Science and Materialism

Science is increasingly idolised these days. There really is no other word for it. It is seen as the only reliable means to knowledge, both of the world and of ourselves. It alone gives truth. It alone has the keys to the kingdom.

But what if it were a false idol and led not to an increased understanding of life but to a narrowing of vision, a loss of true values and eventual death? That is my view (see here and here) but it is definitely a heretical one according to the accepted canons of contemporary belief. It would not only be dismissed as absurd and ignorant by secular authorities but would also be rejected by most religious leaders too who fail to see that if you try to ride two horses going in different directions, one of them will inevitably have to follow the other.

So why is science so highly regarded and why do I reject its authority? To answer the second question first, it's very simple. I reject its authority because it is wrong. If science were not materialistic by default that would not be the case, but it is or certainly has become so. Therefore it denies all truths not open to its own limited means of research. It has identified itself so completely with materialism that it cannot break that connection without diminishing itself and its unique authority. Of course, individual scientists do not necessarily all think in this way but the discipline as a whole does.

So, to be clear, I do not reject science so much as its materialistic bias, but nowadays the two are locked so closely together that they cannot be prised apart. And I reject this bias on practically every ground I can think of, be it those one would expect such as tradition, revelation, religion, experience, intuition, imagination, faith, but also those that are regarded with approval by scientists such as reason and logic. For materialism is irrational in that it can explain nothing fundamental in itself but still won't accept the obvious, namely that the universe is set up and governed by intelligence. It has to deny this intelligence because to accept it would be to undermine its own position of pre-eminence. Thus when science looks behind the veil of existence at such root realities as life, consciousness and intelligence, never mind all those troublesome things not definable in terms of mathematics like beauty, love and goodness, all it sees is basically nothing. Literally nothing real in the latter case (i.e. these things are just subjective), and nothing existing independently of determining material processes in the former.

As for why science is highly regarded, I would say there are various reasons. Firstly, it is relatively new. According to our current way of looking at the world anything recent is likely to be regarded as more advanced than what came before. As, in some respects, it is. Then there is no doubt that science, through its practical application of technology, has changed the world radically and, in many ways, for the better. It has got results and made our lives much easier. It has also explained some things that were mysteries and corrected some ideas that were incorrectly understood. It has vastly increased our intellectual understanding of the physical and, to some extent, psychological worlds. All this is undeniable. But there is also the equally undeniable fact that science appeals to those who wish to reject God which means those who are motivated by pride in their own independent intellects. From this perspective, at least, science can be viewed as a product of the Fall, and one, if not directly inspired by, then certainly exploited by that being who was the agent of the Fall and the first to reject the authority of the Creator.

Even those who recognise that science has overstepped its boundaries from the 19th century onwards like to say that this is not the fault of science as such. It is simply a misuse of science. But I wonder if the aspect of misuse is not actually implicit in the discipline itself. Science, after all, is something that depends on the analysis of the material world and the use of the rational mind. It is fundamentally anti-spiritual in its conception from the outset so unless it submits itself to a higher authority, whether that be God, the soul, revelation or spiritual intuition, it will always end up in the way it has. And the majority of its adherents will always resist anything that threatens their hegemony and position on top of the intellectual pile.

What science fundamentally does is break things up in order to look inside them. That is the way it understands them. Now this is effective up to a point but something essential is lost that way. What it is is hard to define (particularly in scientific terms precisely because it is not open to the scientific method of exploration), but we can call it the spirit or soul or quality of the thing, and anybody with the slightest bit of imagination will know what that means. But science won't accept imagination as in any way pointing to reality because it operates outside of its domain. I am not dismissing the scientific approach but I am saying that, taken to excess, as it is now, it is highly damaging to the proper development of a human being. It must be accompanied by, even subordinated to, a more visionary mode of perception which approaches things intuitively and is able to look through and behind and beyond externals without chopping them up into their component parts but seeing them as wholes. For science may be able to manipulate matter but it cannot see the reality of which matter is only an expression.

This article is unashamedly polemical in nature. It is so because a proper view of life requires balance. God is truth and love, justice and mercy. At the present time we are dangerously out of balance and there is no law that says an extreme imbalance will naturally right itself. At least, none that says this will happen before dramatic consequences of imbalance come into play.