Empirical Science Began as a Domination Fantasy
Meaningful discoveries happen from the bottom up
Science is not a cold abstraction, but a product of directly felt human experience.
If we think of science as the knowledge of nature, then it makes sense that its discoveries often come from those who are most intimately dependent on its processes: sailors, hunters, miners, healers, and others whose livelihoods involve direct encounters with nature’s ways. Nearly every plant and animal species we eat is the result of selective breeding — a gentle form of genetic engineering, really — by working farmers long before Mendel founded the discipline of genetics. Our knowledge of the oceans and tides came from people whom Benjamin Franklin described as “simple whalers.” Contemporary medicine still retrieves occasional insights from nontraditional sources.
Modern scientists are cautious not to romanticize the practices of healers and shamans, for along with any real science they may have unearthed came distinctly unscientific practices, from astrology to voodoo. By refusing to separate themselves from nature, the rationalists argue, these amateur practitioners were unable to achieve objectivity.
This view was best expressed in the 1600s by King James’s famed advisor, Francis Bacon. He believed that nature held…
