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Buy the Book
Up From Evolution
Reflections on a new book about C.S. Lewis, science, and society.
(Page 2 of 2)
Today, Julian Savulescu is called a trans-humanist. According to The Magician’s Twin chapter, written by James Herrick, Savulescu
“is a leading proponent of human enhancement, the school of thought that promotes the progressive use of biotechnologies to improve human intellect, moral reasoning and other traits such as physical strength. Savulescu has argued that deep moral flaws and destructive behaviors point to the need to employ technology and education to change human nature; either we take this path or we face extinction as a species.”
There are striking similarities between the goals of today’s trans-humanists and the technological future envisioned by C.S. Lewis, both in The Abolition of Man and in his novel That Hideous Strength. (Both were written in the 1940s.) As with other writers such as Aldous Huxley in Brave New World, Lewis assumed that progressive opinion would try to incorporate the latest technology into society. Whatever seemed old fashioned would be displaced by something more up-to-date and scientific. Some developments such as the recent enthusiasm for stem cell research have indeed borne that out. (But embryonic stem cell research, which was initially and misleadingly sold to the public by the New York Times as an immortality project, has gone almost nowhere because no one has been able to master the science; it seems to have been mainly a fantasy to begin with.)
In other ways, however, progressive opinion has headed in an unanticipated direction. Consider the global warming scare. Today’s Greens, who are driving this debate, yearn for an old fashioned world with windmills and warmth collected directly from the sun; not a world of big power stations and oil companies. Every excuse to eliminate or postpone nuclear power is seized upon, however low its carbon emissions. Germany is now heading down that self-destructive path and Japan will possibly follow suit. (China, not!)
The new direction of the intelligentsia is elitist to be sure, as it was in Lewis’s day, but it also harbors these anti-technological sentiments. Progressive characters in That Hideous Strength disparage an old fashioned village pub in England and plan to eliminate such anachronisms when they come to power. Today’s intellectuals would be shocked by that. “Ye olde” things appeal to us, we admire old structures and consistently try to preserve them. C.S. Lewis would have been pleased.
The great thrust of the new technology today has been in the making of ever smaller personal computers and the development of a digital world — the world wide web in particular. This momentous development was of course unforeseen, and it has no particular ideology. But its effect is to decentralize power and decision-making and that will continue for years to come (perhaps eventually rendering print obsolete). This direction, too, is inimical to the world planned by experts that Lewis envisioned (and dreaded) in his critique of scientism.
One could say a lot more about this outstanding new book. It is valuable precisely because so little attention has been paid to C.S. Lewis’s views about science and society. It will be of interest not just to students of C.S. Lewis but to anyone following the controversies surrounding intelligent design, the faculty of reason, and the mysterious history of human life.
About the Author
Tom Bethell is a senior editor of The American Spectator and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science, The Noblest Triumph: Property and Prosperity Through the Ages, and most recently Questioning Einstein: Is Relativity Necessary? (2009).
Letter to the Editor View all comments (23) | Leave a comment
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allanius | 9.21.12 @ 7:50AM
Good article! Great way to start my Friday. Thanks!
Dodd2| 9.21.12 @ 8:53AM
Neo-Darwinism, as scientifically flawed and sophomoric as it is, has served its purpose of de-Christianizing society.
And that is a tragedy of the 20th Century which is still adversely affecting us today.
C. Vernon Crisler | 9.21.12 @ 10:25AM
Dittos.....
obadiah| 9.21.12 @ 8:27PM
it's got to be dittos. Nothing but dittos is permitted. evolution is false and evil -- "the global warming scare" is a hoax -- clint was great -- dittos
cowgirl| 9.21.12 @ 10:56AM
Darwin had lots of issues - the first of which he was a drunk. Second he flunked out of dental school, married his first cousin and then produced 10 children - 3 of whom died in infancy from what is widely believed to be hemophilia - the remaining 7 were sickly most of their lives - much like Darwin. Actually Darwin sounds like an earlier version of what would becom the United States' first family - the Kennedys.
