We
are all sad when we think of the wondrous potentialities that human beings seem
to have and when we contrast these potentialities with the small
accomplishments that we have. Again and again people have thought that we could
do much better. People in the past had, in the nightmare of their times, dreams
for the future, and we of their future have, although many of those dreams have
been surpassed, to a large extent the same dreams. The hopes for the future
today are in a great measure the same as they were in the past. At some time
people thought that the potential that people had was not developed because
everyone was ignorant and that education was the solution to the problem, that
if all people were educated, we could perhaps all be Voltaires. But it turns
out that falsehood and evil can be taught as easily as good. Education is a
great power, but it can work either way. I have heard it said that the
communication between nations should lead to an understanding and thus a
solution to the problem of developing the potentialities of man. But the means
of communication can be channeled and choked. What is communicated can be lies
as well as truth, propaganda as well as real and valuable information.
Communication is a strong force, also, but either for good or evil. The applied
sciences, for a while, were thought to free men of material difficulties at
least, and there is some good in the record, especially, for example, in
medicine. On the other hand, scientists are working now in secret laboratories
to develop the diseases that they were so careful to control.
Everybody
dislikes war. Today our dream is that peace will be the solution. Without the
expense of armaments, we can do whatever we want. And peace is a great force
for good or for evil. How will it be for evil? I do not know. We will see, if
we ever get peace. We have, clearly, peace as a great force, as well as
material power, communication, education, honesty, and the ideals of many
dreamers. We have more forces of this kind to control today than did the ancients.
And maybe we are doing it a little bit better than most of them could do. But
what we ought to be able to do seems gigantic compared to our confused
accomplishments. Why is this? Why can’t we conquer ourselves? Because we find
that even the greatest forces and abilities don’t seem to carry with them any
clear instructions on how to use them. As an example, the great accumulation of
understanding as to how the physical world behaves only convinces one that this
behavior has a kind of meaninglessness about it. The sciences do not directly
teach good and bad.
Throughout
all the ages, men have been trying to fathom the meaning of life. They realize
that if some direction or some meaning could be given to the whole thing, to
our actions, then great human forces would be unleashed. So, very many answers
have been given to the question of the meaning of it all. But they have all
been of different sorts. And the proponents of one idea have looked with horror
at the actions of the believers of another—horror because from a disagreeing
point of view all the great potentialities of the race were being channeled
into a false and confining blind alley. In fact, it is from the history of the
enormous monstrosities that have been created by false belief that philosophers
have come to realize the fantastic potentialities and wondrous capacities of
human beings.
The
dream is to find the open channel. What, then, is the meaning of it all? What
can we say today to dispel the mystery of existence? If we take everything into
account, not only what the ancients knew, but also all those things that we
have found out up to today that they didn’t know, then I think that we must
frankly admit that we do not know. But I think that in admitting this we have
probably found the open channel.
Admitting
that we do not know and maintaining perpetually the attitude that we do not
know the direction necessarily to go permit a possibility of alteration, of
thinking, of new contributions and new discoveries for the problem of
developing a way to do what we want ultimately, even when we do not know what
we want.
Looking
back at the worst times, it always seems that they were times in which there
were people who believed with absolute faith and absolute dogmatism in
something. And they were so serious in this matter that they insisted that the
rest of the world agree with them. And then they would do things that were
directly inconsistent with their own beliefs in order to maintain that what
they said was true.
So
I have developed in a previous talk, and I want to maintain here, that it is in
the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a
hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn’t
get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before in various
periods in the history of man. I say that we do not know what is the meaning of
life and what are the right moral values, that we have no way to choose them
and so on. No discussion can be made of moral values, of the meaning of life and
so on, without coming to the great source of systems of morality and
descriptions of meaning, which is in the field of religion.
And
so I don’t feel that I could give three lectures on the subject of the impact
of scientific ideas on other ideas without frankly and completely discussing
the relation of science and religion. I don’t know why I should even have to
start to make an excuse for doing this, so I won’t continue to try to make such
an excuse. But I would like to begin a discussion of the question of a
conflict, if any, between science and religion. I described more or less what I
meant by science, and I have to tell you what I mean by religion, which is
extremely difficult, because different people mean different things. But in the
discussion that I want to talk about here I mean the everyday, ordinary,
church-going kind of religion, not the elegant theology that belongs to it, but
the way ordinary people believe, in a more or less conventional way, about
their religious beliefs.
