256 17 JANUARY 2020 • VOL 367 ISSUE 6475 sciencemag.org SCIENCEPHOTO: ISTOCK.COM/MLENNYC
an science save humanity? In the
face of runaway climate change and
massive species extinction, some say
that we already know all we need to
know to fix these problems: Further
research is a distraction and what we
need now is action. Others anticipate a feat
of technical ingenuity that will catapult us
out of our current crisis. In their view, the
“Anthropos” of the Anthropocene is well
on the way to mastering the Earth system.
A middle ground between these positions
hardly seems to exist.
Into this fray comes Jürgen Renn, a
polymath historian of science, whose re-
search has careened from
ancient Chinese mechanics to
Einstein’s theory of gravita-
tion to contemporary energy
systems. What links these
projects is Renn’s fascination
with the dynamics by which
science changes and changes
hands. His new tour de force,
The Evolution of Knowledge,
addresses all those concerned
with science’s fate.
Renn argues that the cri-
sis of the Anthropocene is
indeed a problem of knowl-
edge, but he sharply distin-
guishes himself from those
hunting for a technical fix.
Knowledge, for Renn, is a
broad and varied concept,
with crucial experiential and
ethical dimensions. Modern
science, although uniquely
efficacious, is just one facet
of the evolution of human knowledge. Un-
derstanding this evolutionary process, he
argues, is the key to reorienting science for
the Anthropocene.
Taking a cue from biologists, Renn
thinks of knowledge as an adaptive sys-
tem, one that gradually transforms the
material and cultural conditions of its own
existence. Knowledge evolves through a
slow, piecemeal process akin to ecologicalHISTORY OF SCIENCEBy Deborah R. Coen succession. If we want to guide the future
evolution of science, we had better get fa-
miliar with its past.
Renn’s history of knowledge is alternately
triumphant and tragic. On the bright side,
he traces the development of techniques
of representation that have increasingly
allowed for reflective engagement with
knowledge-making. His foremost example
is the internet. With the proper oversight,
he proposes, the internet has the poten-
tial to “optimize the current knowledge
economy toward a global coproduction of
knowledge,” building new connections be-
tween local stores of knowledge and new
opportunities to put knowledge into ac-
tion. What’s more, science has evolved un-precedented power to reshape the “cultural
abstractions” that govern human behav-
ior—as, for instance, in the idea of an eco-
logical footprint.
Yet this history of modern science is also
a story of loss. Market forces have distorted
science’s ambitions, diverting it from the
humanitarian aims of earlier centuries. The
globalization of science has suppressed lo-
cal forms of knowledge and alienated non-
expert populations. Renn thus returns to
the past in part to remind readers of the
value of natural knowledge produced in
other eras, by a panoply of human cultures,
even by nonliterate societies.One example of the insights to be drawn
from Renn’s historical case studies can be
found in his retelling of the encounter be-
tween Jesuit and Chinese astronomers in
the early 17th century. The Chinese adopted
Copernican astronomy for the purpose of
reforming official calendars, but they had
no intention of allowing it to mingle with
their religious views. Renn observes that
this episode juxtaposes a remarkably stable
intellectual tradition, that of the Ming dy-
nasty, with one undergoing rapid change,
as Europeans jettisoned medieval scho-
lasticism in favor of rationalism and em-
piricism. The critical difference, he argues,
was the tight relationship between natural
knowledge and religion in the European
scholastic tradition.
That observation brings us
to one of Renn’s most pro-
vocative proposals. He argues
that modern science, rather
than striving to be value-free,
should embrace ethical proj-
ects of the sort usually associ-
ated with religion. Fully aware
of the atrocities that could
result from turning science
into a religion, he nonetheless
proposes that we “seek out
the eschatological dimensions
of science itself and cultivate
its role as a guide in a fragile
world whose future depends
on it.”
Ours is hardly the first era
to witness calls for a whole-
sale reform of natural knowl-
edge. From Francis Bacon in
the 17th century to Vannevar
Bush in the 20th, modern sci-
ence has had its fair share of visionary re-
formers. In this respect, Renn might best
be compared to the philosopher Edmund
Husserl (1859–1938). In the 1930s, at a mo-
ment of existential crisis comparable to to-
day’s, Husserl likewise sought to reorient
science around shared human experiences
and common human needs. Yet Husserl, a
notoriously opaque writer, had little hope
of communicating his message to the sci-
entific community. With this lucid and ac-
cessible book, Renn stands a far greater
chance of success. j10.1126/science.aba1244The reviewer is chair of the Program in the History of Science
and Medicine, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520, USA,
and the author of Climate in Motion: Science, Empire,
and the Problem of Scale (University of Chicago Press, 2018).
Email: [email protected]Knowledge in the Anthropocene
To save society, science should embrace ethical projects
The Evolution of Knowledge:
Rethinking Science
for the Anthropocene
Jürgen Renn
Princeton University Press,- 579 pp.
INSIGHTS | BOOKSCulture can be socially
transmitted via interactions
with the environment, as
exemplified on Easter Island.Published by AAAS