Darwin believed that mutations would sprout new species. Guess that did not work well for Darwin as he married his first cousin and created 10 mutations - 3 which died (please someone tell me with factual data how blood clotting "evolved") and 7 who were sick most of their lives - what happened to the "new species" there Chuck.
Evolution is a complete joke used by evil people to further their own personal agendas. Much like Global Warming and Global Cooling which was popular in the 70's but never happened.
One cannot fix stupid.
Kingofthenet| 9.21.12 @ 5:47PM
Your kidding right, Darwin was most likely one of the top 10 SMARTEST people in the last 500 years.
cowgirl| 9.22.12 @ 1:45PM
Liberals like you claim that Ted Kennedy was the Lion of the Senate and great Statesmen. He was a drunk, murderer, accompliance to rape and was a traitor to this country.
Dawrin was a drunk, flunked out of dental school, married his first cousin, hung around in the forests of South America for two years with tribes that believe in things like sun gods, rain gods and practiced witchcraft. The first chapter of his treatise on the evolution of man was filed with lies - i.e. the comparison of the dog fetus and the human fetsus doctored up by Haeckel - later a member of the German Nazi's - to make them look the same.
Yep, Darwin like the Kennedy (heroes of the American Left) are the smartest people in the world. Right - I am an Princess Diana.
You cannot fix stupid
Seek| 9.21.12 @ 7:13PM
Cowgirl's comment appears to be the joke. Any theory can be used by "evil" or "good" people for advancing their own personal "agendas." So what?
The theory of evolution isn't a proxy religion. It's merely a way -- the most plausible we know of -- to explain differentiation of animal, plant and other species. And like all theories, it stands or falls on the basis of empirical investigation. The Book of Genesis, for all that it is a great piece of literature, cannot generate testable hypotheses. This is why "creationism," quite properly, is regarded as a pseudo-science.
cowgirl| 9.22.12 @ 1:46PM
Evolution is a proxy religion. What world are you living in this year? The Origin of Species if full of lies - see my response to Kingboy.
But the truth is Seek and Kingboy... Death comes to us all - the questions is - where will you be when that happens.
Kingofthenet| 9.21.12 @ 5:46PM
The Author is another Discovery Institute Lackey, who has ZERO credibility on Evolution.
John Navratil| 9.22.12 @ 9:56AM
This author merely has zero credibility.
Kingofthenet| 9.21.12 @ 5:46PM
The Author is another Discovery Institute Lackey, who has ZERO credibility on Evolution.
Nick| 9.21.12 @ 5:58PM
Darwin is the one who has ZERO credibility on evolution,
because he was........WRONG!!!!!!!!!!!
John II| 9.22.12 @ 3:10PM
"For example, who in C.S. Lewis's day would have predicted the abrupt return of Islam within four decades of his death?"
Answer: Hilaire Belloc, for one. Actually, the possibility was a parlor topic for the Brits through much of the nineteenth and early twentieth century. One common objection to the possibility was the significance attached by the Brits to Islamic fatalism. In his essay on "The Great and Enduring Heresy of Mohammed," however, Belloc responds to the objection by pointing out that Islam's doctrine of fatalism was in full vigor at the height of Islam's power:
Another objection was Islam's "fissiparous" tendency toward civil division, to which Belloc responds that, over and over again in its history, Islam has suddenly united under a leader and "accomplished the greatest things."
Belloc concludes: "Now it is probable enough that on these lines--unity under a leader--the return of Islam may arrive. There is no leader as yet, but enthusiasm might bring one and there are signs enough in the political heavens today of what we may have to expect from the revolt of Islam at some future date--perhaps not far distant."
Belloc wrote those words in 1938, coincidentally the year Lewis published "Out of the Silent Planet," the first novel in his Ransom trilogy.
Kingofthenet| 9.22.12 @ 6:10PM
What's wrong with 'Trans-Human' anyway, if there was a SAFE way to make humans, Smarter, Stronger ,Faster you would have to be an idiot NOT to embrace it.
John II| 9.22.12 @ 10:20PM
Well, partly because people of your sort, Kingie, would be the first to clamor to be made Smarter, Stronger, and Faster without any pesky effort on your part, and the consequences would be very unsafe for the rest of us.
