Why Us?: How Science Rediscovered the Mystery of Ourselves by James Le FanuJames Le Fanu’s book has the worthwhile intention of drawing his readers’ attention to the complexity and sheer unlikeliness of the world around us – and, especially, of our unique place in it.
Natural human amazement been ground out of us, he believes, by over-confidence in the ideas of Marx, Freud and Darwin, each of whom started with a legitimate but limited insight and expanded it to claim universal truths, about, respectively, economies, the human psyche and the natural world.
Le Fanu is a doctor, so when it comes to science, he knows what he’s talking about even if his views are decidedly unconventional. Most of the book is devoted to arguing that science’s claims have over-reached the evidence for them. We don’t understand how genes work or why there is such an overlap in the genetic makeup of species which have little in common, for instance, but the theory of evolution is an article of faith, not be questioned.
We certainly don’t understand how the brain works, however detailed the experiments in which parts of it are activated in different tasks. We don’t know how neurones record memories. We don’t even know how gravity works.
The assumption that materialism is ‘all there is’ and that evolution must, in the end, somehow or other, explain every tiny detail of every living organism, puts a huge weight of explanatory responsibility on the ideas of beneficial mutation, natural selection and the survival of the fittest.
Le Fanu’s doubts about all this are interesting and well-argued. His account of where they leave us is not quite as solid. He will occasionally drop the word “soul” in, as if it’s something everyone is comfortable and familiar with. But not all his readers will have been brought up at a Catholic monastic school, as he was at Ampleforth.
Less pointedly, he talks about “the possibility of there being a ‘dual’ nature of reality, with both a material and a non-material realm”. This is the “commonsense” view that has been held for millennia, he says, which has, in recent years been “censored, written out of the script as being of historical interest only, a relic of the superstitious ways of thinking of the distant past”.
The point of drawing attention to science’s failures is to give credence to the aim he gets to in his final chapter, which is called ‘Restoring Man to his Pedestal’. If science’s limitations were acknowledged, he says, that would have many benefits, including allowing us to see the world anew, “fresh-minted in glorious Technicolor as astounding and amazing, magical and mysterious”.
Free will would become intellectually respectable again, restoring the assumption that we exercise personal freedom and responsibility. Science itself would be liberated from its “degenerate” research programmes and allowed to investigate areas which are currently considered off limits. (Rupert Sheldrake would be pleased.)
As for religion, it would enjoy a “renewed sympathy” which would “heal that rupture in Western civilisation between its present and its overwhelmingly Christian past”, along with other religions, who have a common belief “of there being ‘more than can be known’.”
This is an underdeveloped part of the argument. Whilst it doesn’t seem right to dismiss all of religious thought and culture as superstition, as scientists may want, there’s no question that believers in most faiths are asked to sign up to some very specific and unproven claims. Is Le Fanu saying we shouldn’t worry about that – which would be odd since he’s dismissing the claims of science on the basis of a lack of evidence – or is he saying that there will be a new, less specific kind of religious belief – perhaps just a kind of nature-worshipping awe, combined with the admission that there’s a lot we don’t understand? He’s less forthcoming on a future vision for religion that on the current problems of science.
Marx and Freud no longer hold sway the way they once did, Le Fanu argues. It’s time we downgraded Darwin too. It’s a refreshingly independent-minded book. Even if Le Fanu hasn’t presented a solid alternative to science’s world view, it’s worthwhile – and eye-opening - to be reminded what an odd thing it is that we exist at all.
But whose idea was it to call it Why Us? That doesn’t do justice to the subject. And the subtitle How Science Rediscovered the Mystery of Ourselves is even worse. The main point is that far from any ‘rediscovering’, science refuses to admit the mystery of our existence. The book is 16 years old, was well reviewed and is still worth reading, but it could have been so more influential with a better title. Science in Denial? Humans are Special? What Science Doesn’t Admit? Restoring Humanity’s Self-Esteem? The Unique Species?
