Six Theses on Science
Science becomes entangled with art and philosophy whenever science is “put to the test” in an experiment.
The artistry of the experimentalist and experimentalism of the artist can never be neatly distinguished from one another and, what's more, the choice of an experiment by the artist-experimentalist is always a philosophical choice — which means that the artist-experimentalist can never be neatly distinguished from the philosopher.
The artist, the philosopher, and the scientist are only distinguished from one another by how they use their experiments. The artist uses their experiments to make sensations in a given world, the philosopher to make conceptions of a given world, and the scientist to make predictions about a given world.
Art, science, and philosophy are, otherwise, always being (con)fused with one another in and through the making of experiments. They are always becoming something other than what they are supposed to be — something other than simply art, science, and philosophy. They are always becoming practices of “world-making”.
When art, science and philosophy are not (con)fused in experimental practices of world-making — when they simply are what they are — we are left with the banal evils of artistic traditions, scientific establishments, and philosophical dogmas that are gracelessly resolved against creative freedom.
The six theses below are directed at scientists. They aim to motivate scientists to take responsibility for the makings of worlds, to do art and philosophy with and through science, and to become otherwise than they are.
These six theses were first written and shared this past September, when I was previewing the (De-/Re-)Constructing Worlds project a month prior to its launch.
One.
A poster that is quite common on lawns and in windows here in Seattle proclaims, "We believe that science is real."
This proclamation disturbs me to no end because science is not itself real. Rather, science is a “virtual reality”. This is to say, in other words, that science is a simulation of reality: a good scientific model is a simulation that can predict observable outcomes with a high degree of accuracy.
Two.
Considering the matter further, we must also note that a scientific prediction of an observable outcome is not itself an objectively real phenomena.
To test the accuracy of a scientific prediction is to intervene in an otherwise indeterminate reality, and the outcome of one’s intervention is a determinate reality.
This is to say, in other words, that science induces observable outcomes or “actual realities” in order to test the accuracy of its models or “virtual realities”.
Three.
To say that “science is real" is to deny that the scientist has agency and responsibility. It is to cast the scientist as a passive observer of outcomes. But the scientist is, in fact, an active participant in the production of observable outcomes.
Rather than saying that “science is real”, we ought to say that "science can effectively shape reality." This phrasing would motivate us to hold scientists accountable for how they choose to test the accuracy of their models.
Four.
Scientists who test their models in and through inducing deathly, degrading, and destructive outcomes are not to be celebrated for doing so. Such scientists include the physicists who made the atomic bomb, the medical scientists who induce illnesses in lab animals and human test subjects, and the psychological and social scientists who “passively” study the adverse effects of pollution, poverty, racism, and sexual violence on individuals and societies.
Scientists who test their models in and through inducing lively, creative, and reparative outcomes are to be celebrated: take, for instance, the astrophysicist whose practice revolves around enabling the public to easily contribute to and access data about the cosmos and to participate in making discoveries; or the ecologist who engages with indigenous knowledges in order to learn and disseminate indigenous know-how to care for a cherished habitat; or the psychological or social scientist who experiments with social forms in order to actively promote care and compassion in and for others.
Five.
The notion that a scientist must remain objective and should not be an activist is a mistaken notion because it doesn't take into account the fact that scientists have agency and responsibility when it comes to testing their models.
A dealthy, degrading, and destructive prediction should not be induced, whether by action or inaction, in order to prove that a model is correct. Instead, attempts to avoid and mitigate predictable death, degradation, and destruction should be taken with the model in mind, and the success or failure these attempts should be the basis for evaluating the model in question.
In light of climate change and other anthropogenic natural disasters, it is particularly important that we re-conceive of the role of the scientist in this way. Rather than testing and refining models by passively watching death, degradation, and destruction unfold, scientists need to test and refine their models by undertaking experiments that aim to avoid deathly, degrading, and destructive outcomes and to induce lively, creative, and reparative outcomes.
For instance, the climate scientist ought to refuse funding to study how increased deforestation hastens climate change and, instead, seek and accept funding to participate in reforestation efforts in order to study how reforestation mitigates climate change. Whereas participating in reforestation in order to further scientific knowledge is an aesthetically and ethically rich endeavor; observing deforestation in order to further scientific knowledge is an aesthetically and ethically empty endeavor.
Six.
Scientific knowledge imbued with aesthetic and ethical concerns is the only scientific knowledge worth seeking; scientific knowledge devoid of aesthetic and ethical concerns is only worth questioning.
Those scientists who believe that aesthetics and ethics should have nothing to do with the makings of scientific knowledge are those who have been compelled to disavow aesthetics and ethics when doing science. The question is: what sorts of power formations have compelled these scientists to disavow aesthetics and ethics?
