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The Perils of Inconsistency
| Article
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10594 |
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Section : |
MODERN THOUGHT
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| Issue
Date : |
2 / 1986 |
6,668 Words |
| Author
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Michael Polanyi
Michael Polanyi was a Hungarian-born philosopher and professor
of chemistry. He was an influential writer on philosophy,
history, economics, as well as on religion and science. Prior
to his death in 1976 he was widely recognized for his books,
Science, Faith and Society, Personal Knowledge, and Beyond
Nihilism. This article appeared in his book, The Logic of
Liberty, and is reprinted with permission from the University
of Chicago Press. |
This piece is about intellectual freedom. I shall argue that its doctrine, as handed down to us, is intrinsically inconsistent and that the fall of liberty on the continent of Europe was an outcome of this inadequacy. Freedom of thought destroyed itself when a self-contradictory conception of liberty was pursued to its ultimate conclusions.
To present this argument, I must glance back for a moment to the very beginning of systematic thinking. Modern thought in the widest sense emerged with the emancipation of the human mind from a mythological and magical interpretation of the universe. We know when this first happened, at what place and by what method. This act of liberation was due to the Ionian philosophers who flourished in the sixth century B.C. They were succeeded by other philosophers of Greece covering a period of a thousand years. These ancient thinkers enjoyed much freedom of speculation without ever raising decisively the issues of intellectual freedom.
The millennium of ancient philosophy was brought to a close by St. Augustine. There followed the long rule of Christian theology and the Church of Rome over all departments of thought. The rule of ecclesiastic authority was first impaired from the twelfth century on by a number of sporadic intellectual achievements. Then, as the Italian Renaissance blossomed out, the leading artists and thinkers of the time brought religion more and more into neglect. The Italian Church itself seemed to yield to the new secular interests. Had the whole of Europe been at the time of the same mind as Italy, Renaissance Humanism might have established freedom of thought everywhere, simply by default of opposition. Europe might have returned to--or if you like relapsed into--a liberalism resembling that of pre-Christian antiquity. Whatever may have followed after that, our present disasters would not have occurred.
However, there arose instead in a number of European countries, in Germany, Switzerland, Spain, a fervent religious revival, accompanied by a schism of the Christian churches, which was to dominate people's minds for almost two centuries. The Catholic Church sharply reaffirmed its authority over the whole intellectual sphere. The thoughts of men were moved and politics shaped by the struggle between Protestantism and Catholicism, to which all contemporary issues contributed by alliance to one side or the other.
By the beginning of the present century--to which I am leading up now--the wars between Catholics and Protestants had long ceased; yet the formulation of
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