Science and Values

Claudio Gutierrez

Toute philosophie est pratique, même celle qui paraît d'abord la plus contemplative; la méthode est une arme social et politique....
Jean-Paul Sartre

I am not going to support this epigram. Neither am I about to attempt its refutation. I am using it only to call attention to the truth, I think a very fundamental one, that it is impossible to state a sharp distinction, much less an opposition, between contemplative, pure theory, on the one hand, and praxis, historical action, or values on the other. I think, although the purpose of this study is not to prove it, that the radical position of values in the methodology of science, as emphasized, for example, by Max Weber in regard to the social disciplines and by Michael Polanyi with respect to the natural sciences, cannot be denied. I will take this conviction as basic for the sequel, and I hope that the fruitfulness of this premise for the treatment of our problem will tend to add strength to the premise itself. I will suppose in what is to follow that formalism as a method of science, the paramount usefulness of which I fully recognize, can function meaningfully and profitably only within a context made out of intellectual passions, heuristic and persuasive tendencies, and commitment to values (POLANYI 64). Nevertheless, I am going to take for granted that values are objective, in the sense that they are not identical with circumstantial interest or arbitrary individual caprice. Rather, they are always asserted as having universal intent and are discovered as having-been-there-all-along. I am going to quarrel, however, with the interpretation of this objectivity as reducible to physical or empirical objectivity (whatever that might mean).

As against a naturalistic interpretation of value I will set forth the position that values, although dependent on empirical knowledge, do not let themselves be empirically deduced and are best perceived in conflict and struggle with the values of other persons (WEBER 49, 49-112). This struggle, however, takes place under a (partially) common firmament of values to which each one of the contending parties keeps some kind of responsible attachment and which each participant contributes somehow progressively to change. This common firmament or "superior knowledge" (POLANYI 64, pp. 374-380) cannot possibly be reduced to purely empirical categories. Due to the widespread support that the naturalistic conception of values seems to have, especially in English-speaking countries, and also to the fact that its being true would be fatal for the position that I am going to maintain here, I will devote the next pages to the exposition and refutation of its principal arguments.

I will take C. E. Ayres' position (AYRES 61) as a forceful articulation of the naturalistic interpretation of value. His central thesis is, I think, that in order to be significant for the progress of mankind, values have to be objective; otherwise, nobody could tell whether progress is being made or not. The model here is mechanical progress, the evolution of machines. It is originally with respect to tools that the concepts "good" and "bad" have meaning. With respect to other matters, ceremonial or sacred, values have just a derivative and erroneous meaning; mores and ritual are only simulacra of technical causality. Value is thus reducible to technical knowledge, i.e., the knowledge of the regularities of nature. Morality is reducible to expedience and ethics –the study of value– to science or the quest for empirical truth.

One feature of Ayres' otherwise excellent book strikes the reader unfavorably: its preaching mood, purporting to be a descriptive presentation of fact. NOTE 1 It is to the credit of the author that he presents a forceful case for the prevalence of reason in social life. One of the shortcomings of his work is that it is written as if the arguing for its case were altogether unnecessary. The result risks being completely different from the attempted furtherance of reason in human communication, insofar as the attempt itself is not totally faithful to the defended policy: it tends to rest too heavily upon emotional persuasion. Witness the correlative abundant use of persuasive definitions: "There is only one form of knowledge, the knowledge man has acquired in the course of his technological activities" (AYRES 61, p. 107) –and we lose the distinction between "knowledge" and "technology" necessary to formulate the liberal-arts criticism against technological specialism. "Our freedom is virtually synonymous with the fullness of life as it has been realized by industrial society" (AYRES 61, p. 177) –and we cannot say that industrial society is unfree. "Virtues prove on examination to be simplifications of the technical necessities of organization" (AYRES 61, p. 267) –and organization is virtuous always, provided it is technical. In all these cases it is clear that there is a pattern of attack on the possibilities of thought (and criticism). It produces a contraction of language that deprives us of some useful intellectual means of analysis and polemic. This, I think, is not reasonablenessz!

One could reply that it is unfair to see in those acute statements just cases of persuasive definitions for the simple reason that they are the sharp and clear main theses of the book. I am ready to accept it. But then the conclusion forces upon us that it is all but impossible to present non persuasive theses, that a definite assertion always affects in one way or another the very means of expressing assertions, language itself. This means that in the final analysis there is no real separation between meaning and truth. These conclusions I admit, and I am convinced they go clearly contrary to the thesis of the natural objectivity of value. Persuasion is essential to a sincere expression of belief –natural objectivity is an impossible substitute for the intersubjective participation that must prevail among bona fide contending parties.

