SCIENCE AND THE HUMANITIES

GAIL M. LEFTWICH

Making a public case for meaningful connections between the two

Whether described as informed inquiry or organized skepticism, the process of questioning is a crucial connection between science and the humanities. The salience of this connection was especially important to the scholars, educators, and politicians who helped establish the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) in 1965. They were animated by concern about the perception that the humanities and science were at odds, with the sciences being championed by the National Science Foundation (NSF), which had been in existence for 15 years at that point. Their anxiety regarding the advantageous position of science was magnified by the tremendous increase in federal support for science following the 1957 launch of Sputnik and the “space race.”

This worry no doubt helped drive the group’s tactical focus on the similarities between the sciences and the humanities as systematic methods to approach the pursuit of knowledge to support their argument that the humanistic disciplines were a legitimate national concern. The 1964 Report of the Commission on the Humanities, which laid the foundation for creation of the NEH, notes “if the interdependence of science and the humanities were more generally understood, men would be more likely to become masters of their technology and not its unthinking servants.”

In fact, years after the 1964 Report, we are still pursuing a wider understanding of how science and the humanities are interdependent. Throughout the 20th, and now continuing into the 21st century, science and technology have emerged as preeminent forces shaping and defining nearly every aspect of contemporary life. From the microchip revolution to the prospect of human cloning; from smart bombs to smart highways; from the fanciful notion of a universe defined by string theory to the rhetoric of the Unabomber’s infamous Manifesto, the challenges posed by science and technology—their impact on our lives, our institutions, and our basic understanding of the world—have been profound. Despite this inextricable intertwining of science and human experience, many Americans, while readily endorsing increased funding for science, find the culture of science inaccessible, dismissing their capacities to derive satisfaction from science literature or learning and, more significantly, absenting themselves from discussion of public policy issues involving science and technology. Their conclusion and withdrawal from policy debate threatens the longterm health of our democratic society.

It is illuminating to examine the ways in which the public humanities and, in particular, the communitybased work of state humanities councils present a useful reconciliation of two strands of potentially divergent thought. This analysis helps define the relationship between science and the humanities, facilitating meaningful connections. The first approach, self-reflexive in its analysis based on the relative success in attracting resources for work done in the respective fields, considers the pursuit of knowledge in science and the humanities as having very different ends. This view embraces science and humanities as “two cultures,” and holds the scientific road as being of greater utility and demonstrably greater significance. A second approach, in contrast, holds the sciences and humanities as complementary systems of knowledge.

One recent practical application of this first approach is seen in the final report of the May 2000 Roundtable on Scholarly Communication in the Humanities and Social Sciences, convened by the Association of Research Libraries, the National Humanities Alliance, and the Knight Collaborative, with support from NEH. The Roundtable was convened to consider the future of disseminating scholarly findings in the humanities and social sciences. Reflecting upon the publishing challenges at a time of rising costs and changing technologies, the authors of the report observe that humanists and social scientists tended to think first about the reasons for discovery, and only later about how their results would be published and shared with others. “Audience, style, and purpose” were central issues. In the sciences, in contrast, the publish or perish mandate put questions of access, cost, and control at the forefront.

The authors of the report conclude that our society, in recent decades, has drawn a distinction between scientific and non-scientific research. Areas where there are “practical” advances, like science, technology, and medicine, are valued more than scholarly advances in literature, history, philosophy, and other areas of the humanities. Finally, in a statement apt for a discussion of making a public case for breaking down these distinctions, the report notes,

No scholar in the humanities and social sciences can fail to perceive the difference between the kind of external support provided to the scientific fields and that which the work in his or her own discipline attracts. ...Through the past two decades, the scientific disciplines have proven remarkably successful in building public support for research in apparently inscrutable domains, deploying the popular media to help communicate both the excitement and value of scientific discovery.

Although this visceral appeal to the public is significant, when it is complemented with humanistic inquiry there is a tremendously important additional benefit in deepening public understanding of the moral complexity of science and technology. This is the goal of programs sponsored by several state humanities councils. These programs seek to negotiate the gap between the practicality of the apparent certainty of science and the often frustrating ambiguity of the humanities. For example, the Texas Council on the Humanities (TCH) has sought proposals for projects during 2000-2002 directed at the theme “Science and Human Values.” The very predictability of the universe is one of the questions to be pondered, along with how this predictability or unpredictability influences dayto- day life. Another topic looked at the ways Newtonian physics, quantum mechanics, or chaos theory influence interactions among people. TCH invited proposals for projects that will provide opportunities for Texans to consider and discuss the following issues:

Web of Human Relationships: New Technologies, New Communities;
From Revolutions in Science to Evolutions in Human Thought;
Technologies of Life: Health Care, Genetics, and Medical Ethics;
The Self and the Laws of Science;
Artificial Intelligence and the Nature of Knowledge;
New Theories in Education and Business; and
The History of Science and Society.