I
do believe that there is a conflict between science and religion, religion more
or less defined that way. And in order to bring the question to a position that
is easy to discuss, by making the thing very definite, instead of trying to
make a very difficult theological study, I would present a problem which I see
happens from time to time.
A
young man of a religious family goes to the university, say, and studies
science. As a consequence of his study of science, he begins, naturally, to
doubt as it is necessary in his studies. So first he begins to doubt, and then
he begins to disbelieve, perhaps, in his father’s God. By “God” I mean the kind
of personal God, to which one prays, who has something to do with creation, as
one prays for moral values, perhaps. This phenomenon happens often. It is not
an isolated or an imaginary case. In fact, I believe, although I have no direct
statistics, that more than half of the scientists do not believe in their
father’s God, or in God in a conventional sense. Most scientists do not believe
in it. Why? What happens? By answering this question I think that we will point
up most clearly the problems of the relation of religion and science.
Well,
why is it? There are three possibilities. The first is that the young man is
taught by the scientists, and I have already pointed out, they are atheists,
and so their evil is spread from the teacher to the student, perpetually… Thank
you for the laughter. If you take this point of view, I believe it shows that
you know less of science than I know of religion.
The
second possibility is to suggest that because a little knowledge is dangerous,
that the young man just learning a little science thinks he knows it all, and
to suggest that when he becomes a little more mature he will understand better
all these things. But I don’t think so. I think that there are many mature
scientists, or men who consider themselves mature—and if you didn’t know about
their religious beliefs ahead of time you would decide that they are mature—who
do not believe in God. As a matter of fact, I think that the answer is the
exact reverse. It isn’t that he knows it all, but he suddenly realizes that he
doesn’t know it all.
The
third possibility of explanation of the phenomenon is that the young man
perhaps doesn’t understand science correctly, that science cannot disprove God,
and that a belief in science and religion is consistent. I agree that science
cannot disprove the existence of God. I absolutely agree. I also agree that a
belief in science and religion is consistent. I know many scientists who
believe in God. It is not my purpose to disprove anything. There are very many
scientists who do believe in God, in a conventional way too, perhaps, I do not
know exactly how they believe in God. But their belief in God and their action
in science is thoroughly consistent. It is consistent, but it is difficult. And
what I would like to discuss here is why it is hard to attain this consistency
and perhaps whether it is worthwhile to attempt to attain the consistency.
There
are two sources of difficulty that the young man we are imagining would have, I
think, when he studies science. The first is that he learns to doubt, that it
is necessary to doubt, that it is valuable to doubt. So, he begins to question
everything. The question that might have been before, “Is there a God or isn’t
there a God” changes to the question “How sure am I that there is a God? “ He
now has a new and subtle problem that is different than it was before. He has
to determine how sure he is, where on the scale between absolute certainty and
absolute certainty on the other side he can put his belief, because he knows
that he has to have his knowledge in an unsure condition and he cannot be
absolutely certain anymore. He has to make up his mind. Is it 50-50 or is it 97
percent? This sounds like a very small difference, but it is an extremely
important and subtle difference. Of course it is true that the man does not
usually start by doubting directly the existence of God. He usually starts by
doubting some other details of the belief, such as the belief in an afterlife,
or some of the details of Christ’s life, or something like this. But in order
to make this question as sharp as possible, to be frank with it, I will
simplify it and will come right directly to the question of this problem about
whether there is a God or not.
The
result of this self-study or thinking, or whatever it is, often ends with a
conclusion that is very close to certainty that there is a God. And it often
ends, on the other hand, with the claim that it is almost certainly wrong to
believe that there is a God.
Now
the second difficulty that the student has when he studies science, and which
is, in a measure, a kind of conflict between science and religion, because it
is a human difficulty that happens when you are educated two ways. Although we
may argue theologically and on a high-class philosophical level that there is
no conflict, it is still true that the young man who comes from a religious
family gets into some argument with himself and his friends when he studies
science, so there is some kind of a conflict.
Well,
the second origin of a type of conflict is associated with the facts, or, more
carefully, the partial facts that he learns in the science. For example, he
learns about the size of the universe. The size of the universe is very
impressive, with us on a tiny particle that whirls around the sun. That’s one
sun among a hundred thousand million suns in this galaxy, itself among a
billion galaxies. And again, he learns about the close biological relationship
of man to the animals and of one form of life to another and that man is a
latecomer in a long and vast, evolving drama. Can the rest be just a
scaffolding for His creation? And yet again there are the atoms, of which all
appears to be constructed following immutable laws. Nothing can escape it. The
stars are made of the same stuff, the animals are made of the same stuff—but in
some such complexity as to mysteriously appear alive.