Apart from that, Ayres' argument in favor of the objectivity of value is a good and important one. His insistence on the common nature of the process that originates all values is quite sound. I do not see any reason why one should have to identify it with the development of tools. Nevertheless it is true that a close relation between knowledge of cause-and-effect relationships and moral questions does exist and is determinant. It is as well true, I think, that in all societies two sets of values, sacred and profane, are distinguishable. It is not at all evident, however, that it is "the former which differs so widely from people to people, whereas the latter are the same for all" (AYRES 61, p. 6).
On the contrary, it is argued in philosophy of science (KUHN 62) that scientific knowledge is dependent upon the acceptance of conceptual paradigms that not only vary with time but are even incommensurable among themselves. On the other hand, one can make a strong case for the basic coincidence of all religious world-views, as both an analysis of the nature of religious attitudes and the existence today of ecumenical movements would tend to demonstrate (religious strife being more often than not the result of worldly and possessive interests and of the clash of scholastic, quasiscientific, theological paradigms). I do not see, furthermore, how one can consistently maintain both that man is culturally conditioned, as Ayres does (AYRES 61, p. 74 ff.), and that "good tools" means the same for everybody (AYRES 61, p. 8). One has only to consider the extremely difficult task that teaching the use of modern machinery is in the underdeveloped regions of the world in order to realize that a tool is not the straightforward thing the author wants us to take it to be. I would be inclined rather to say, with phenomenological philosophy, that the essence of a tool is altogether a function of our being-in-the world, and varies together with individual purposes and habits, and, in general, with the changes of the conditions of human existence.

I think the author is basically right in saying that "it is the dissociation of truth and value that defines the moral crises of the twentieth century," (AYRES 61, p. 49) I even will go as far as accepting that "every culture has two aspects, which the terms secular and supernatural identify ."
Again, I would admit also that "the significant distinction is not between description and evaluation. It is rather between secular efforts of description and evaluation and those exercises of description and evaluation which employ supernatural premises" (AYRES 61, p. 50).

But I think that Ayres makes a blunder both in identifying "secular" with "true" or "valid" and "supernatural" with "false" or "invalid" . In my opinion he is, in doing so, both too naive and too bold, too uncritical and much too critical. In particular, he shows a serious misunderstanding of the nature of myth in human life and in human history NOTE 2. I consider Ayres wrong when he says that "no one is ever called upon to decide whether to accept the universe or not... whether the existence of the human species is 'a good thing' or not" . As a matter of fact, one is always being called to do precisely that, to the extent, that is, that one is a transcendental animal. For instance, this is what it means to be religious. Ayres is begging the question when he adds, skillfully enough, that "no one could possibly do so, since the term 'good' has clear and definite meaning only with reference to the ongoing life-process of mankind" (AYRES 61, p. 18).

The problem with Ayres is that he wants to take "our existence as a species" and "the system of activities by which we live and to which we are irrevocably committed" as fundamentally given (AYRES 61, p. 117). This is fine as an individual or cultural decision, much in the spirit of the radical theologian's proposal of discontinuing transcendental discussion for a time, while doing our best to humanly solve our human problems. But it could be very wrong, I think, to the extent that it amounts to an obscurantist injunction to arrest all transcendental or religious inquiry. Again, even as a practical decision it would be open to question, because of its entailing the rejection of all social organization principle other than the technological one, i.e., the rejection of all status or ceremonial considerations and the anthropological background that support them. Ayres recognizes this when he says: "All mores define what is right and proper for persons of designated status... As an organization its principal function is not that of getting things done, but rather that of preventing change" (AYRES 61, p. 126). That might be so; still, one has to acknowledge that man needs some stability in order to be able to live at all. "Regularities in nature" are not the only regularities that are relevant for human life. "Regularities in society" may prove as important! The author is right in warning against the dangers of the traditionalist principle: "Ceremonial adequacy requires that tradition shall always be honored regardless of consequences –that is, of mere technological consequences.... " (AYRES 61, p. 137).
But one should complete the picture by guarding against this absolutization of Ayres' progressivist principle: "Technological teamwork is efficient only to the extent that all considerations of status are ignored in single-minded commitment to getting the job done" (AYRES 61, p. 136) regardless of mere personal or transcendental consequences. Where is one to stop, following this principle, short of Nazi-style "final solutions"? I would prefer in this connection to repeat with Knight: "Values conflict and no one value can be absolute. The only near-absolute value is that of the best possible compromise.... " (KNIGHT 53, p. 281).