But there are deeper reasons as well. If you can work up the interest, try Mary Shelly's "Frankenstein" (the brooding novel, I mean, rather than any of the movies you've seen) and, come to think of it, C.S. Lewis's "That Hideous Strength."
And now back to "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," the superior 1932 version in which Fredric March perfectly captures the original-sin motif of the Stevenson novella. The 1941 version with Spencer Tracy isn't too shabby either. The 1973 version with Kirk Douglas is tolerable, but the 1999 version is so ludicrous as to render respectable the 1952 "Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," in which Boris Karloff actually plays the Doctor pretty well. I have mixed feelings about the 1920 silent version with the great John Barrymore--except to say with certitude that it too attests to the fascination of all generations with the (Biblical) theme.
Most people seem to recognize certain deep truths about the human condition, Kingie--it apparently has to do with what St. Paul calls "the law written on the heart."
Kingofthenet| 9.23.12 @ 1:53AM
Dude, I would DEFINITELY be Khan....
Kingofthenet| 9.23.12 @ 1:56AM
Oh and don't forget, Captain America, The Hulk, Storm and and all the rest are 'Trans-Human'.
John II| 9.23.12 @ 3:52PM
Now why am I guessing that, no matter what superhero you chose, Kingie, you'd quickly morph into the Green Goblin?
Myself, I'd want to be Plato and Aristotle and Augustine and Aquinas and Dante and Shakespeare and Browning and Wittgenstein all rolled into one. That way, I could watch the rest of my movies on fast-forward and finish them before I die. The preoccupation would keep me from becoming dangerously intolerant of human stupidity.
And now back to "The Sixth Finger " (1963), an episode of the old "Outer Limits" TV show in which a very young David McCallum (the elderly forensic medical examiner "Duckie" in the current, rather long-running NCIS TV series) plays a bitter semi-educated coal miner miraculously transformed into a man of the future, with a sixth finger (greater dexterity) and a big bald head (more room for the gray matter) and a colossal attitude, wherewith he simply kills people he finds disagreeable because of their relatively monkey-like status and puny intellects.
I mean, he just stops their hearts by glancing at them and applying his futuristic psychokinetic powers. Dude, he really sucks.
Mnestheus| 9.24.12 @ 12:44AM
We normally associate Tom Brthell with Christian apologetics, pseudoscientific literature of which he is a prolific author, , and the Narnia stories, which are more realistic than his fantasic view of Darwin and Einstein.
But seeing Tom slouching into lockstep behind the magi of the Discovery Institute reminds us that throughout his life Bethell has always subordinated reality to metaphysics and believes in the abject submission of culture and politics to the growing authority of religion. Lewis respected science, but Bethell rejects it as a reliable method of knowledge about the world, damning objectivity as the godless error scientism. As for evolution, his skepticism about it increased over the years, until his views fused with the Discovery Institute's blimnkered legalism and he became o sort of PZ Meyers of the party of the right.
If he perseveres, he will not be much missed.
John II| 9.24.12 @ 10:47AM
Who's "We"?
Mnestheus| 9.24.12 @ 8:12PM
Good question, but better ask Tom:
We normally associate C.S. Lewis with Christian apologetics, English literature, and the Narnia stories; less so with science and questions about evolution. But as the Discovery Institute's John G. West points out in The Magician's Twin, throughout his life Lewis was concerned about the abject submission of culture and politics to the growing authority of science. Lewis respected science, but he rejected the idea that it is the only reliable method of knowledge about the world. He called that error scientism. As for evolution, his skepticism about it increased over the years.
gene| 9.25.12 @ 2:31PM
We have the Law of Biogenesis
We have the Theory of Evolution.
The latter negates the former, but anyone who questions this is marginalized as a Religious Fanatic or a Fundamentalist Wacko. When pressed on this, the Evolutionists will claim. Well there only had to be ONE exception over the eons for this to work, and we are here, so it must have happened at least once. Nothing created everything by blind chance. REAL Scientific.
Yeah. Right. Evolution is actually a Religion if anyone wants to look at it closely.