to 420 ppm (parts per million) and temperatures have risen by 1°C.”

In fact, the author highlights that many of the proposed solutions to climate change, such as dismantling industrial economies and abandoning fossil fuels, would lead to catastrophic consequences for human progress. This critique resonates with the broader skeptical stance that climate models are unreliable and that the policies they inspire are far more harmful than the potential risks posed by a changing climate.

The author identifies six key threads that unite these groups: Socialism and centralized institutions, extreme environmentalism, scientism, relativism, dogmatism, and doomerism.

These forces are portrayed as undermining the very fabric of a prosperous and free society, attacking the cornerstones of modern civilization such as individual liberty, economic growth, and rationality. Let’s break down each of these themes in detail.

Socialism and Centralized Institutions

The essay argues that Socialism and its preference for centralized institutions represent one of the most powerful threats to human progress. Socialism, in this context, is not merely an economic system but an ideology that seeks to consolidate power in the hands of a few elites, supposedly in the name of equality or fairness. The author asserts that this is a dangerous development because centralized control inherently stifles innovation, suppresses individual freedoms, and ultimately leads to authoritarianism.

The critique here is rooted in the observation that Socialism often claims to address inequalities but typically does so by curbing the very forces—namely free markets and competition—that have historically lifted billions out of poverty. Socialism, with its disdain for capitalism, naturally aligns with central planning and top-down decision-making, which, the essay warns, can only result in inefficiency and stagnation. The reliance on large, bureaucratic institutions to solve society’s problems contrasts sharply with the spontaneous order created by free markets, and history is rife with examples where such centralization has led to disaster—from the Soviet Union to Venezuela.

The impossibility of socialist-style central planning came to light in 1989, when Boris Yeltsin, then the president of the Soviet Union, visited a grocery store in the United States. Back in Russia, people waited in line for food and other goods, but in the capitalist United States, Yeltsin could buy as much of any of the countless items he wanted, and the lines were nothing like they were back home. In recognition of the stark contrast, Yeltsin told some Russians who were with him that if Russians saw what American supermarkets were like, “there would be a revolution.”

Extreme Environmentalism

Extreme environmentalism, according to the essay, has evolved from a legitimate concern about ecological stewardship into a movement that seeks to roll back human progress in the name of saving the planet. The Net Zero agenda, for instance, is described not merely as impractical but as an existential threat to industrial society. The author sees radical environmentalists as being fundamentally anti-human, in the sense that their policies would lead to massive energy shortages, economic collapse, and the erosion of living standards for billions of people.

You may laugh at those environmentalists who throw paint at art, but they’ve been effective at halting the development of nuclear power, a potential source of abundant energy that we’ve known how to build for decades. We can’t calculate how much suffering could have been ameliorated had we been free to build nuclear power plants across the Earth.

The obsession with reducing carbon emissions at all costs, without regard to technological feasibility or the needs of the developing world, is seen as one of the most dangerous aspects of this movement. The essay suggests that extreme environmentalists view humanity as a blight on the Earth, and their ultimate goal is not to ensure sustainable progress but to reverse industrialization and shrink human activity to a bare minimum. Such a philosophy ignores the benefits that fossil fuels and industrialization have brought, including longer life expectancies, reduced poverty, and increased global wealth.

Scientism

The essay also takes aim at “scientism,” which it distinguishes from science itself. Scientism, as defined here, is the ideological misuse of science to justify policy decisions without regard for the uncertainties or limitations inherent in scientific models. This is particularly evident in the climate change debate, where complex, uncertain models are used to push drastic political agendas. The author warns that this approach transforms science from a tool for understanding the world into a dogma that must not be questioned.

Quite simply, people think that they can take science’s successes and carry them over into every other field of human endeavor. In political and cultural battles, it is often thought that he who knows the most science must be in the right. If only we put the most scientifically minded people in charge of the world, it is thought, then they could solve all our problems from on high. 

Scientism conflates the predictive models of scientists with absolute truth, ignoring the fact that these models are based on assumptions that may or may not hold true in the real world. As a result, the author argues, policies based on such models are often overconfident and lead to unintended consequences, especially when they aim to overhaul entire economic systems based on the projections of what might happen decades from now. This reliance on scientism creates a technocratic elite who dictate policies without room for dissent or skepticism, under the guise of “following the science.”