I consider the notion of interrelatedness of value as the main valid precipitate of Ayres's position NOTE 3. His central contention in this respect is that nothing has value "in itself," that is, independent of the interconnectness of all experiences in the life process. Immanent coherence or all-encompassing harmony, i.e., contribution to the total enhancement of human life is the criterion of value. Where I part company with the author is only in his view that because there is an immanent criterion of value ultimate questions are to be regarded as superstitious. For in fact every opinion of value is ultimate, in the sense that there is no attribution of value which does not take the whole of human personality, although in an ideal or virtual fashion, as the root and foundation of its validity. Of course, in a way this is what Ayres is saying in his reference to the "life-process" . But the evidence is obscured in the writer's outlook due to the fact that he believes in the unambiguous existence of a single common system of values, the objective (in the naturalistic sense) system. And what really exists is a set of value systems always in conflict and always changing, in dialogue or polemic with one another and in process of becoming clearer, more consistent and encompassing, somehow asymptotically approaching the (ideal and single) objective system. Value is the attitude of the person in his quest for ultimate truth. It is always provisional but also passionate and persuasive. A problem of value is not primarily a problem as to the validity of those personal attitudes. We cannot but think that they are valid. The primary and fundamental problem is how we can change or improve those attitudes so that the asymptotic approach to the ideal continues to be realized (KNIGHT 41). It is not a matter of wondering whether a value opinion is possible. We cannot avoid having one or another. It is precisely because of this unavoidability that value judgments are meta-empirical and necessary. Our problem is rather the problem of reformation of value opinion. That is why intellectual discussion is so important. Society can exist, that is it can be free, only insofar as interests in conflict are subordinated to opinions about values. Moreover, it can be free only insofar as the disagreeing parties face their disagreement as a problem, recognizing in each other the will and capacity for fruitful discussion. Group action is free only if unanimous but hopeful discussion can be a very efficacious substitute for actual unanimity. The collective pursuit of truth is an indispensable component in the definition of value, as it is of the essence of the ideal society (KNIGHT 41).

We have come very far from the conception that all decisions or exercise of value opinions in life or society "are made by the same process by which one decides what to eat for breakfast" –that is, by a simple calculation of cause and effect (AYRES 61, p. 16). The distance consists mainly in the fact that Ayres assumes that there is no real problem in any decision, that value opinions must of necessity coincide, no justified conflict being at all possible. One has only to read out the regularities of nature! Contrariwise, it is fundamental to realize that a personal commitment to a system of value is involved in any important question, especially if it must affect several persons. Then the rational procedure is to iron out the differences of opinion, which is ideally done through the process of orderly intellectual discussion. In summation: Values do form systems, they are interrelated; but value systems are multiple and, more often than not, they do conflict with one another. NOTE 4 We need systematism, multiplicity, and conflict. But also openness to dialogue and to possible modification of opinion.

One could still point to a missing trait in this axiological conception and try to complete the picture. Value is not simply opinion, however conflicting we would put it. It spells also habit and eagerness to resist change. Change of value opinion must be worked out as change of attitude, if it is at all to be effective. Work is indispensable, (SARTRE 60, p. 20) even toilsome work. The final result is that intellectual discussion can be very painful, even violent and costly. Struggle might be needed to clarify values, both at the private and at the social levels. So, the quasiPlatonic conception drawn in the last paragraph must be corrected with a down-to-earth realistic element, namely, "effort," a Parsonian category (PARSONS 37, p. 719) whose fate seems to be always to be forgotten in academic presentations of the problem of value.

But even in the case of struggle and violence, one needs to be affiliated to the system in order to fight against it. Multiplicity of outlook and the inertial tendency to resist change do not mean impossibility of communication. One needs a common language to express and substantiate one's polemic point, a firmament which all parties in an argument both contribute to create and work under: History, who makes us and whom we do make (SARTRE 60, p. 64; KNIGHT 41; SCHUTZ 54).