It
is a great adventure to contemplate the universe, beyond man, to contemplate
what it would be like without man, as it was in a great part of its long
history and as it is in a great majority of places. When this objective view is
finally attained, and the mystery and majesty of matter are fully appreciated,
to then turn the objective eye back on man viewed as matter, to view life as
part of this universal mystery of greatest depth, is to sense an experience
which is very rare, and very exciting. It usually ends in laughter and a
delight in the futility of trying to understand what this atom in the universe
is, this thing—atoms with curiosity—that looks at itself and wonders why it
wonders. Well, these scientific views end in awe and mystery, lost at the edge
in uncertainty, but they appear to be so deep and so impressive that the theory
that it is all arranged as a stage for God to watch man’s struggle for good and
evil seems inadequate.
Some
will tell me that I have just described a religious experience. Very well, you
may call it what you will. Then, in that language I would say that the young
man’s religious experience is of such a kind that he finds the religion of his
church inadequate to describe, to encompass that kind of experience. The God of
the church isn’t big enough.
Perhaps.
Everyone has different opinions. Suppose, however, our student does come to the
view that individual prayer is not heard. I am not trying to disprove the
existence of God. I am only trying to give you some understanding of the origin
of the difficulties that people have who are educated from two different points
of view. It is not possible to disprove the existence of God, as far as I know.
But is true that it is difficult to take two different points of view that come
from different directions. So let us suppose that this particular student is
particularly difficult and does come to the conclusion that individual prayer
is not heard. Then what happens? Then the doubting machinery, his doubts, are
turned on ethical problems. Because, as he was educated, his religious views
had it that the ethical and moral values were the word of God. Now if God maybe
isn’t there, maybe the ethical and moral values are wrong. And what is very
inter- esting is that they have survived almost intact. There may have been a
period when a few of the moral views and the ethical positions of his religion
seemed wrong, he had to think about them, and many of them he returned to.
But
my atheistic scientific colleagues, which does not include all scientists—I
cannot tell by their behavior, because of course I am on the same side, that
they are particularly different from the religious ones, and it seems that
their moral feelings and their understandings of other people and their
humanity and so on apply to the believers as well as the disbelievers. It seems
to me that there is a kind of independence between the ethical and moral views
and the theory of the machinery of the universe.
Science
makes, indeed, an impact on many ideas associated with religion, but I do not
believe it affects, in any very strong way, the moral conduct and ethical
views. Religion has many aspects. It answers all kinds of questions. I would,
however, like to emphasize three aspects.
The
first is that it tells what things are and where they came from and what man is
and what God is and what properties God has and so on. I’d like, for the
purposes of this discussion, to call those the metaphysical aspects of
religion.
And
then it says how to behave. I don’t mean in the terms of ceremonies or rituals
or things like that, but I mean how to behave in general, in a moral way. This
we could call the ethical aspect of religion.
And
finally, people are weak. It takes more than the right conscience to produce
right behavior. And even though you may feel you know what you are supposed to
do, you all know that you don’t do things the way you would like yourself to do
them. And one of the powerful aspects of religion is its inspirational aspects.
Religion gives inspiration to act well. Not only that, it gives inspiration to
the arts and to many other activities of human beings.
Now
these three aspects of religion are very closely interconnected, in the
religion’s view. First of all, it usually goes something like this: that the
moral values are the word of God. Being the word of God connects the ethical
and metaphysical aspects of religion. And finally, that also inspires the
inspiration, because if you are working for God and obeying God’s will, you are
in some way connected to the universe, your actions have a meaning in the
greater world, and that is an inspiring aspect. So these three aspects are very
well integrated and interconnected. The difficulty is that science occasionally
conflicts with the first two categories, that is with the ethical and with the
metaphysical aspects of religion.
There
was a big struggle when it was discovered that the earth rotates on its axis
and goes around the sun. It was not supposed to be the case according to the
religion of the time. There was a terrible argument and the outcome was, in
that case, that religion retreated from the position that the earth stood at
the center of the universe. But at the end of the retreat there was no change
in the moral viewpoint of the religion. There was another tremendous argument
when it was found likely that man descended from the animals. Most religions
have retreated once again from the metaphysical position that it wasn’t true.