Relativism

Relativism, as discussed in the essay, is the philosophical rejection of objective truth, particularly in the realms of culture, ethics, and knowledge. In its place, relativism promotes the idea that all viewpoints are equally valid, which, according to the author, undermines the foundations of Western civilization that are built on reason, debate, and the search for universal truths.

Relativism might seem open-minded and fair, but it is neither. For it is not open to the possibility that one party is in the right and the other in the wrong. It is not open to the idea that one society is open and dynamic and the other closed and static. It is not open to the notion that one country cherishes life while the other worships death.

This worldview has seeped into educational systems, media, and public discourse, leading to what the author sees as a weakening of societal cohesion. If there are no objective truths—only competing narratives—then the very idea of rational debate or progress becomes meaningless. This erosion of confidence in reason has serious implications, particularly in science and law, where objective standards are essential for maintaining order and advancing knowledge. Relativism, in this view, creates a society that is easily manipulated, as people no longer trust in a shared reality but instead retreat into their own subjective experiences and tribal affiliations.

Dogmatism

Despite the claim by many modern ideologies that they are grounded in open-mindedness or scientific inquiry, the essay argues that dogmatism is rampant in these movements. Whether it’s climate activism, social justice, or radical environmentalism, the author sees a rigid adherence to doctrines that brook no dissent. This dogmatism is presented as a betrayal of the Enlightenment principles upon which Western civilization was built—principles that value skepticism, debate, and the testing of ideas through reasoned discourse.

Because all our ideas contain errors, dogmatism always prevents us from improving on the ideas locked in dogma’s cage. Couple that with the fact that any error, no matter how small, could result in the eventual extinction of the human race, and we have good reason to rid our society of all dogmatic elements.

The rise of cancel culture is cited as an example of this new dogmatism. In the name of combating “misinformation” or “hate speech,” individuals who question prevailing narratives are often silenced, de-platformed, or otherwise marginalized. This stifling of debate is seen as not only intellectually dishonest but dangerous, as it prevents society from correcting its mistakes and refining its ideas through open discussion.

Doomerism

Finally, the essay explores the phenomenon of “doomerism,” or the belief that the world is inevitably headed toward catastrophe—whether through climate change, overpopulation, or resource depletion. Doomerism is described as a nihilistic ideology that robs people of hope and paralyzes them with fear. Instead of focusing on human ingenuity and our proven ability to overcome challenges, doomerists obsess over worst-case scenarios and use these apocalyptic visions to justify radical and often destructive policies.

Another dangerous effect of doomerism is tyranny, whether through cultural taboos, governmental regulations, or outright bans. They all amount to slowing the growth of knowledge and wealth, and of progress more generally. For if the next innovative step marks our doom, then surely a little—or a lot—of tyranny is justified! But innovation is the very panacea that doomers are worried about. It is stasis, not change, that will mark our end.

In particular, climate doomerism is called out for its exaggerated claims about the imminence of planetary collapse. The essay highlights the fact that such predictions have been made for decades without coming to pass—yet each new generation of environmentalists insists that this time the end is near. The danger of doomerism is that it fosters a mindset of helplessness and despair, which in turn justifies authoritarian measures to “save” humanity from itself. This, the author argues, is the real threat: a retreat from the optimism and progress that have defined modern civilization in favor of a future where human freedom and prosperity are sacrificed on the altar of fear.

Conclusion: A Battle for Civilization

In summing up, the essay makes a strong case that these six ideologies—Socialism, extreme environmentalism, scientism, relativism, dogmatism, and doomerism—are united in their opposition to the values that have made Western civilization successful. Each of these movements, in its own way, seeks to dismantle the structures that have allowed humanity to flourish. Whether through economic centralization, the rejection of human progress, or the suppression of free speech, these ideologies pose a direct threat to the continued success of modern society.

The author calls for a defense of the Enlightenment principles of reason, liberty, and progress, warning that if these ideologies are allowed to dominate, they will lead to a future marked by poverty, stagnation, and oppression. The stakes, according to this essay, are nothing less than the survival of civilization itself.