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Higher Superstition: The Academic Left and Its Quarrel with Science by Paul R. Gross and Norman Levitt, Johns Hopkins University Press, pp 314, $25.95

Here we have a polemic against ‘the academic left’, or at least those who mount ‘postmodernist’ critiques of science. The polemic is directed against diverse targets. They include cultural constructivists who analyse how science embodies social biases; feminists who attack science for imposing patriarchal domination; and environmentalists who implicate science in technological threats to nature’s fragile equilibriums.

In their response, Paul Gross and Norman Levitt do not simply reiterate the pretence that science is value-free; they acknowledge that it may well be influenced by culture and politics. They insist, however, that a detailed knowledge of science is a prerequisite for making valid criticism, and that the postmodern critics simply substitute a ‘moral one-upmanship’ for the necessary professional competence. In particular, Gross and Levitt resent the claim that the methods of critical social theory ‘are equal in epistemic power to those of science’.

In the authors’ view, the general public lacks the scientific knowledge needed to take part in science-related political debate. Moreover, what they characterise as the academic left reinforces such popular ignorance and disenfranchisement. In this way, Gross and Levitt blame the postmodernist critics for perpetuating the political impotence of oppressed people, who become ‘ironic victims’ of their would-be champions.

Taking the moral high ground, Gross and Levitt ask, ‘How do we demo-cratise scientific and technological decision making?’ Their remedy is to ‘educate the great mass of citizens so that thinking accurately about science is possible’. This simple answer reveals their own ideological commitments on at least two counts. First, they imply that the value-laden character of science cannot be debated meaningfully by anyone lacking a formal science education. Secondly, they ignore the capacity of people who are not scientists to engage critically with scientific artefacts and processes, such as automation, medicine or chemical hazards. Indeed, they forget that conflicts between the scientists and technologists and lay people have often forced changes in the experts’ own world view.

Such everyday experiences provide a common reference point for various ‘post-modern’ critiques, whatever their faults. By contrast, Gross and Levitt reassert ‘the fundamental methodology’ of science; they assume that some neutral universal method can offer privileged access to higher truths. What lies behind this fervent belief?

Les Levidow is researching the safety regulation of biotechnology at the Open University.