The result is no particular change in the moral view. You see that the earth
moves around the sun, yes, then does that tell us whether it is or is not good
to turn the other cheek? It is this conflict associated with these metaphysical
aspects that is doubly difficult because the facts conflict. Not only the
facts, but the spirits conflict. Not only are there difficulties about whether
the sun does or doesn’t rotate around the earth, but the spirit or attitude
toward the facts is also different in religion from what it is in science. The
uncertainty that is necessary in order to appreciate nature is not easily
correlated with the feeling of certainty in faith, which is usually associated
with deep religious belief. I do not believe that the scientist can have that
same certainty of faith that very deeply religious people have. Perhaps they
can. I don’t know. I think that it is difficult. But anyhow it seems that the
metaphysical aspects of religion have nothing to do with the ethical values,
that the moral values seem somehow to be outside of the scientific realm. All
these conflicts don’t seem to affect the ethical value.
I
just said that ethical values lie outside the scientific realm. I have to
defend that, because many people think the other way. They think that
scientifically we should get some conclusions about moral values.
I
have several reasons for that. You see, if you don’t have a good reason, you
have to have several reasons, so I have four reasons to think that moral values
lie outside the scientific realm. First, in the past there were conflicts. The
metaphysical positions have changed, and there have been practically no effects
on the ethical views. So there must be a hint that there is an independence.
Second,
I already pointed out that, I think at least, there are good men who practice
Christian ethics and don’t believe in the divinity of Christ. Incidentally, I
forgot to say earlier that I take a provincial view of religion. I know that
there are many people here who have religions that are not Western religions.
But in a subject as broad as this it is better to take a special example, and
you have to just translate to see how it looks if you are an Arab or a
Buddhist, or whatever.
The
third thing is that, as far as I know in the gathering of scientific evidence,
there doesn’t seem to be anywhere, anything that says whether the Golden Rule
is a good one or not. I don’t have any evidence of it on the basis of
scientific study.
And
finally I would like to make a little philosophical argument—this I’m not very
good at, but I would like to make a little philosophical argument to explain
why theoretically I think that science and moral questions are independent. The
common human problem, the big question, always is “Should I do this?” It is a
question of action. “What should I do? Should I do this?” And how can we answer
such a question? We can divide it into two parts. We can say, “If I do this
what will happen?” That doesn’t tell me whether I should do this. We still have
another part, which is “Well, do I want that to happen?” In other words, the
first question—”If I do this what will happen?”—is at least susceptible to
scientific investigation; in fact, it is a typical scientific question. It
doesn’t mean we know what will happen. Far from it. We never know what is going
to happen. The science is very rudimentary. But, at least it is in the realm of
science we have a method to deal with it. The method is “Try it and see”—we
talked about that—and accumulate the information and so on. And so the question
“If I do it what will happen?” is a typically scientific question. But the
question “Do I want this to happen”—in the ultimate moment—is not. Well, you
say, if I do this, I see that everybody is killed, and, of course, I don’t want
that. Well, how do you know you don’t want people killed? You see, at the end
you must have some ultimate judgment.
You
could take a different example. You could say, for instance, “If I follow this
economic policy, I see there is going to be a depression, and, of course, I
don’t want a depression.” Wait. You see, only knowing that it is a depression
doesn’t tell you that you do not want it. You have then to judge whether the
feelings of power you would get from this, whether the importance of the
country moving in this direction is better than the cost to the people who are
suffering. Or maybe there would be some sufferers and not others. And so there
must at the end be some ultimate judgment somewhere along the line as to what
is valuable, whether people are valuable, whether life is valuable. Deep in the
end—you may follow the argument of what will happen further and further
along—but ultimately you have to decide “Yeah, I want that” or “No, I don’t.”
And the judgment there is of a different nature. I do not see how by knowing
what will happen alone it is possible to know if ultimately you want the last
of the things. I believe, therefore, that it is impossible to decide moral
questions by the scientific technique, and that the two things are independent.
