Modernity as Autonomy

Autonomy is certainly a desirable value and a key concept in modern thought, par­ticularly in Immanuel Kant. Nevertheless it could turn into a “slippery” concept if autonomy is constituted as a prime and absolute value and not compensated by the necessary connections with other desirable values.

In II bene, il male e la scienza (1992) Evandro Agazzi underlines that the pas­sage from the Middle Ages to Modernity was characterized by a series of demands of autonomy on behalf of different intellectual and practical domains, starting with demands set to theology, which tended to occupy, so to speak, the top of the pyra­mid of knowledge. It is historically true that the autonomous exercise of reason in philosophy had already been claimed in the 13 th century by the theologian and philosopher Thomas Aquinas. In his Summa Theologiae (1, q.1, a.2), he stressed that it was necessary to remain in line with the “natural light of the intellect” for solving prevailingly philosophical matters. The autonomy of natural science was further claimed by Galileo, whose intellectual and personal adventure may be interpreted as a search for the autonomy of science, rather than a clash between science and religion. Machiavelli, in turn, sustained the autonomy of political sci­ence and inspired British liberal scholars, who widened this principle to the eco­nomic domain, likewise did Kant and the romantics as referred to art.

As in many other areas of knowledge, Kant brought this journey into auton­omy to a critical point. Kant himself, moreover, argued clearly for the autonomy between the three parts of the sphere of knowledge: science, morality and arts. Actually, he dedicated each one of his three great Critiques to each one of these parts. According to Kant’s intention, each of these three domains counts with independent objectives and values, and each with a specific argumentative style.

In a first sense, certainly the most basic, we could interpret autonomy as inde­pendence of judgement. In this sense, each field may judge on the basis of its own criteria and values. So, for example, a work of art may be valued positively in the light of merely aesthetic criteria and, at the same time, negatively concerning its political repercussions. A scientific research project may result excellent on the basis of scientific criteria and values, but at the same time, economically or ethi­cally unsustainable.

In a more ambitious sense, instead, we may intend autonomy not only with ref­erence to evaluation, but also referred to action. In this way, to remain with the previous example, both the artist and the scientist will be able to act independently inside their own operative area without considering the exterior criteria of politi­cal, economic or moral character.

A third and more radical interpretation of autonomy implies the total absence of external controls limiting, for example, scientific activities. As Agazzi (1992: 13) points out, the acceptance of the first level of autonomy “does not imply that of the second, as also the second level does not include the third”.

We note, first of all, a parallelism between the demand for autonomy coming from different areas of knowledge and the search for autonomy in the political and social fields. A good example could be the origin of nations, and the healthy tendency to the internal separation of powers. The aspiration to autonomy in the political sphere was not actually experimented as a simple fact, but as a just demand. The same may be said on the intellectual level, for which the freedom of philosophical, scientific and artistic productive thought was perceived as a desir­able good and as a sure form of human progress. Following in this example, the autonomy of nations and that of the powers of the State depended on an extremely delicate balance of forces and on the will of reciprocal respect.

In the intellectual sphere, the scientific vision of the world and the rationality of technological efficiency tried to rule and colonize the life world (Lebenswelt).^[174] Such subjugation arose in the wake of the thought of Descartes and Bacon and of Newton’s physics, and found an enabling atmosphere in the illuminist and positiv­ist mentality. We note, therefore, that an autonomy, which is fair at the beginning, can degenerate first in autarchy and then in new hierarchical impositions, both in the scientific and in the political field. In fact Agazzi writes:

Today the tendency to discuss over again these different points is clearly evident [...] operating a critical revision of the concept of autonomy, without, after all, letting us get involved in forms of obscurantism, retrograde involution or negation of the positive aspects certainly contained in the declarations of autonomy and liberty that we have con­sidered (1992: 13).

We, as postmodern, maintain the advantage of a more profound historical perspec­tive. We also have, thanks to this very advantage, the obligation to be fair in our balances. Neither the ideology of scientism and technologism, with its tendency to the hierarchical dominion of techno-science, nor the anti-scientific and anti-techno­logical attitudes, which deny autonomy to techno-science, are satisfactory from our point of view. We know also that the enterprise to make life more scientific and technical has made at the same time dreams come true and generated new monsters.

The spreading in all directions of the techno-scientific domains, on the other hand, has not always brought positive results to human life and to the lives of the other habitants of the world. If, on one side, we have assisted to a growth of knowledge and wellbeing, on the other, we have also favoured the end of certain values and different traditions, we have triggered pain and suffering. The 20th cen­tury is the proof of how the most brutal totalitarian intentions have fed themselves with the most advanced scientific means to produce suffering and destruction. So, the century that met undeniable progress, like the improvement of anaesthesia and antibiotics, also saw the development of the most efficient techniques to produce death and destruction. It would be naive or dishonest to give the fault to techno­science, though we must recognize, in any case, that similar results would not have been possible without its contribution. Should we wish to draft a temporary con­clusion, we could say that it would not be reasonable to put at the helm of human life only techno-science. Likewise, we cannot consider it totally self-sufficient, as it must be inserted in a net of limits, counterweights and pondered controls, with­out cancelling its legitimate margin of autonomy.

If we accept that decisions in science may be good or bad, as they may be rational or irrational, we affirm—or we suppose implicitly—that the criteria of goodness and rationality are independent from science, and we place ourselves outside of scientism. We recognize that the identification of human reason with the sole scientific method, and the plain correspondence between techno-scientific progress and human development are naive and misleading.

To sum it up: the ancient and the medieval world have pursued a hierarchical type of order. The modern world instead has been fascinated by the idea of auton­omy, mostly brought to the extremes in terms of autarchy, so imposing at times new hierarchies. It therefore appears that today’s world must find a different and more harmonic balance, with the just weight given to relations and horizontal con­nections amongst science, morality, art and other various areas of human life.

Both closed hierarchy and autarchy, are terms full of constraints and dangers, and find reciprocal nourishment and support. Today we are trying to balance these two opposite tendencies, trying to find a more efficient mediation, a form of connection between different areas of human life, each one with its own values, interests and criteria. This is, without a doubt, one of the main challenges of post­modernity, if not actually the main one of our time.

A prove of what I am saying is the constant presence in today’s debate of terms like dependence, conciliation (of family life and work), solidarity, dialogue, links, web, net, globalization, European community, globalization, etc., all of them tend­ing to compensate excesses in matter of autonomy (Marcos 2012). In my opinion, one of the most promising suggestions for reaching the longed balance is certainly the new theorisation of the systemic approach elaborated by Agazzi.

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