The relationship between science and the philosophy of science is likely to be judged a contested one. Certainly many philosophical debates may seem oblique to the uninitiated (and even then, perhaps still!), whilst recent intellectual debacles have tended to portray philosophers of science in a poor light. During the 1990s, for example, the ‘‘Science Wars’’ erupted over the question of whether scientific theories provided true, objective descriptions of reality, or whether they were simply arbitrary ‘‘constructions,’’ mere mythologies on a par with ancient Greek theogony or medieval magic [1]. There is some truth to such charges, some of it certainly attributable to an unhealthy certain intoxication with trendy theories (like ‘‘relativism’’ and ‘‘constructionism’’). Yet even if those charges are not always justified, and even if the majority of the philosophy of science is informed and responsible, it remains true that philosophers of science who pitch into debates about the sciences beyond their own professional boundaries must take extra care before letting loose their ideas. With that proviso in mind, the title of Paul Feyerabend’s book, The Tyranny of Science, should set off alarm bells, especially since the cover of the book depicts bloodred atomic bombs falling from above onto a desolate city. Indeed, the author himself, who was professor of philosophy at Berkeley and Zurich until his death in 1993, has a ‘‘bad reputation’’ both within and beyond the philosophy of science. Feyerabend was famously dubbed ‘‘the worst enemy of science’’ by Science, and even today philosophers of science will tend to associate his name with antiscience polemics, defences of voodoo and astrology, and more besides [2]. Fortunately, Feyerabend is far more sensible than the title and cover of this book and his bad reputation suggest. Although he is reputed as a critic of science, he is not. Feyerabend is critical not of science itself, but of false and misleading images of the sciences. The ‘‘tyranny’’ of the title refers not to an encroaching and disenchanting ‘‘scientific worldview,’’ of the sort popular with some cultural critics, but with the dangers which arose when people fail to understand and appreciate science. Back in the 1960s and early 1970s, Feyerabend urged philosophers of science to take seriously both the history of science and scientific practice— he was a trained physicist himself—and warned his peers that mere abstract reflection on the sciences would produce only idealised fantasies of science, rather than workable models of it. Although subsequent generations of philosophers of science took him seriously, many at the time took his claim as a personal attack— hence the ‘‘bad reputation.’’ Into the 1980s, Feyerabend began to expand the scope of his ideas. By the beginning of the 1980s, the philosophy of science was a richer discipline, so Feyerabend moved onto new issues. It struck him that public confidence in the sciences was beginning to change into the 1980s. The nuclear accidents at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, waning interest in the space program, and ambitious new claims on behalf of genetics were beginning to affect public faith in the sciences. Feyerabend was not opposed to such public doubts, but he did worry that the public concerns, although sincere, were too often ill-informed. Worse still, those worries were often amplified by overzealous philosophers who, to his mind, were failing in their job of clarifying concepts, scrutinising arguments, and helping people to articulate and develop their ideas. By the late 1980s, Feyerabend began to take special issue with philosophers who actively encouraged such confusions, for instance by announcing that electrons and genes were mere ‘‘social constructions,’’ or by rebranding forms of relativism, or by implicating ‘‘Western Science’’ in a powerful conspiracy to disempower indigenous cultures—indeed, Feyerabend himself succumbed to such alluring polemics for a time, which partly explains his hostile reaction to them later in his career [3]. Feyerabend’s issues with public concerns about science and his worries about philosophers’ role in the subsequent debates laid the foundations for the lectures that became The Tyranny of Science. In fact, the original title of that lecture series was Conflict and Harmony, which is a much better title because it indicates that public engagement with Feyerabend P (2011) The Tyranny of Science. Oberheim E, editor. Cambridge: Polity Press. 180 p. ISBN-13: 978-0745651897 (hardcover). US$54.95 doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001166.g001