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Where the science/religion dichotomy is concerned, the ‘box’ consists in two basic assumptions: (1) that in scientific enquiry all causes are physical causes governed by natural law (philosophically this is termed ‘materialism’ or a ‘monism of matter’), and (2) that in religion the very opposite is true, causes are believed to be spiritual in origin and natural law is not seen to be their vehicle; instead there is talk of miraculous causation (in religion there is much talk about God having ‘laws,’ but these are seen to be moral and not physical in character). Any thinker who then tries to combine these two separate realms, the law-abiding and the miraculous, automatically becomes a defacto ‘dualist,’ and so can no longer be a scientist in the truest sense of the word; because science is rational causal enquiry, and rationality must preclude any dealings with miracles or with causal contradictions.
Scientific materialism is the only critical monism that is now recognized, and when it is combined with any religious or spiritual worldview a contradictory dualism always results, the two opposing parts of which must be kept, as it were, in separate water-tight compartments in the brain. All this is now well known and well inside the box. What of major importance still lies outside?
It is the possible existence of a second critical monism, one in which ultimate causality in nature is seen to derive not out of matter but out of Mind or spirit, i.e. of a genuine science based upon a monism of Mind or spirit and not on a monism of matter. As noted above, science is defined as causal enquiry, but this is the one ‘causal’ issue that the age of science has steadfastly refused to explore, i.e. the possibility that the ultimate cause of the natural world derives from spirit and not from matter. As soon as it is broached this question raises the spectre that Owen Barfield termed ‘the great tabu,’ a tabu erected specifically ‘against’ any form of spiritual causality in science. The reason for this extreme form of opposition is clear enough; it is that where science is concerned the two critical monisms are totally incompatible, so that only one of them can finally be true. If materialism were to prove untrue, it would constitute a second major cultural shock, the equivalent, but in the opposite direction, to that brought on through the works of Gallileo. Such a finding, however, would not adversely affect science as a whole, but only those aspects of current scientific theory that are directly dependent upon the concept of material causation, the Darwinian theory being the most obvious of these. Such a development, however, could profoundly alter the attitude of scientists towards their most important task—the pursuit of truth—and might also help to discourage the use of science to achieve baser ends.
Can a second critical monism exist? The truth is that it has already existed now for a hundred years. Its foundations are to be found in the vast works of the Austrian seer/scientist Rudolf Steiner, of which Owen Barfield had made a lifelong study. Of special importance are Steiner's epistemological works, wherein he develops a ‘monism of thought’ offering a basis in critical cognitive enquiry for a for a future disciplined science of the spirit. It was in an attempt to increase awareness of this work, and of its profound significance for the future of human knowledge, that Owen Barfield wrote his essay ‘Rudolf Steiner’s Concept of Mind’.[1] This entire subject, however, as evidenced by the widespread academic neglect of Steiner’s work, is one that still exists well outside the box, a box that remains heavily fortified by Barfield’s ‘great tabu’—although there are signs that this may now be weakening.
Rudolf Steiner postulates an evolution of human consciousness, in which we progress as individuals to an ever deepening critical awareness of the spiritual realities behind human existence. Materialism he sees as an essential part of this process, the first critical monism whereby we learned to become scientists, but which now needs to be overcome so that we may consciously re-direct our newly disciplined cognitive abilities to the spiritual realm; thereby gradually replacing faith in authority with ‘higher knowledge.’ He states unequivocally that a direct knowledge of the higher realities which create and maintain the physical world is possible. This he saw as mankind’s future endeavour, in the pursuit of which his own vast body of work represents just a beginning.[2] Just as the single-minded focus on physical causation has led us over several centuries to an impressive though unbalanced technological mastery over nature, so that same single-mindedness, applied now to a genuine science of spiritual causation, will rectify that imbalance and at the same time immeasurably deepen our grasp of the world’s inner spiritual realities.
Don Cruse
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