Much of the discussion in these and other humanities- based programs involves examining the assumptions that shape the work of those pursuing science and technology, or in some cases, considering how potentially significant outcomes may be overlooked or disregarded when the question of purpose is ignored. In the case of “Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Health Care,” an extremely successful project initiated by the Maine Humanities Council and now being carried out by several New England councils, health care providers participate in a series of reading and discussion programs aimed at encouraging them to connect the world of medicine with the world of lived experience. A family physician who had attended the voluntary seminars in Maine for three years stated, “(w)e use literature to help strip away the assumptions we bring to work, and improve our understanding of our patients and each other.”

FORGING NEW CONNECTIONS

In the mid-1990s, the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities brought together scientists, humanities scholars, teachers, and members of the public in an “Initiative on Science, Technology and Society.” The project, which included a public discussion series at a then-revolutionary teachers’ institute, attracted teachers in a broad range of disciplines from across the state. The program was designed to help overcome the perceived foreignness of the goals of science for the average individual. The council’s goal was to encourage a number of new programs to break down the barriers between scientists and humanists, and help boost public interest in the work of scientists. If participants could walk away from the program with a far deeper understanding of how science, government, culture, and the market interact, hopefully they would become more active participants in discussions of where scientific research and technological developments can and should be headed.

The Virginia council described the impetus for the program as follows:

For many people, science and the benefits that result from technological innovation are inseparable from the idea of human progress. Others believe that science may have gone too far, or at least progressed too quickly, raising issues that society cannot answer and moral dilemmas that individuals can barely comprehend, much less address.Meanwhile, increasingly sophisticated technologies born of new scientific discoveries are continually reshaping the fields of health care, education, transportation, communication, agriculture, and a host of other activities from sexuality and human reproduction to personal banking. But at the same time, very few non-scientists become actively engaged in making judgements about what science should do. Likewise, few opportunities exist at present for so-called ordinary people to question and interpret the work of science and the applications of new research, or to participate in structured discussions about the impact of technology on their lives.

These details on the Virginia program are drawn from material the council submitted in connection with Nature, Technology and Human Understanding, a joint NEH/NSF initiative. From 1993-1995, the two agencies ran a special competition for state councils that was designed to promote public understanding of the interrelationships between science and the humanities. The guidelines for the first year of the initiative provided that it would support “...public programs designed to inform and stimulate discussion about the interrelations of science, technology, and the humanities... It is also hoped that the project will have longterm benefits for public understanding of the sciences and humanities....” Suggested topics included the conception and very definition of science; understanding nature and mind; science, engineering, and social change; the history of science and evolution of engineering; and science and its cultural context.

It is interesting to note the subtle shift in emphasis of the initiative from 1993 to 1995, as indicated in the guidelines for the 1995 funding cycle. These guidelines now spelled out that the two agencies expected these projects to help the public deepen its understanding of the similarities in the methodologies of scientists and non-scientists. Other goals included an increased public awareness of the role scientific institutions play in our democratic processes, as well as the many philosophical issues raised by new scientific and technological breakthroughs.

Here we see the second approach to the relationship between science and the humanities, one which does not emphasize cultural differences based on unique goals, but sees them as complementary, interrelated systems of knowledge. The shift is also reflected in the slightly different thrust of the topics suggested in the 1995 guidelines, which focused on the social context of science; political culture and science; understanding nature and mind; approaches to knowledge; and science and its cultural context in the United States.

Several state councils drew upon the integrative model of the relationship between science and technology and the humanities, including the Georgia council, which sponsored a series of public lectures and discussion sessions on “Technology and the African American Experience.” The Kentucky council, in turn, sponsored a series of lectures and discussion sessions on the theme “Science in Our Lives,” examining the state’s transition from an agrarian lifestyle and an economy based on tobacco farming and coal mining to technologically sophisticated alternatives. In Nevada, the council supported a seven-part lecture series, “Nevada in the Nuclear Age,” which explored growing scientific, philosophical, and social concerns associated with the nuclear era.