Now
the inspirational aspect, the third aspect of religion, is what I would like to
turn to, and that brings me to a central question that I would like to ask you
all, because I have no idea of the answer. The source of inspiration today, the
source of strength and comfort in any religion, is closely knit with the
metaphysical aspects. That is, the inspiration comes from working for God, from
obeying His will, and so on. Now an emotional tie expressed in this manner, the
strong feeling that you are doing right, is weakened when the slightest amount
of doubt is expressed as to the existence of God. So when a belief in God is
uncertain, this particular method of obtaining inspiration fails. I don’t know
the answer to this problem, the problem of maintaining the real value of
religion as a source of strength and of courage to most men while at the same
time not requiring an absolute faith in the metaphysical system. You may think
that it might be possible to invent a metaphysical system for religion which
will state things in such a way that science will never find itself in
disagreement. But I do not think that it is possible to take an adventurous and
ever-expanding science that is going into an unknown, and to tell the answer to
questions ahead of time and not expect that sooner or later, no matter what you
do, you will find that some answers of this kind are wrong. So I do not think
that it is possible to not get into a conflict if you require an absolute faith
in metaphysical aspects, and at the same time I don’t understand how to
maintain the real value of religion for inspiration if we have some doubt as to
that. That’s a serious problem.
Western
civilization, it seems to me, stands by two great heritages. One is the
scientific spirit of adventure— the adventure into the unknown, an unknown that
must be recognized as unknown in order to be explored, the demand that the
unanswerable mysteries of the universe remain unanswered, the attitude that all
is uncertain. To summarize it: humility of the intellect.
The
other great heritage is Christian ethics—the basis of action on love, the
brotherhood of all men, the value of the individual, the humility of the
spirit. These two heritages are logically, thoroughly consistent. But logic is
not all. One needs one’s heart to follow an idea. If people are going back to
religion, what are they going back to? Is the modern church a place to give
comfort to a man who doubts God? More, one who disbelieves in God? Is the
modern church the place to give comfort and encouragement to the value of such
doubts? So far, haven’t we drawn strength and comfort to maintain the one or
the other of these consistent heritages in a way which attacks the values of
the other? Is this unavoidable? How can we draw inspiration to support these
two pillars of Western civilization so that they may stand together in full
vigor, mutually unafraid? That, I don’t know. But that, I think, is the best I
can do on the relationship of science and religion, the religion which has been
in the past and still is, therefore, a source of moral code as well as
inspiration to follow that code.
Today
we find, as always, a conflict between nations, in particular a conflict
between the two great sides, Russia and the United States. I insist that we are
uncertain of our moral views. Different people have different ideas of what is
right and wrong. If we are uncertain of our ideas of what is right and wrong,
how can we choose in this conflict? Where is the conflict? With economic
capitalism versus government control of economics, is it absolutely clear and
perfectly important which side is right? We must remain uncertain. We may be
pretty sure that capitalism is better than government control, but we have our
own government controls. We have 52 percent; that is the corporate income tax
control.
There
are arguments between religion on the one hand, usually meant to represent our
country, and atheism on the other hand, supposed to represent the Russians. Two
points of view—they are only two points of view—no way to decide. There is a
problem of human values, or the value of the state, the question of how to deal
with crimes against the state—different points of view—we can only be
uncertain. Do we have a real conflict? There is perhaps some progress of
dictatorial government toward the confusion of democracy and the confusion of
democracy toward somewhat more dictatorial government. Uncertainty apparently
means no conflict. How nice. But I don’t believe it. I think there is a
definite conflict. I think that Russia represents danger in saying that the
solution to human problems is known, that all effort should be for the state,
for that means there is no novelty. The human machine is not allowed to develop
its potentialities, its surprises, its varieties, its new solutions for
difficult problems, its new points of view.
The
government of the United States was developed under the idea that nobody knew
how to make a government, or how to govern. The result is to invent a system to
govern when you don’t know how. And the way to arrange it is to permit a
system, like we have, wherein new ideas can be developed and tried out and
thrown away. The writers of the Constitution knew of the value of doubt. In the
age that they lived, for instance, science had already developed far enough to
show the possibilities and potentialities that are the result of having
uncertainty, the value of having the openness of possibility. The fact that you
are not sure means that it is possible that there is another way some day. That
openness of possibility is an opportunity. Doubt and discussion are essential
to progress. The United States government, in that respect, is new, it’s
modern, and it is scientific. It is all messed up, too. Senators sell their
votes for a dam in their state and discussions get all excited and lobbying
replaces the minority’s chance to represent itself, and so forth. The
government of the United States is not very good, but it, with the possible
exception the government of England, is the greatest government on the earth
today, is the most satisfactory, the most modern, but not very good.
