On the Autonomy of the Sciences

Abstract

There are two quite different kinds of issues about the relations between the sciences, on the one hand, and values, on the other. From at least the nineteenth century on, scholars from a variety of disciplines have wondered whether increasing scientific understanding of nature and our place in it would transform our conception of moral, political, and social values; the most prominent ventures of this kind explore the bearing of evolutionary biology on our ethical claims. The questions that arise from these investigations are complex and unsettled. My aim here is to pursue a second type of question, one that strikes many people-especially scientists-as decided: What is the role of moral, social, and political values in the practice of the sciences? Those who believe that this issue is settled typically believe that the answer can be given in a single word: None. But that can't be quite right. Even those who are most insistent that scientific research is to be a value-free zone will acknowledge, on reflection, that the conduct of that research is constrained by moral norms. Nobody is likely to insist that scientists may legitimately pursue any means in their efforts to attain their goals-for that would be to permit the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, the practices of the Nazi doctors, and a host of less repugnant, but still morally reprehensible, interventions. We could resolve problems about the relative strengths of the effects of nature and of nurture by trying to breed pure lines of children and rearing them in carefully controlled and varied environments, but I don't think there's likely to be much enthusiasm for experiments of that kind. People who celebrate the value-freedom of the sciences will surely want to draw a distinction in response to these examples. The means that researchers undertake to try to reach their scientific goals are to be subject to moral norms; but the goals themselves are not subject to moral appraisal. Behind that claim stands a widespread interpretation of the way in which the identity of the scientific role was forged in the early modern period. On this popular view, an important aspect of the scientific revolution was the denial that the search for truth could in any way be constrained by considerations of the conflict between the deliverances of the sciences and what are accepted as moral, social, or political values. Modern science was founded in a declaration of independence. I'm not going to probe the accuracy of this historical view in any detail, for what interests me is the declaration of independence and its merits. I want to start by trying to be as clear as possible about what is intended by those who think of the goals of sciences as independent of moral values (and other non-epistemic values). Here is a relatively simple way to state the declaration of independence: The sciences are dedicated to the pursuit of truth, and scientists are permitted-even obliged-to seek and to identify the truth whether or not what they discover conflicts with principles that express moral, social, or political values. Now there are many scholars who would object to this formulation on the grounds that it makes use of a questionable notion (that of truth), or because they think that the aims of the sciences are better represented in other terms (for example as the provision of models that agree with reality in particular respects and to particular degrees, or as the construction of models and technologies that work). I don't propose to enter these debates. I have no allergy to talk of truth, nor am I gripped by skepticism that scientific research ever attains truth. A more important shortcoming of the formulation can be brought out by focusing on the notion of "conflict." If this is understood in terms of the logical relation of contradiction, then it is easy to recognize the motivation behind the declaration. The autonomy of the sciences is important precisely because, if the course of research were to produce claims at odds with statements expressing accepted moral values (say) that would be the occasion for revising our views about what is valuable; and it is a mistake to confine ourselves to what is currently accepted by allowing the values we have to constrain the research that is done-we shouldn't deny ourselves the occasions for improvement. …