Like Virginia, the New Hampshire Humanities Council has pursued a fairly comprehensive model. Indeed, by the time of the launch of the NEH/NSF initiative, the New Hampshire council already had developed the unique “Scientist as Humanist Project,” which for several years brought together science and humanities teachers from schools throughout the state to participate in resident summer teacher institutes where they could explore the connections between science and the humanities. In describing the success of this project in their application for a grant under the 1993 NEH/NSF special initiative, the council reported “dramatic results in integrating sciences and the humanities in the classroom, in breaking down the perceived barriers between the sciences and the humanities, and in redefining the notions of insight, creativity, and categories of knowledge.” To this earlier, teacher-focused initiative they added “Of Apples and Origins: Stories about Life on Earth,” a program featuring a series of public lectures and reading discussions exploring the history of great ideas in science and philosophy, and a closing conference offering audiences new insights into 20th century science and its implications for everyday life. A second phase of the project, “Of Apples and Origins II: The Brain, The Mind, and Human Meaning,” explored new ideas about human consciousness and the brain.

The appeal of this approach is its relevance for the everyday life of the average individual. State humanities council programs in this area seek to make science and technology accessible by connecting the theoretical knowledge with its practical application. Thus, during 1997-1999, the Pennsylvania Humanities Council, building on the NEH/NSF-supported project they had created on new communication technologies and their effect on American society, pursued a project entitled “Technology, Communications, and Community.”With support from the Howard Heinz Endowment, this project opened up community forums, reading-and-discussion groups, and Internet training and demonstrations where participants could discuss the impact of such 20th-century technologies as radio, television, and the computer on American communities, as a way to prepare for the future. A succeeding project, “Technology and Community,” brought humanities scholars together with the public in face-to-face and online conversations about the proliferation of the Internet in society. Other similar programs supported by the council included a Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania panel discussion and in-person and online lectures on DNA research and its impact on the work of family historians; and a project sponsored by the Franklin Institute that gathered an audiovisual collection of oral histories documenting how scientific and technological innovation in the past century had affected and shaped the lives of local citizens.

FURTHER AREAS RIPE FOR COLLABORATION

Today, almost a decade later, we confront contemporary challenges in areas in which science and the humanities clearly have opportunities for joint problem- solving. Examples include the following:

The commodification of knowledge—The rise of market-driven, corporate-financed research at universities has been noted with increasing alarm by scholars and lamented by public commentators. A major source of the concern, the compromising of the values of openness and sharing that traditionally characterized and gave distinction to the nonprofit knowledge enterprise represented by the university, is a matter presenting moral questions uniquely suited to the humanities.

The growing divide between pure and applied research—Federal support and private funding is becoming increasingly skewed in favor of applied research. The increasingly pervasive emphasis on connecting funding to immediately demonstrable, utilitarian results and/or economic benefits presents members of the scientific community with a distressing development that mirrors the “divide” between science and the humanities, suggesting a basis for finding common intellectual ground based on shared experiences.

The persistence of non-scientific and even antiscientific views—This trend is particularly alarming, as it’s clear that modern technology is and will continue to be a powerful force shaping our everyday lives.

The humanities provide a vehicle to resist the push to commodification of knowledge and willful science illiteracy. The public programs, reading and discussion programs, and teacher institutes supported by state humanities councils provide a context for public conversations about issues demanding scientific expertise. This community-based activity is a powerful complement to the efforts of the beleaguered academic humanities community, which one would expect to be among those leading the charge against the trends toward commercialization, on the one hand, and the questioning of scientific knowledge on the other. However, the post-modern delegitimization of expertise has led many university-based humanities scholars to retreat from any public debate about right and wrong and adopt a relativistic approach to all knowledge. This approach runs the risk of leaving an intellectually bereft public that is easy picking for a market without morality or a backward-looking ideology of denial designed to resist the onslaught of modernity.

State humanities councils have a rich history of helping citizens feel they are able to participate in conversations about science and technology. Council programs and projects take advantage of the unique capacity of the humanities to explore and explain complexity in human life. These are the vitally important occasions where science and the humanities should join forces.

Gail M. Leftwich (CC ’01) is president of the Federation of State Humanities Councils, the association of the independent state affiliates of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Ms. Leftwich practiced law for several years prior to working at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and as director of Cambridge Forum in Cambridge, MA.

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