Russia
is a backward country. Oh, it is technologically advanced. I described the
difference between what I like to call the science and technology. It does not
apparently seem, unfortunately, that engineering and technological development
are not consistent with suppressed new opinion. It appears, at least in the
days of Hitler, where no new science was developed, nevertheless rockets were
made, and rockets also can be made in Russia. I am sorry to hear that, but it
is true that technological development, the applications of science, can go on
without the freedom. Russia is backward because it has not learned that there
is a limit to government power. The great discovery of the Anglo-Saxons is—they
are not the only people who thought of it, but, to take the later history of
the long struggle of the idea—that there can be a limit to government power.
There is no free criticism of ideas in Russia. You say, “Yes, they discuss
anti-Stalinism.” Only in a definite form. Only to a definite extent. We should
take advantage of this. Why don’t we discuss anti-Stalinism too? Why don’t we
point out all the troubles we had with that gentleman? Why don’t we point out
the dangers that there are in a government that can have such a thing grow
inside itself? Why don’t we point out the analogies between the Stalinism that
is being criticized inside of Russia and the behavior that is going on at the very
same moment inside Russia? Well, all right, all right…
Now,
I get excited, see.… It’s only emotion. I shouldn’t do that, because we should
do this more scientifically. I won’t convince you very well unless I make
believe that it is a completely rational, unprejudiced scientific argument.
I
only have a little experience in those countries. I visited Poland, and I found
something interesting. The Polish people, of course, are freedom-loving people,
and they are under the influence of the Russians. They can’t publish what they
want, but at the time when I was there, which was a year ago, they could say
what they wanted, strangely enough, but not publish anything. And so we would
have very lively discussions in public places on all sides of various questions.
The most striking thing to remember about Poland, by the way, is that they have
had an experience with Germany which is so deep and so frightening and so
horrible that they cannot possibly forget it. And, therefore, all of their
attitudes in foreign affairs have to do with a fear of the resurgence of
Germany. And I thought while I was there of the terrible crime that would be
the result of a policy on the part of the free countries which would permit
once again the development of that kind of a thing in that country. Therefore,
they accept Russia. Therefore, they explained to me, you see, the Russians
definitely are holding down the East Germans. There is no way that the East
Germans are going to have any Nazis. And there is no question that the Russians
can control them. And so at least there is that buffer. And the thing that
struck me as odd was that they didn’t realize that one country can protect
another country, and guarantee it, without dominating it completely, without
living there.
The
other thing they told me was very often, different individuals would call me
aside and say that we would be surprised to find that, if Poland did get free
of Russia and had their own government and were free, they would go along more
or less the way they are going. I said, “What do you mean? I am surprised. You
mean you wouldn’t have freedom of speech.” “Oh, no, we would have all the
freedoms. We would love the freedoms, but we would have nationalized industries
and so on. We believe in the socialistic ideas.” I was surprised because I
don’t understand the problem that way. I don’t think of the problem as between
socialism and capitalism but rather between suppression of ideas and free
ideas. If it is that free ideas and socialism are better than communism, it
will work its way through. And it will be better for everybody. And if
capitalism is better than socialism, it will work its way through. We have got
52 percent…
well…
The
fact that Russia is not free is clear to everyone, and the consequences in the
sciences are quite obvious. One of the best examples is Lysenko, who has a
theory of genetics, which is that acquired characteristics can be passed on to
the offspring. This is probably true. The great majority, however, of genetic
influences are undoubtedly of a different kind, and they are carried by the
germ plasm. There are undoubtedly a few examples, a few small examples already
known, in which some kind of a characteristic is carried to the next generation
by direct, what we like to call cytoplasmic, inheritance. But the main point is
that the major part of genetic behavior is in a different manner than Lysenko
thinks. So he has spoiled Russia. The great Mendel, who discovered the laws of
genetics, and the beginnings of the science, is dead. Only in the Western countries
can it be continued, because they are not free in Russia to analyze these
things. They have to discuss and argue against us all the time. And the result
is interesting. Not only in this case has it stopped the science of biology,
which, by the way, is the most active, most exciting, and most rapidly
developing science today in the West. In Russia it is doing nothing. At the
same time you would think that from an economic standpoint such a thing is
impossible. But nevertheless by having the incorrect theories of inheritance
and genetics, the biology of the agriculture of Russia is behind. They don’t
develop the hybrid corn right. They don’t know how to develop better brands of
potatoes. They used to know. They had the greatest potato tuber collections and
so on in Russia before Lysenko than anywhere in the world. But today they have
nothing of this kind. They only argue with the West.
In
physics there was a time when there was trouble. In recent times there has been
a great freedom for the physicist. Not a hundred percent freedom; there are
different schools of thought which argue with each other. They were all in a
meeting in Poland. And the Polish Intourist, the analogue of Intourist in
Poland, which is call Polorbis, arranged a trip. And of course, there was only
a limited number of rooms, and they made the mistake of putting Russians in the
same room. They came down and they screamed, “For seventeen years I have never
talked to that man, and I will not be in the same room with him.”
There
are two schools of physics. And there are the good guys and the bad guys, and
it’s perfectly obvious, and it’s very interesting. And there are great
physicists in Russia, but physics is developing much more rapidly in the West,
and although it looked for a while like something good would happen there, it
hasn’t.
Now
this doesn’t mean that technology is not developing or that they are in some
way backward that way, but I’m trying to show that in a country of this kind
the development of ideas is doomed.
You
have read about the recent phenomenon in modern art. When I was in Poland there
was modern art hung in little corners in back streets. And there was the
beginning of modern art in Russia. I don’t know what the value of modern art
is. I mean either way. But Mr. Khrushchev visited such a place, and Mr.
Khrushchev decided that it looked as if this painting were painted by the tail
of a jackass. My comment is, he should know.
To
make the thing still more real I give you the example of a Mr. Nakhrosov who traveled
in the United States and in Italy and went home and wrote what he saw. He was
castigated for, I quote the castigator, “A 50-50 approach, for bourgeois
objectivism.” Is this a scientific country? Where did we ever get the idea that
the Russians were, in some sense, scientific? Because in the early days of
their revolution they had different ideas than they have now? But it is not
scientific to not adopt a 50-50 approach—that is, to not understand what there
is in the world in order to modify things; that is, to be blind in order to
maintain ignorance.
I
cannot help going on with this criticism of Mr. Nakhrosov and to tell you more
about it. It was made by a man whose name is Padgovney, who is the first
secretary of the Ukranian Communist Party. He said, “You told us here… (He was
at a meeting at which the other man had just spoken, but nobody knows what he
said, because it wasn’t published. But the criticism was published.) You told
us here you would only write the truth, the great truth, the real truth, for
which you fought in the trenches of Stalingrad. That would be fine. We all
advise you to write that way. (I hope he does.) Your speech, and the ideas you
continue to support smack of petty bourgeois anarchy. This the party and people
cannot and will not tolerate. You, Comrade Nakhrosov, had better think this
over very seriously.” How can the poor man think it over seriously? How can
anyone think seriously about being a petty bourgeois anarchist? Can you picture
an old anarchist who is a bourgeois also? And at the same time petty? The whole
thing is absurd. Therefore, I hope that we can all maintain laughter and
ridicule for the people like Mr. Padgovney, and at the same time try to
communicate in some way to Mr. Nakhrosov that we admire and respect his
courage, because we are here only at the very beginning of time for the human
race. There are thousands of years in the past, and there is an unknown amount
of time in the future. There are all kinds of opportunities, and there are all
kinds of dangers. Man has been stopped before by stopping his ideas. Man has
been jammed for long periods of time. We will not tolerate this. I hope for
freedom for future generations—freedom to doubt, to develop, to continue the
adventure of finding out new ways of doing things, of solving problems.
Why
do we grapple with problems? We are only in the beginning. We have plenty of
time to solve the problems. The only way that we will make a mistake is that in
the impetuous youth of humanity we will decide we know the answer. This is it.
No one else can think of anything else. And we will jam. We will confine man to
the limited imagination of today’s human beings.
We
are not so smart. We are dumb. We are ignorant. We must maintain an open
channel. I believe in limited government. I believe that government should be
limited in many ways, and what I am going to emphasize is only an intellectual
thing. I don’t want to talk about everything at the same time. Let’s take a
small piece, an intellectual thing.
No
government has the right to decide on the truth of scientific principles, nor
to prescribe in any way the character of the questions investigated. Neither
may a government determine the aesthetic value of artistic creations, nor limit
the forms of literary or artistic expression. Nor should it pronounce on the
validity of economic, historic, religious, or philosophical doctrines. Instead
it has a duty to its citizens to maintain the freedom, to let those citizens
contribute to the further adventure and the development of the human race.
Thank you.